6 ms·

Ouch. Two billion dollars. That could have been put into much better use, imagine being able to fund the Iran war for one more day.

falcor84 3mo ago
Why not both?
- anonym29 3mo ago
  I can think of about 39 trillion reasons... https://www.usdebtclock.org/ https://www.usdebtclock.org/
  - deleted 3mo ago
    [deleted]
  - LoganDark 3mo ago
    How do I get rid of the weird popup that wants me to download a pdf? Edit: there's a button in the top-right that says "Secret Window"
arjie 3mo ago
It's funny how this kind of pricing works. A bag of weed captured is estimated at a thousand dollars. Ten movies pirated at twice that. We fire a JASSM in combat and it costs a lot of money. We fire it in training and it costs nothing. There is no financial impact estimated to require all elevators be big enough to turn a full length gurney around. A wealth tax will yield revenue for the next thirty years at 30 times what it will yield this year. $6.6 billion will end world hunger but $100 billion is better spent on a train between Bakersfield and Fresno. I bought my car for $32k. To replace it would be $50k. I crash it, am I out $32k or $50k? Or some other number? Numerically, it could be anything.
- AnthonyMouse 3mo ago
  > A wealth tax will yield revenue for the next thirty years at 30 times what it will yield this year. Isn't this the opposite of how a wealth tax works? The annual turnover for e.g. Apple stock is ~0.4%, so a 0.8%/year wealth tax would triple the number of sellers without adding any new buyers. The negative effect on the price is outsized because most people hold long-term rather than buying or selling in any given year, but now people have to liquidate some every year in order to pay the government because you're taxing unrealized gains. And then because "wealth" is calculated as share price times number of shares, when the share price goes down, everyone's "wealth" goes down and with it next year's revenue from a wealth tax. There would be some limits on that in terms of the compounding negative effect on the share price because (among other things) if the price went down then foreign investors would find it more attractive to buy in and then they're not subject to the tax and don't have to sell every year to pay it, but causing more of the market to be owned by foreign rather than domestic taxpayers over time is also not a thing which leads to stable domestic tax revenue. > $6.6 billion will end world hunger but $100 billion is better spent on a train between Bakersfield and Fresno. The current UN estimate is more like $100 billion a year to end world hunger, whereas the initial build of a rail line is a one-time cost.
  - jquery 3mo ago
    The purpose of wealth taxes is redistributive, not revenue maximization of a spherical cow.
    - datsci_est_2015 3mo ago
      I prefer the phrasing “more liquid and efficient allocation of capital” over “wealth redistribution”.
    - AnthonyMouse 3mo ago
      What does that have to do with the revenue claim being questionable? Also, if that was the goal, wouldn't it be better to tax (or break up) the corporations rather than the shareholders? It comes out of their pocket either way, but forcing asset sales has a lot of negative consequences and bad incentives. On top of that, it handles the problem that the CEO of a huge company has too much power regardless of what percentage of the company's stock they own, by reducing the size of the company rather than their ownership stake in it.
- dnnehgf 3mo ago
  good list. if you were to send me an article containing a new one of these each day, with citations, i would pay you $1 per day. but if you were to send me an article containing a new one of these each day, with citations, plus a bunch of econ theory rationalizing it, i would pay you $0.
  - shermantanktop 3mo ago
    But would you pay $0.50 for the article plus a wiki link to the Laffer Curve article?
- Hendrikto 3mo ago
  > $6.6 billion will end world hunger And then you ask how, and you just get hand waving. Elon Musk offered the money if somebody would provide a coherent plan of how to solve world hunger with it. Nobody could.
- Veelox 3mo ago
  > $6.6 billion will end world hunger My understanding is that the only places that are starving is places like Gaza and South Sudan which are poor and actively under attack. Do you have a source for how we can spend <$10b and solve world hunger?
  - shermantanktop 3mo ago
    I read the comment as a set of examples to make a point. Sounds like you read it as a laundry list of facts that should each have cited sources. Both could be true, but OPs point is clear and valid even without sourcing a (perhaps hyperbolic) statement.
  - TheGRS 3mo ago
    They're referencing a pretty publicized spat between some folks at the UN and Elon Musk promising he would donate that amount of money towards solving world hunger. It was meant as an example of pricing at this scale. https://factually.co/fact-checks/business/elon-musk-6-billion-hunger-promise-explained-58f0ad https://factually.co/fact-checks/business/elon-musk-6-billio...
  - throwaway27448 3mo ago
    Where did you get that understanding?? People are starving all over the world, even in places that generally have access to food markets. Food insecurity exists outside of famine, sanctions, etc.
- gunapologist99 3mo ago
  > wealth tax This isn't directed at your excellent comment, but about wealth tax in general (and the proposed California version specifically); Should we tax the very people who are literally creating the future before they've even done so? The progressive views on a wealth tax are an incredibly shocking blind spot, esp on this site, begun by those who are immersed in startups and believers that risking (venturing?) to pursue tech ventures can bring about a more excellent future for everyone, not just the founders. We dare to imagine a future that does not exist, and then we believe in it until it does. If anything, we want to lubricate that path, not add friction. Hitting the VC's or founders who've made it hits everyone, all the way down the line.

falcor84 3mo ago

Why not both?

anonym29 3mo ago
I can think of about 39 trillion reasons... https://www.usdebtclock.org/ https://www.usdebtclock.org/
- deleted 3mo ago
  [deleted]
- LoganDark 3mo ago
  How do I get rid of the weird popup that wants me to download a pdf? Edit: there's a button in the top-right that says "Secret Window"

arjie 3mo ago

It's funny how this kind of pricing works. A bag of weed captured is estimated at a thousand dollars. Ten movies pirated at twice that. We fire a JASSM in combat and it costs a lot of money. We fire it in training and it costs nothing. There is no financial impact estimated to require all elevators be big enough to turn a full length gurney around. A wealth tax will yield revenue for the next thirty years at 30 times what it will yield this year. $6.6 billion will end world hunger but $100 billion is better spent on a train between Bakersfield and Fresno. I bought my car for $32k. To replace it would be $50k. I crash it, am I out $32k or $50k? Or some other number? Numerically, it could be anything.

AnthonyMouse 3mo ago
> A wealth tax will yield revenue for the next thirty years at 30 times what it will yield this year. Isn't this the opposite of how a wealth tax works? The annual turnover for e.g. Apple stock is ~0.4%, so a 0.8%/year wealth tax would triple the number of sellers without adding any new buyers. The negative effect on the price is outsized because most people hold long-term rather than buying or selling in any given year, but now people have to liquidate some every year in order to pay the government because you're taxing unrealized gains. And then because "wealth" is calculated as share price times number of shares, when the share price goes down, everyone's "wealth" goes down and with it next year's revenue from a wealth tax. There would be some limits on that in terms of the compounding negative effect on the share price because (among other things) if the price went down then foreign investors would find it more attractive to buy in and then they're not subject to the tax and don't have to sell every year to pay it, but causing more of the market to be owned by foreign rather than domestic taxpayers over time is also not a thing which leads to stable domestic tax revenue. > $6.6 billion will end world hunger but $100 billion is better spent on a train between Bakersfield and Fresno. The current UN estimate is more like $100 billion a year to end world hunger, whereas the initial build of a rail line is a one-time cost.
- jquery 3mo ago
  The purpose of wealth taxes is redistributive, not revenue maximization of a spherical cow.
  - datsci_est_2015 3mo ago
    I prefer the phrasing “more liquid and efficient allocation of capital” over “wealth redistribution”.
  - AnthonyMouse 3mo ago
    What does that have to do with the revenue claim being questionable? Also, if that was the goal, wouldn't it be better to tax (or break up) the corporations rather than the shareholders? It comes out of their pocket either way, but forcing asset sales has a lot of negative consequences and bad incentives. On top of that, it handles the problem that the CEO of a huge company has too much power regardless of what percentage of the company's stock they own, by reducing the size of the company rather than their ownership stake in it.
dnnehgf 3mo ago
good list. if you were to send me an article containing a new one of these each day, with citations, i would pay you $1 per day. but if you were to send me an article containing a new one of these each day, with citations, plus a bunch of econ theory rationalizing it, i would pay you $0.
- shermantanktop 3mo ago
  But would you pay $0.50 for the article plus a wiki link to the Laffer Curve article?
Hendrikto 3mo ago
> $6.6 billion will end world hunger And then you ask how, and you just get hand waving. Elon Musk offered the money if somebody would provide a coherent plan of how to solve world hunger with it. Nobody could.
Veelox 3mo ago
> $6.6 billion will end world hunger My understanding is that the only places that are starving is places like Gaza and South Sudan which are poor and actively under attack. Do you have a source for how we can spend <$10b and solve world hunger?
- shermantanktop 3mo ago
  I read the comment as a set of examples to make a point. Sounds like you read it as a laundry list of facts that should each have cited sources. Both could be true, but OPs point is clear and valid even without sourcing a (perhaps hyperbolic) statement.
- TheGRS 3mo ago
  They're referencing a pretty publicized spat between some folks at the UN and Elon Musk promising he would donate that amount of money towards solving world hunger. It was meant as an example of pricing at this scale. https://factually.co/fact-checks/business/elon-musk-6-billion-hunger-promise-explained-58f0ad https://factually.co/fact-checks/business/elon-musk-6-billio...
- throwaway27448 3mo ago
  Where did you get that understanding?? People are starving all over the world, even in places that generally have access to food markets. Food insecurity exists outside of famine, sanctions, etc.
gunapologist99 3mo ago
> wealth tax This isn't directed at your excellent comment, but about wealth tax in general (and the proposed California version specifically); Should we tax the very people who are literally creating the future before they've even done so? The progressive views on a wealth tax are an incredibly shocking blind spot, esp on this site, begun by those who are immersed in startups and believers that risking (venturing?) to pursue tech ventures can bring about a more excellent future for everyone, not just the founders. We dare to imagine a future that does not exist, and then we believe in it until it does. If anything, we want to lubricate that path, not add friction. Hitting the VC's or founders who've made it hits everyone, all the way down the line.