4 ms·

> This is a big problem with current envy-driven politics surrounding wealth. It seems like most of the envy is more perceived by the ultra-rich (or wannabes)

by jedrek 13y ago

> This is a big problem with current envy-driven politics surrounding wealth. It seems like most of the envy is more perceived by the ultra-rich (or wannabes) than actually exists... > I like to think that if the people supporting these high rates of tax for those with some above average level of wealth realised who they were really targeting, we'd have a different attitude to taxation today. You realize the 75% tax rate is on year income exceeding one million euro, right? One million euro is 34x the average salary in France, which means that anybody hit by that tax makes more money in less than two years than the majority of their countrymen will earn in their entire lives. I make way more than an average salary where I live and I don't really have any problem paying higher tax rates. Sure, I work harder than lots of people who work 9-5 jobs, but I don't work any harder than friends I have who work two jobs. There is no question, in my mind, that people who work harder and take risks should reap greater potential rewards... the real question we need to answer is how much higher those rewards should be. It's time to stop pretending that the doctor who spent years training, working as an intern, etc did it in a vacuum. It was tax francs that built the hospitals, that created the institutions that taught them and made them the best of the best. The entrepreneur sells a product shipped on roads built with taxes, over an electric grid built with taxes and might very well bill people using letters sent by mail... well, you get the idea. Not to mention the employees they hire, who were educated with what? Was it taxes? You betcha. Besides with progressive taxes, that doctor will always make more, because progressive taxes do not penalize you for earning more. If you're making 100,000€, your after-tax income is ~62,500; if you're making 200,000€, it's ~133,000€. > usually they are people who have reached those positions not through good fortune or family connections but through a lot of hard work over a long period of time. You're a little delusional. France has a pretty high level of social mobility because of it's high taxes, not in spite of them. Having access to free higher education is a massive boon to lifting people out of poverty. France has the second highest birth rate in the EU due do a generous social safety net. These things cost money, but they're excellent long-term investments. People don't exist in a vacuum, economies are wonderfully interconnected things and acting like the people who take risks and succeed are some kind of superheroes who shouldn't give back because of some deranged notion that they "did it themselves" is myopic, dishonest and, to be frank, total bullshit.

deleted 13y ago
[deleted]
Silhouette 13y ago
You realize the 75% tax rate is on year income exceeding one million euro, right? Yes, though please note that I was commenting on a general trend of confusing going after bankers with actually catching entrepreneurs, not on the French situation specifically. One million euro is 34x the average salary in France, which means that anybody hit by that tax makes more money in less than two years than the majority of their countrymen will earn in their entire lives. By the time you allow for progressive taxation at lower levels, and for the other taxes in the French system, the multiplier for how much money those people are actually keeping is smaller than that. Of course it's still a wide gap, but let's not pretend these people are rich enough to retire after two years on that salary. People don't exist in a vacuum, economies are wonderfully interconnected things and acting like the people who take risks and succeed are some kind of superheroes who shouldn't give back because of some deranged notion that they "did it themselves" is myopic, dishonest and, to be frank, total bullshit. I have little interest in debating in detail with someone whose argument boils down to swearing at me and calling me delusional, but please consider this: taking the argument you seem to be making to its logical conclusion, why shouldn't everyone pay 100% taxes and have the state pay for everything, because we're all part of the same system?
- jedrek 13y ago
 Of course it's still a wide gap, but let's not pretend these people are rich enough to retire after two years on that salary. Of course they're not retiring - someone earning enough to hit that 75% tax rate isn't living like your average mope. Give them five years, though, and they could easily put that money into blue chips, bonds and other low risk investments and support a middle class family with interest. And while I do see the difference between entrepreneurs and those who live off the margins of financial transactions, I'm not really sure why they should be treated all that differently as far as tax law goes. Kids grow up wanting to be royalty, by college the fantasy is still there, now they're just Business Superheroes, because that's how we treat the rich. Entrepreneurs aren't magic. We're people who've decided that we either don't like working for a boss or who've looked at the numbers and said, "hey, I think I can make more working on my own than for someone." Should we be in awe of someone who "worked hard" for a few years to get paid a couple million dollars to have a competitor shut their product down? Or amazed by a company who has managed to sell their stockholders on the idea that it doesn't need to be profitable, allowing them to destroy (or disrupt, in SV terms) traditional markets, where others can't compete, because their shareholders actually demand they turn a profit. Now, are you telling me these Superheroes of Business will look at a progressive tax rate and say, "you know what, if I thought I could make $3 million after 3 years of hard work, I would do it... but since it'll only be $2.7, I guess I'm gonna stick to my day job where I make $150k/year." Because that's the logical conclusion of what you're saying. why shouldn't everyone pay 100% taxes and have the state pay for everything Probably because that's not the logical conclusion of the reality I've described, although a lot of American businessmen do think the opposite should be true: all services should be privatized, yada, yada. That's crap, there tons of services that require long term, massive investments that will get shitty ROIs but benefit society and the economy as a whole. We all know that, we all think people should be rich, I just don't think that income tax has the kind of dampening effect on entrepreneurship people claim it does. I for one would rather pay 50% on my 1.5mil than 25% on 150k, should it come to that.

by jedrek 13y ago

deleted 13y ago

[deleted]

Silhouette 13y ago

You realize the 75% tax rate is on year income exceeding one million euro, right? Yes, though please note that I was commenting on a general trend of confusing going after bankers with actually catching entrepreneurs, not on the French situation specifically. One million euro is 34x the average salary in France, which means that anybody hit by that tax makes more money in less than two years than the majority of their countrymen will earn in their entire lives. By the time you allow for progressive taxation at lower levels, and for the other taxes in the French system, the multiplier for how much money those people are actually keeping is smaller than that. Of course it's still a wide gap, but let's not pretend these people are rich enough to retire after two years on that salary. People don't exist in a vacuum, economies are wonderfully interconnected things and acting like the people who take risks and succeed are some kind of superheroes who shouldn't give back because of some deranged notion that they "did it themselves" is myopic, dishonest and, to be frank, total bullshit. I have little interest in debating in detail with someone whose argument boils down to swearing at me and calling me delusional, but please consider this: taking the argument you seem to be making to its logical conclusion, why shouldn't everyone pay 100% taxes and have the state pay for everything, because we're all part of the same system?

jedrek 13y ago
Of course it's still a wide gap, but let's not pretend these people are rich enough to retire after two years on that salary. Of course they're not retiring - someone earning enough to hit that 75% tax rate isn't living like your average mope. Give them five years, though, and they could easily put that money into blue chips, bonds and other low risk investments and support a middle class family with interest. And while I do see the difference between entrepreneurs and those who live off the margins of financial transactions, I'm not really sure why they should be treated all that differently as far as tax law goes. Kids grow up wanting to be royalty, by college the fantasy is still there, now they're just Business Superheroes, because that's how we treat the rich. Entrepreneurs aren't magic. We're people who've decided that we either don't like working for a boss or who've looked at the numbers and said, "hey, I think I can make more working on my own than for someone." Should we be in awe of someone who "worked hard" for a few years to get paid a couple million dollars to have a competitor shut their product down? Or amazed by a company who has managed to sell their stockholders on the idea that it doesn't need to be profitable, allowing them to destroy (or disrupt, in SV terms) traditional markets, where others can't compete, because their shareholders actually demand they turn a profit. Now, are you telling me these Superheroes of Business will look at a progressive tax rate and say, "you know what, if I thought I could make $3 million after 3 years of hard work, I would do it... but since it'll only be $2.7, I guess I'm gonna stick to my day job where I make $150k/year." Because that's the logical conclusion of what you're saying. why shouldn't everyone pay 100% taxes and have the state pay for everything Probably because that's not the logical conclusion of the reality I've described, although a lot of American businessmen do think the opposite should be true: all services should be privatized, yada, yada. That's crap, there tons of services that require long term, massive investments that will get shitty ROIs but benefit society and the economy as a whole. We all know that, we all think people should be rich, I just don't think that income tax has the kind of dampening effect on entrepreneurship people claim it does. I for one would rather pay 50% on my 1.5mil than 25% on 150k, should it come to that.