15 ms·

I don’t know what country you live in, but I can tell you how it is in Sweden. As a freelancer I pay appropriately 70% of what I charge in taxes. How high do yo

I don’t know what country you live in, but I can tell you how it is in Sweden. As a freelancer I pay appropriately 70% of what I charge in taxes. How high do you think taxes can get before people stop putting energy into raising their productivity?

__pache__ 4y ago
[flagged]
- cambaceres 4y ago
  I’m still a high earner so I’m fine. I still have approximately $7500/month after my taxes are paid. That’s a lot since all medical care, 1 year parental leave, my kids education from kindergarten through high school etc are “free”, e.g. paid with my taxes. My point was not to complain but to say to the guy that claims that we need a new system with more wealth distribution that those systems already exist. There are a limit though to how high you can tax someone before they stop producing.
  - __pache__ 4y ago
    That's insane salary, props to you on that
  - fbrncci 4y ago
    I was earning similarly in Europe. The moment I realized how much tax I was paying (51% bracket), I moved to Asia to work remotely. I honestly don’t care what’s being paid from my taxes, but to me that amount felt like theft. I now pay ~20% while being well above 10k after taxes.
    - satvikpendem 4y ago
      This is why comparisons between the US and Europe regarding wages are always fraught. For some people, it makes sense to pay a lot of tax for the benefits it confers. For others, like you and me it seems, it is not really worth it to pay that much tax and not really receive the rewards. But everyone who discusses conflates some people's preferences to suddenly be everyone's preferences, and this is simply not a true comparison.
  - webmobdev 4y ago
    You made a good point. But I don't think people are advocating taxing people like you but the super rich. The disparity between the few super-rich and the poor is so huge in many countries. Wealth that is not being put to use by the super-rich is money wasted. All this hoarded wealth could be put to so much good.
    - __pache__ 4y ago
      Why is it bad some people are extremely wealthy? I'm sorry but it's just true that a few people are incredible. Elon musk. Steve jobs. These people are basically worth infinity, their potential and vision is extremely useful to humanity. Sorry a few make it to the NBA, but everyone can try.
      - webmobdev 4y ago
        The problem with the super-rich is that they have more money they can spend. The not spending is the problem. Money is good for public welfare only when it is earned and spent. Investments are supposed capitalist solutions to this - to make money "work" for you. But it's a broken circular system that seems to only make the wealthier more wealthy. (It's also becoming dysfunctional with speculations). It doesn't seem to be creating an egalitarian society because people with money often have access to better opportunities. And that's a huge hurdle tomorrow for your kids trying to compete with Elon Musk's or Steve's Jobs kid who are born with wealth.
        __pache__ 4y ago
        Of course they can spend the money ... Musk risked a fortune Honestly I think you're just jealous. I started from nothing and have a few million. It's not crazy. There are like 30 million millionaires in the USA. Do you think the economy is zero sum? Elon musk _took_ money?
        webmobdev 3y ago
        > I started from nothing and have a few million. And if you need that millions throughout your lifetime, that's fine. But imagine you have so much money to spend that you don't really know how to spend it in your lifetime? That's the problem.
- vages 4y ago
  The Nordic countries are actually the easiest place in the world to earn at least 30 million dollars (or become billionaire for that case) exactly because of the welfare system: https://youtu.be/A9UmdY0E8hU https://youtu.be/A9UmdY0E8hU When you don’t have to struggle for a living, you’re more free to take risks and start your own business. Workers accept disruptive innovation and being let go, knowing that the state will help them reskill if necessary. Edit: Changed sentence from "earn a million dollars" to "30 million dollars" to reflect the actual video contents. (Mea culpa.)
  - jschveibinz 4y ago
    You know, this is the first comment I’ve ever read on government participation in the economy (socialism, if you will) that seems to make great sense to me. I would happily pay into a tax fund that was locked to educating or re-educating participants in the workforce. I like this way better than plain UBI because of the potential for increased dignity, pride and self-esteem.
    - _siis 4y ago
      You know, there's some significant issues that aren't touched on. Any statement that's all upsides no downsides poorly reflects reality over time. Or, in other words, if it sounds too good to be true it probably is. The main one being how would you pay for it? Basic accounting says the moment population growth stalls you have more outflows than inflows. You can't print money without consequence, and there are other factors that confound these issues further. Its the ideal of socialism, but the reality is you run into the economic calculation problem. Shortages happen because we live in a world of scarcity, and when they do the system collapses usually causing death (historically).
      - vages 4y ago
        The Norwegian tax system is not socialist as much as it is _georgist_: Norway taxes natural resource use (mainly extracting oil from oil fields and using waterfalls for power generation) _hard_. This tax policy makes the "more outflows than inflows" calculation a bit more complex than in most countries. The country is not immune to the effects of population decrease, but less so than others. The main threat to the Norwegian tax system today (in my opinion) is that new industries (fish farming, wind farming) are actively lobbying against georgist tax policies directed at their industries: https://slimemoldtimemold.com/2022/05/17/norway-the-once-and-future-georgist-kingdom/ https://slimemoldtimemold.com/2022/05/17/norway-the-once-and...
stefanfisk 4y ago
As a fellow Swedish freelancer I’d like to know how you calculate that. Or are you doing B2C?
- cambaceres 4y ago
  I’m including VAT in the calculation, and simplifies a bit by viewing the rest as salary.
  - stefanfisk 4y ago
    IMHO that is very misleading in this context where there are a lot of Americans. If the VAT rates went to 0% you would still get to keep the exact same amount as with the current 25% rate. And when discussing B2B prices VAT is never included, as it is generally not an expense for the company but rather just an accounting detail.
    - vc8f6vVV 4y ago
      I would include VAT. No matter B2B or not, it's how much your end customer pays is what matters. Yes, business will pass on this tax further, but end consumer won't be able to claim it. It's the same as a sales tax in the US. To include it in price or not is more a psychological thing (in the US it's not included in price). When I pay $106.25 for something it makes a little difference for me that $6.25 goes to my state or passed to the previous business, and if I only have $100 you lost me. That's the reality. Basically it's very similar to debates about US taxes. Sure, it's not 70%, but things add up quickly. Income tax, social security, medicare, medical insurance, sales tax. The usual argument is "but, but ... it's not me who is paying my medical insurance or half of social taxes, it's my employer, so it's not my tax". Well, it is. That's the money your employer would have paid _you_ if those taxes hadn't existed.
      - docmars 4y ago
        It does all add up quickly indeed. Not to mention, things that fall outside of capital / income taxes which increase the overall percentage in sneaky ways in the US: car registration fees, the death tax, property taxes, student loan repayments (depending on your view of subsidized university).
smikhanov 4y ago
Nobody can be fully certain of this, but I suspect all the way up to 100%
- cambaceres 4y ago
  We can actually be certain that humans work the other way since we ran huge experiments in labs called the Soviet Union and China. In those experiments we found out that people worked way less/not at all when there was no economic incentive to do so.
  - smikhanov 4y ago
    There’s an economic incentive for someone to increase their productivity at every taxation level that is less than 100%, no?
    - usefulcat 4y ago
      Technically correct, but totally missing the point. There’s going to be a big incremental incentive difference between, say 10% and 90% taxation.
      - smikhanov 4y ago
        Societies taxing their entrepreneurs at 10 and at 90% are always vastly different. This difference in turn heavily influences every participant’s system of motivations, so comparing these two numbers alone is usually not very helpful
      - ramblenode 4y ago
        An apt comparison is sharecroppers. Their effective tax rate is close to 100% but they still work hard because eating > not eating.
  - pg938hkd 4y ago
    That’s not true. Many companies people work at provide them little to no incentive to work harder or better, yet still a lot of people try to do so. Lots of places have almost no possibility of promotion just the ability to go elsewhere. Some professions like teaching, nursing pharmacy treat all workers as interchangeable with no performance incentives.
low_tech_love 4y ago
Interesting, my understanding is exactly the opposite. In my opinion the reason why so many people don’t care much (or are so in love with admin jobs) in Sweden is precisely because it’s too safe?
tarsinge 4y ago
Better distribution is through capital tax, not income tax. Taxing workers even more is the opposite of sharing productivity gains captured by shareholders. Are capital gains and dividends taxed at least at 70% in Sweden?
- kazinator 4y ago
  1. Salary is your company's money that becomes your money. 2. Capital tax is tax on your company's money. 3. Income tax is tax on your money. With either tax, the economic system that consists of you and your employer is being robbed. Speaking of which, if someone takes your groceries and runs, just before you have paid for them, that is shoplifting. If it's just after you paid, it's robbery. You might think you're better off with the former, but shoplifting raises prices; some of it is shifted onto you, so that it is effectively robbery.
  - tarsinge 4y ago
    The situation is trickle down from laissez-faire is definitely proven wrong just by the situation we are in and is the starting point of the discussion. Tax is just a tool to correct the failure of the system of failing to correctly redistribute productivity gains from workers starting a few decades ago (and the point above is with the promises of LLM it’s crucial we address that situation). Robbery or not is not the debate here, income tax higher than capital tax is just a good candidate cause and solution (given historical data), but of course we can discuss alternatives.
    - oort-cloud9 4y ago
      [dead]
  - camgunz 4y ago
    1. Companies only have money because of the work I and others do. 2. It doesn't follow that when companies have more money their workers get more. Evidence is: record profits concomitant with layoffs, corporate profits vs wages, etc etc. 3. Taxes fund a government that answers to me. Capital powers corporations that not only don't answer to me but likely want to exploit me.
v0id24 4y ago
by tax revenues In China, corporations pay more than 2 times more taxes than individuals (in the US, individuals pay almost 6 times more taxes than corporations). China: corporate income tax (19%), individual income tax (7%) USA: corporate income tax (7.6%), individual income tax (41.1%)

__pache__ 4y ago

[flagged]

cambaceres 4y ago
I’m still a high earner so I’m fine. I still have approximately $7500/month after my taxes are paid. That’s a lot since all medical care, 1 year parental leave, my kids education from kindergarten through high school etc are “free”, e.g. paid with my taxes. My point was not to complain but to say to the guy that claims that we need a new system with more wealth distribution that those systems already exist. There are a limit though to how high you can tax someone before they stop producing.
- __pache__ 4y ago
  That's insane salary, props to you on that
- fbrncci 4y ago
  I was earning similarly in Europe. The moment I realized how much tax I was paying (51% bracket), I moved to Asia to work remotely. I honestly don’t care what’s being paid from my taxes, but to me that amount felt like theft. I now pay ~20% while being well above 10k after taxes.
  - satvikpendem 4y ago
    This is why comparisons between the US and Europe regarding wages are always fraught. For some people, it makes sense to pay a lot of tax for the benefits it confers. For others, like you and me it seems, it is not really worth it to pay that much tax and not really receive the rewards. But everyone who discusses conflates some people's preferences to suddenly be everyone's preferences, and this is simply not a true comparison.
- webmobdev 4y ago
  You made a good point. But I don't think people are advocating taxing people like you but the super rich. The disparity between the few super-rich and the poor is so huge in many countries. Wealth that is not being put to use by the super-rich is money wasted. All this hoarded wealth could be put to so much good.
  - __pache__ 4y ago
    Why is it bad some people are extremely wealthy? I'm sorry but it's just true that a few people are incredible. Elon musk. Steve jobs. These people are basically worth infinity, their potential and vision is extremely useful to humanity. Sorry a few make it to the NBA, but everyone can try.
    - webmobdev 4y ago
      The problem with the super-rich is that they have more money they can spend. The not spending is the problem. Money is good for public welfare only when it is earned and spent. Investments are supposed capitalist solutions to this - to make money "work" for you. But it's a broken circular system that seems to only make the wealthier more wealthy. (It's also becoming dysfunctional with speculations). It doesn't seem to be creating an egalitarian society because people with money often have access to better opportunities. And that's a huge hurdle tomorrow for your kids trying to compete with Elon Musk's or Steve's Jobs kid who are born with wealth.
      - __pache__ 4y ago
        Of course they can spend the money ... Musk risked a fortune Honestly I think you're just jealous. I started from nothing and have a few million. It's not crazy. There are like 30 million millionaires in the USA. Do you think the economy is zero sum? Elon musk _took_ money?
        webmobdev 3y ago
        > I started from nothing and have a few million. And if you need that millions throughout your lifetime, that's fine. But imagine you have so much money to spend that you don't really know how to spend it in your lifetime? That's the problem.
vages 4y ago
The Nordic countries are actually the easiest place in the world to earn at least 30 million dollars (or become billionaire for that case) exactly because of the welfare system: https://youtu.be/A9UmdY0E8hU https://youtu.be/A9UmdY0E8hU When you don’t have to struggle for a living, you’re more free to take risks and start your own business. Workers accept disruptive innovation and being let go, knowing that the state will help them reskill if necessary. Edit: Changed sentence from "earn a million dollars" to "30 million dollars" to reflect the actual video contents. (Mea culpa.)
- jschveibinz 4y ago
  You know, this is the first comment I’ve ever read on government participation in the economy (socialism, if you will) that seems to make great sense to me. I would happily pay into a tax fund that was locked to educating or re-educating participants in the workforce. I like this way better than plain UBI because of the potential for increased dignity, pride and self-esteem.
  - _siis 4y ago
    You know, there's some significant issues that aren't touched on. Any statement that's all upsides no downsides poorly reflects reality over time. Or, in other words, if it sounds too good to be true it probably is. The main one being how would you pay for it? Basic accounting says the moment population growth stalls you have more outflows than inflows. You can't print money without consequence, and there are other factors that confound these issues further. Its the ideal of socialism, but the reality is you run into the economic calculation problem. Shortages happen because we live in a world of scarcity, and when they do the system collapses usually causing death (historically).
    - vages 4y ago
      The Norwegian tax system is not socialist as much as it is _georgist_: Norway taxes natural resource use (mainly extracting oil from oil fields and using waterfalls for power generation) _hard_. This tax policy makes the "more outflows than inflows" calculation a bit more complex than in most countries. The country is not immune to the effects of population decrease, but less so than others. The main threat to the Norwegian tax system today (in my opinion) is that new industries (fish farming, wind farming) are actively lobbying against georgist tax policies directed at their industries: https://slimemoldtimemold.com/2022/05/17/norway-the-once-and-future-georgist-kingdom/ https://slimemoldtimemold.com/2022/05/17/norway-the-once-and...

stefanfisk 4y ago

As a fellow Swedish freelancer I’d like to know how you calculate that. Or are you doing B2C?

cambaceres 4y ago
I’m including VAT in the calculation, and simplifies a bit by viewing the rest as salary.
- stefanfisk 4y ago
  IMHO that is very misleading in this context where there are a lot of Americans. If the VAT rates went to 0% you would still get to keep the exact same amount as with the current 25% rate. And when discussing B2B prices VAT is never included, as it is generally not an expense for the company but rather just an accounting detail.
  - vc8f6vVV 4y ago
    I would include VAT. No matter B2B or not, it's how much your end customer pays is what matters. Yes, business will pass on this tax further, but end consumer won't be able to claim it. It's the same as a sales tax in the US. To include it in price or not is more a psychological thing (in the US it's not included in price). When I pay $106.25 for something it makes a little difference for me that $6.25 goes to my state or passed to the previous business, and if I only have $100 you lost me. That's the reality. Basically it's very similar to debates about US taxes. Sure, it's not 70%, but things add up quickly. Income tax, social security, medicare, medical insurance, sales tax. The usual argument is "but, but ... it's not me who is paying my medical insurance or half of social taxes, it's my employer, so it's not my tax". Well, it is. That's the money your employer would have paid _you_ if those taxes hadn't existed.
    - docmars 4y ago
      It does all add up quickly indeed. Not to mention, things that fall outside of capital / income taxes which increase the overall percentage in sneaky ways in the US: car registration fees, the death tax, property taxes, student loan repayments (depending on your view of subsidized university).

smikhanov 4y ago

Nobody can be fully certain of this, but I suspect all the way up to 100%

cambaceres 4y ago
We can actually be certain that humans work the other way since we ran huge experiments in labs called the Soviet Union and China. In those experiments we found out that people worked way less/not at all when there was no economic incentive to do so.
- smikhanov 4y ago
  There’s an economic incentive for someone to increase their productivity at every taxation level that is less than 100%, no?
  - usefulcat 4y ago
    Technically correct, but totally missing the point. There’s going to be a big incremental incentive difference between, say 10% and 90% taxation.
    - smikhanov 4y ago
      Societies taxing their entrepreneurs at 10 and at 90% are always vastly different. This difference in turn heavily influences every participant’s system of motivations, so comparing these two numbers alone is usually not very helpful
    - ramblenode 4y ago
      An apt comparison is sharecroppers. Their effective tax rate is close to 100% but they still work hard because eating > not eating.
- pg938hkd 4y ago
  That’s not true. Many companies people work at provide them little to no incentive to work harder or better, yet still a lot of people try to do so. Lots of places have almost no possibility of promotion just the ability to go elsewhere. Some professions like teaching, nursing pharmacy treat all workers as interchangeable with no performance incentives.

low_tech_love 4y ago

Interesting, my understanding is exactly the opposite. In my opinion the reason why so many people don’t care much (or are so in love with admin jobs) in Sweden is precisely because it’s too safe?

tarsinge 4y ago

Better distribution is through capital tax, not income tax. Taxing workers even more is the opposite of sharing productivity gains captured by shareholders. Are capital gains and dividends taxed at least at 70% in Sweden?

kazinator 4y ago
1. Salary is your company's money that becomes your money. 2. Capital tax is tax on your company's money. 3. Income tax is tax on your money. With either tax, the economic system that consists of you and your employer is being robbed. Speaking of which, if someone takes your groceries and runs, just before you have paid for them, that is shoplifting. If it's just after you paid, it's robbery. You might think you're better off with the former, but shoplifting raises prices; some of it is shifted onto you, so that it is effectively robbery.
- tarsinge 4y ago
  The situation is trickle down from laissez-faire is definitely proven wrong just by the situation we are in and is the starting point of the discussion. Tax is just a tool to correct the failure of the system of failing to correctly redistribute productivity gains from workers starting a few decades ago (and the point above is with the promises of LLM it’s crucial we address that situation). Robbery or not is not the debate here, income tax higher than capital tax is just a good candidate cause and solution (given historical data), but of course we can discuss alternatives.
  - oort-cloud9 4y ago
    [dead]
- camgunz 4y ago
  1. Companies only have money because of the work I and others do. 2. It doesn't follow that when companies have more money their workers get more. Evidence is: record profits concomitant with layoffs, corporate profits vs wages, etc etc. 3. Taxes fund a government that answers to me. Capital powers corporations that not only don't answer to me but likely want to exploit me.

v0id24 4y ago

by tax revenues In China, corporations pay more than 2 times more taxes than individuals (in the US, individuals pay almost 6 times more taxes than corporations). China: corporate income tax (19%), individual income tax (7%) USA: corporate income tax (7.6%), individual income tax (41.1%)