5 ms·

More reasons for a 90% top marginal tax rate

by hownottowrite 4y ago

nivenkos 4y ago
Tax wealth, not income.
- choko 4y ago
  Tax transactions, not income or wealth.
- pavlov 4y ago
  More specifically, tax inheritances. Dynasties are detrimental.
  - oifjsidjf 4y ago
    I wonder what you will say when you will be forced to pay 90% tax on all of the inheritance. Want to keep your parents house? Pay 90% of it's value to the government or the government takes it. Parents will do anything for the children to have a better life, this is a basic human drive that you cannot go against.
    - neverminder 4y ago
      Progressive taxes. Heavily tax those who inherit millions and billions.
    - awinder 4y ago
      In a lot of ways, the extreme wealthy providing that better life deprives the majority of providing their kids a better life. The state could fund things that meaningfully improve the lives of many kids at the expensive of generational wealth transfer for a few. Conceivably, the kids of extreme wealthy would still have been given a massive leg up — it’s just that they would have to contribute (or eat a tax, realistically they’re still probably able to do nothing in many cases). Also it’s entirely possible to set a floor before a tax kicks in to allow some token transfer of wealth, but yeah there’s a huge difference between a moderate transfer of wealth like a (average) home and rebasing millions and millions of asset wealth, a fleet of homes, etc.
    - ben_w 4y ago
      > I wonder what you will say when you will be forced to pay 90% tax on all of the inheritance. Wouldn’t that be paid by the estate between the death of the deceased and the inheritor getting the assets? > Want to keep your parents house? Pay 90% of it's value to the government or the government takes it. My experience in the UK is the opposite problem exists in reality — the UK has inheritance tax, which my parents’ assets seem to have totally avoided, because my dad looked at the rules at made sure his assets were under the threshold by (1) giving my siblings and I a lot of gifts well before he died, and (2) turns out physical items such as the antiques (not many) and the stamp collection (how much!?!) is the kind of thing the government value (or valued past tense, IANAL) in aggregate as £1. The cunning ploy of giving away money is, practically speaking, quite difficult to solve.
    - refurb 4y ago
      This makes total sense if you ignore the fact that people won't just sit there and pay the tax, they'll likely gift it while alive through tax avoidance schemes.
    - antifa 4y ago
      If you're going to strawman, why 90%? Why not a 100% inheritance tax? Then OP would feel really silly for proposing it! Most non-strawman look like "capital gains tax after the first $1 million" or "40% excempting the first $11 million" https://taxfoundation.org/joe-biden-estate-tax-wealth-tax/ https://taxfoundation.org/joe-biden-estate-tax-wealth-tax/
      - mod 4y ago
        This is off tangent, but I wish they'd find a new thing besides dollars to measure with. Or pin it to the average income. After laws have been in effect fifty or a hundred years, the amounts don't make sense anymore, and they usually aren't updated very often. See the IRS reporting requirement still being 10k, or some old laws with really small fines
    - ameister14 4y ago
      In the US it's currently only estates larger than 11 million or so that get taxed - I'd be fine with a 90% tax rate on everything over that.
    - anonymous_sorry 4y ago
      > I wonder what you will say when you will be forced to pay 90% tax on all of the inheritance. I wonder what you say when you are forced to pay x% tax on all of your earned income every year? It only really makes sense to consider the merits of a tax in the context of other taxes it would replace. I inherited a decent amount of money last year. It was nice, and I am of course grateful. But I would definitely still vote for significantly higher taxes on unearned wealth, in exchange for better Government services and/or a reduction other taxes. Hard-working parents will still find ways to give their children advantages. They will still invest money and time in their development.
  - koheripbal 4y ago
    This is why crypto will remain.
  - SyzygistSix 4y ago
    Even many of the wealthy agree that dynasties are detrimental.
    - nobodyandproud 4y ago
      Do they really agree, or are they just paying lip service to public sentiment? I ask because it’s really difficult to tell the difference, and I’m still not sure whether I believe the ultra wealthy when they agree.
- koheripbal 4y ago
  That has been tried and it results in wealth exodus. France reversed that suicidal policy within one year.
- refurb 4y ago
  Make the upper half pay for the lower half, so hike taxes on anyone making more than $68,000USD (US household median income). Once you hit double the median income (~top 10%) you should be paying >50% in total tax rate. More than 4x median income ($275,000) should be paying 67% of income in taxes. We could fund everything with that kind of revenue.
  - SyzygistSix 4y ago
    You imagine the state could fund everything with that but it won't because we don't have the kind of voters who vote for that kind of tax policy in the first place. Or even reasonable tax policies that are more progressive than what the US has now. Thank goodness, because even the most progressive countries in the EU realize taxation at that level would be incredibly counter-productive.
    - refurb 4y ago
      Those aren’t far off from welfare-heavy EU rates. 40% marginal rate starting at 50,000GBP in the UK. The EU can afford high public spending because it has high taxes, including on the middle class.
- leetcrew 4y ago
  tax land and nonrenewable resources, not wealth.

More reasons for a 90% top marginal tax rate

nivenkos 4y ago

Tax wealth, not income.

choko 4y ago
Tax transactions, not income or wealth.
pavlov 4y ago
More specifically, tax inheritances. Dynasties are detrimental.
- oifjsidjf 4y ago
  I wonder what you will say when you will be forced to pay 90% tax on all of the inheritance. Want to keep your parents house? Pay 90% of it's value to the government or the government takes it. Parents will do anything for the children to have a better life, this is a basic human drive that you cannot go against.
  - neverminder 4y ago
    Progressive taxes. Heavily tax those who inherit millions and billions.
  - awinder 4y ago
    In a lot of ways, the extreme wealthy providing that better life deprives the majority of providing their kids a better life. The state could fund things that meaningfully improve the lives of many kids at the expensive of generational wealth transfer for a few. Conceivably, the kids of extreme wealthy would still have been given a massive leg up — it’s just that they would have to contribute (or eat a tax, realistically they’re still probably able to do nothing in many cases). Also it’s entirely possible to set a floor before a tax kicks in to allow some token transfer of wealth, but yeah there’s a huge difference between a moderate transfer of wealth like a (average) home and rebasing millions and millions of asset wealth, a fleet of homes, etc.
  - ben_w 4y ago
    > I wonder what you will say when you will be forced to pay 90% tax on all of the inheritance. Wouldn’t that be paid by the estate between the death of the deceased and the inheritor getting the assets? > Want to keep your parents house? Pay 90% of it's value to the government or the government takes it. My experience in the UK is the opposite problem exists in reality — the UK has inheritance tax, which my parents’ assets seem to have totally avoided, because my dad looked at the rules at made sure his assets were under the threshold by (1) giving my siblings and I a lot of gifts well before he died, and (2) turns out physical items such as the antiques (not many) and the stamp collection (how much!?!) is the kind of thing the government value (or valued past tense, IANAL) in aggregate as £1. The cunning ploy of giving away money is, practically speaking, quite difficult to solve.
  - refurb 4y ago
    This makes total sense if you ignore the fact that people won't just sit there and pay the tax, they'll likely gift it while alive through tax avoidance schemes.
  - antifa 4y ago
    If you're going to strawman, why 90%? Why not a 100% inheritance tax? Then OP would feel really silly for proposing it! Most non-strawman look like "capital gains tax after the first $1 million" or "40% excempting the first $11 million" https://taxfoundation.org/joe-biden-estate-tax-wealth-tax/ https://taxfoundation.org/joe-biden-estate-tax-wealth-tax/
    - mod 4y ago
      This is off tangent, but I wish they'd find a new thing besides dollars to measure with. Or pin it to the average income. After laws have been in effect fifty or a hundred years, the amounts don't make sense anymore, and they usually aren't updated very often. See the IRS reporting requirement still being 10k, or some old laws with really small fines
  - ameister14 4y ago
    In the US it's currently only estates larger than 11 million or so that get taxed - I'd be fine with a 90% tax rate on everything over that.
  - anonymous_sorry 4y ago
    > I wonder what you will say when you will be forced to pay 90% tax on all of the inheritance. I wonder what you say when you are forced to pay x% tax on all of your earned income every year? It only really makes sense to consider the merits of a tax in the context of other taxes it would replace. I inherited a decent amount of money last year. It was nice, and I am of course grateful. But I would definitely still vote for significantly higher taxes on unearned wealth, in exchange for better Government services and/or a reduction other taxes. Hard-working parents will still find ways to give their children advantages. They will still invest money and time in their development.
- koheripbal 4y ago
  This is why crypto will remain.
- SyzygistSix 4y ago
  Even many of the wealthy agree that dynasties are detrimental.
  - nobodyandproud 4y ago
    Do they really agree, or are they just paying lip service to public sentiment? I ask because it’s really difficult to tell the difference, and I’m still not sure whether I believe the ultra wealthy when they agree.
koheripbal 4y ago
That has been tried and it results in wealth exodus. France reversed that suicidal policy within one year.
refurb 4y ago
Make the upper half pay for the lower half, so hike taxes on anyone making more than $68,000USD (US household median income). Once you hit double the median income (~top 10%) you should be paying >50% in total tax rate. More than 4x median income ($275,000) should be paying 67% of income in taxes. We could fund everything with that kind of revenue.
- SyzygistSix 4y ago
  You imagine the state could fund everything with that but it won't because we don't have the kind of voters who vote for that kind of tax policy in the first place. Or even reasonable tax policies that are more progressive than what the US has now. Thank goodness, because even the most progressive countries in the EU realize taxation at that level would be incredibly counter-productive.
  - refurb 4y ago
    Those aren’t far off from welfare-heavy EU rates. 40% marginal rate starting at 50,000GBP in the UK. The EU can afford high public spending because it has high taxes, including on the middle class.
leetcrew 4y ago
tax land and nonrenewable resources, not wealth.