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The total economy argument is good but I still don’t see the reason why being rich should lead you to pay less percentage in taxes than someone just selling the

The total economy argument is good but I still don’t see the reason why being rich should lead you to pay less percentage in taxes than someone just selling their labor. Which is what always tends to happen or is even explicitly so.

dave4420 2y ago
What I take from this is that you should be able to get more tax from the super rich by properly taxing their income and consumption than you can by taxing their wealth as such.
- xscott 2y ago
  I wonder how we justify what people "should" pay. I mean it seems like there's some benefit to any person for the protection of society (police, fire, etc...), and that's probably close to constant per person. It's not like rich people have their houses burn down more often. And then there is protecting the balance in your bank account, and maybe there is some justification that the protection cost is proportional (linear) to your account. Similarly for your income - linear tax could kind of make sense. But how do we arrive at the conclusion that any tax should be super-linear? As for taxing wealth, I think a lot of young and naive people fail to realize that their eventual retirement savings will fall into the same category. Try and make sure your sweeping new policies to punish the billionaires don't horribly impact the ability for middle class to quit working before they die.
xscott 2y ago
I guess that depends on what you think anyone is paying for. Maybe we're paying for rule of law and personal safety. Maybe we're paying for the government to protect our assets and income. Maybe we're just paying to be allowed to live on the land, like rent. I don't really know. However, it turns out the wealthiest 1% pay about 40% of the Federal income tax. And the next 4% pay the next 20%. So if we had 100 people in a room: 1 person is paying for 40 people 4 persons are paying for the next 20 people and the last 50 people are paying for about 2, but they're the ones saying the rest aren't paying enough. Honestly, I think we should just say that the bottom 50% of the wealth curve doesn't pay taxes at all. Because really their contribution isn't significant, and then they can go find something else to bitch about. But then the politicians can't pander to them with appeals "to make the billionaires pay their share!". It's all pretty silly. https://www.mercatus.org/research/data-visualizations/tax-burden-across-varying-income-percentiles https://www.mercatus.org/research/data-visualizations/tax-bu... I'm sure you can find other links with similar information if this one doesn't appeal to you.

dave4420 2y ago

What I take from this is that you should be able to get more tax from the super rich by properly taxing their income and consumption than you can by taxing their wealth as such.

xscott 2y ago
I wonder how we justify what people "should" pay. I mean it seems like there's some benefit to any person for the protection of society (police, fire, etc...), and that's probably close to constant per person. It's not like rich people have their houses burn down more often. And then there is protecting the balance in your bank account, and maybe there is some justification that the protection cost is proportional (linear) to your account. Similarly for your income - linear tax could kind of make sense. But how do we arrive at the conclusion that any tax should be super-linear? As for taxing wealth, I think a lot of young and naive people fail to realize that their eventual retirement savings will fall into the same category. Try and make sure your sweeping new policies to punish the billionaires don't horribly impact the ability for middle class to quit working before they die.

xscott 2y ago

I guess that depends on what you think anyone is paying for. Maybe we're paying for rule of law and personal safety. Maybe we're paying for the government to protect our assets and income. Maybe we're just paying to be allowed to live on the land, like rent. I don't really know. However, it turns out the wealthiest 1% pay about 40% of the Federal income tax. And the next 4% pay the next 20%. So if we had 100 people in a room: 1 person is paying for 40 people 4 persons are paying for the next 20 people and the last 50 people are paying for about 2, but they're the ones saying the rest aren't paying enough. Honestly, I think we should just say that the bottom 50% of the wealth curve doesn't pay taxes at all. Because really their contribution isn't significant, and then they can go find something else to bitch about. But then the politicians can't pander to them with appeals "to make the billionaires pay their share!". It's all pretty silly. https://www.mercatus.org/research/data-visualizations/tax-burden-across-varying-income-percentiles https://www.mercatus.org/research/data-visualizations/tax-bu... I'm sure you can find other links with similar information if this one doesn't appeal to you.