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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 th

• 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...
      • satvikpendem 4y ago
        Georgism is pretty great, consistently incentivizing people to utilize their land. However, I wonder how much it would change with non-land-based productivity, ie people or AI making money through the internet.
        • vages 4y ago
          Strict georgism emphasizes taxing limited resources, i.e. resources that can be hogged, preventing others from innovating. If what you're using can be made more plentiful, it's not worth taxing. For example, taxing your use of transmission capacity would go against georgism: It's possible to make better equipment that transfers bits faster. There are, however, resources that can be hogged on the Internet. For example, domain names: Short (non-trademarked) domain names, e.g. flowers.com, are more valuable than a random string of characters from a lesser known top-level domain, e.g. lrchcu.hat. As there is a limited number of single-word domain names, the owner of the former domain should pay a higher fee or tax for their domain than the owner of the latter.
        • imtringued 4y ago
          Silvio Gesell applies the land value tax on money. This results in a so called demurrage currency.
    • imtringued 4y ago
      The economic calculation problem exists form any type of economy regardless of whether it is dezentralized or centralised. The difference is that a central miscalculation impacts the entire economy while a decentral miscalculation usually only impacts a small area surrounding that person. If a group of independent people makes a miscalculation like during the global financial crisis then you end up with the same problem it is just less frequent.
  • __pache__ 4y ago
    Why is govt needed to do this? This is like trying to get govt to invent flight, when instead you just give markets as much power as reasonably possible. Cheap goods and services lead to innovation way better than govt capturing and "redirecting money to their brother's school."
    • antifa 4y ago
      > This is like trying to get govt to invent flight The Soviet Union invented space flight.
      • __pache__ 4y ago
        They invented rocket propulsion...? If you can stomach it: https://youtu.be/0Xg4Uq1W4L8 https://youtu.be/0Xg4Uq1W4L8 Please don't ignore the thousands and thousands of examples of govt being terrible at this, for the handful of somewhat useful examples of shit sticking to the wall. It's still flinging shit
        • antifa 4y ago
          > government bad That's mostly just you grandstanding your ideology and not really contributing to a rational discussion.
          • __pache__ 4y ago
            Yes government bad. Did Russia invent rocket propulsion? How many dozens of millions died because of insane huge govt policies, like redistributing from the successful to the unsuccessful ...
• __pache__ 4y ago
  Nah I think something else is at play, as to why so many millionaires are in Switzerland. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_number_of_millionaires https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_number_... USA demolishing most everyone else, as you'd expect if you own what you create. Almost 10% of 400 million people are millionaires in the USA! Insanely productive all things considered. Also kind of shockingly the USA has the most progressive tax system, I believe -- the vast majority of those paying are high earners, low earners pay barely any taxes and can save a lot.
  • than3 4y ago
    A millionaire today is someone that had $100,000 roughly 10 years ago. Hardly comparable.
    • __pache__ 4y ago
      [flagged]
      • than3 4y ago
        https://www.investopedia.com/terms/d/debasement.asp https://www.investopedia.com/terms/d/debasement.asp
        • __pache__ 4y ago
          [flagged]
    • pgodzin 4y ago
      That's a 25% annual rate of return, where can I find that with my 100k?
      • satvikpendem 4y ago
        They're counting returns in the most recent bull market as well as currency inflation, their comment seems sarcastic.