4 ms·

Pretty much every country that tried to tax wealth had to back up exactly because of wealthy and capital flight. > local competitors will immediately spring up

• naasking 4y ago
  > Pretty much every country that tried to tax wealth had to back up exactly because of wealthy and capital flight. No, mainly because of the risk of capital flight. > It's exactly this kind of people that you will alienate and drive away with these of wealth-hostile policies. I disagree. If a good or service is truly valuable, someone will provide it. The value of an unmet need will increase until it becomes attractive, and if it never meets that bar, then by definition it wasn't valuable enough. The only exceptions are goods or services that capitalism isn't effective at solving anyway, either because they are common goods that capitalism would exploit to exhaustion, or because they would yield only natural monopolies that are rife with abuse. A state-run corporation is a good option here, and wealth flight isn't an issue.
  • nickpp 4y ago
    I lived in a country lacking capital (first because it was robbed by communists and then due to the risk of the transition managed by a deeply corrupt political elite) and I can tell you existing demand was only met through imports. It sucked for everybody - without local capital the entrepreneurship was very limited, jobs remained scarce, specialists emigrated and the trade deficit became unmanageable. In the end multinational corporations slowly entered and bought various state-granted monopolies (the only real monopoly entrepreneurship can't solve) on the cheap. But that tiny capital started a snowball effect that eventually raised the living standard to unhoped-for levels. Now we have both billionaires and a wealthy middle-class. It took a long time though. Careful what you wish for - a country without successful entrepreneurs and local capital(ists) is an easy prey on the international markets.
• lwhi 4y ago
  > Pretty much every country that tried to tax wealth had to back up exactly because of wealthy and capital flight. Which brings the need for inter governmental regulation.
  • nickpp 4y ago
    Good luck with that! The most authoritarianists have ever managed to do was make it illegal for people to leave their inhuman regime: guns on borders, pointing inside. Not surprisingly, those countries were quickly outcompeted by free countries.
    • lwhi 4y ago
      It's exactly what has happened / is happening in Europe.
      • nickpp 4y ago
        Europe is divided between countries deeply infiltrated by Russia and countries who can’t wait to escape and write their own futures. UK, Poland, Hungary will welcome fleeing capital. Brexit wasn’t the last exit. With its anti-business attitude, tiny high-tech industry and lacking innovation and creativity, Europe’s importance in the world is vanishing fast. The future is in Asia and Eastern Europe. And US, of course.
        • lwhi 4y ago
          I completely disagree.