Forum Post: How About A Tax On Wealth
Posted 13 years ago on Oct. 15, 2011, 6:14 a.m. EST by AndrewBWilliams
(52)
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How about a tax on wealth? If the One Percent own a hugely disproportionate percentage of the national wealth, perhaps a tax on wealth itself is appropriate. Does any single person need $20 billion dollars? (The Koch Brothers). Is the incentive to innovate or succeed diminish because one gets taxed on that kind of money?
I offer the proposition that after a certain point ownership of too much wealth warps the political system and is unhealthy for the republic. It allows an unhealthy amount of influence and limits the ability of fhe 99 percent to succeed or have influence.
I propose a limit on the accumulation of wealth at $1 Billion dollars. Wealth beyond that is taxed yearly at a rate of ten percent. This is not just income, but the taking of the property itself much as is done with the Inheritance Tax which was put in place to stop dynasties from forming to avoid a landed gentry.
I would welcome your thoughts.
The economist that has written extensively on this is Ed Wolff of NYU.
http://bostonreview.net/BR21.1/wolff.html
http://www.levyinstitute.org/pubs/wp_589.pdf
http://www.levyinstitute.org/pubs/wp_502.pdf
Ralph Nader has also endorsed the basic idea: http://www.theamericanconservative.com/2004_06_21/cover.html
Right now, we have a tax system that is gradually concentrating wealth in the hands of a few people. Just ceasing that trend would be a huge step forward.
Much of the present increases in weath of the top 1% relate purely to being a wealth holder when the Regan/Bush tax cuts were put in place. The trickle up effects where much larger than Reagan's economists predicted.
I don't think we'll easily get a public consensus around taxing existing wealth right now. What we might get a consensus on is gradually increasing taxes on assets of the very rich if their growth exceeds that of the assets of the 99%. In that case, we aren't redistributing assets-we are preventing future redistribution of assets upward.
Donald Trump of all people suggested a ~15% wealth tax to pay down the debt, it was one time though.
I don't see how you solve the disparity without some implementation of this.
Trump is bright enough to realize that some compromise will be necessary sooner or later. He's just trying to negotiate early to get a better deal.
I'd probably set the bar lower than $1 billion...
how about a tax on greed....
We should also tax lust and sloth
Dont forget gluttony, the glutton tax would rake!
While your at it, why don't you just toss a tax on getting too angry (wrath) and showing off pictures of your newborn baby (pride)? Heck, tax poor people for having less than others, because obviously, they're going to be envious.
Wait till they enact the reality tv tax
The great Michael Hudson on "Why America Had A 90% Income Tax"
http://michael-hudson.com/2011/01/why-america-had-a-90-income-tax/
so you want to prevent people from being too successful? how do you do that? and what counter incentives would that create? so i want to be a professional football player but im too slow, should we make the other pros wear ankle weights or heavy boots so the playing field is fair? the problem is not that others are too rich or successful, the problem is that you are not, and the remedy is not to penalize others but for you to find a way to achieve your goals, by yourself and without momma government helping you. so go do it and stop whining that the system is holding you back
Stern progressive income tax and maximum income limit can serve the same purpose and protect individual freedom.
I don't think wealth tax is needed, and will only instill the "socialist revolution" label.
History shows that two-three generations later all wealth gets back into the system without any death tax.
Very good way!
I do think there are special provisions that should be made for the uber-wealthy (and i don't mean upper middle class ppl making 225K), just like there are special provisions that are made for the uber-poor. Not sure if a straight up wealth tax is the way to go, there's more precedent for an increasingly progressive income tax.
One problem is income taxes have strange effects on people with really variable income. Wealth is a better indication of long term ability to pay.
I'd be willing to start small on the wealth tax-and ramp it up gradually whenever the wealthy's assets have exceeded that of the other 99%
http://multinationalmonitor.org/mm2003/03may/may03interviewswolff.html
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wealth_in_the_United_States
In addition, wealth is unevenly distributed, with the wealthiest 25% of US households owning 87%[2] of the wealth in the United States, which was $54.2 trillion in 2009.[3][4]
There is also significant foreign investment in the US that could potentially be subject to taxation.
If we taxed the upper 1% at 2%, that would bring in about $433 Billion/year. All that would really do is slow down the rate at which those folks were getting richer.
The thing is: whenever there is a major tax cut in other areas, the potential for asset taxation rises.
Sorta not the American way hmm,
If the American way is to only be on your own then you are right. I believe we should look after each other. Was the 90% tax in the Eisenhower administration and similarly high taxes under Nixon and Ford also not the American way? I think capitalism has limits which must be reined in at a certain point or it becomes simply the legalization of greed. In my humble opinion once you have reached a billion dollars the needs of the many outweigh the desires of one individual. I have lived for long periods in countries where there was no such limitations and the poor lived and died on the streets in the name of the free market. I just can't go there here. In my mind the only thing that justifies capitalism is that harnessing greed creates a better place for everyone. However, taken to the extreme concentration of wealth has the opposite effect.
Inflation is the sane and fair version of a wealth tax.
Not really. Inflation is a tax on holding currency or having fixed interest accounts. Those are both a small part of overall assets in society. You need to also look at stocks, bonds, options--all financial instruments-and real estate(particularly that beyond what one person can live on/use).
ok... seriously... think about freedoms & prosperity
individual freedom... economic freedom.... economic prosperity....individual prosperity....
putting a limit is like putting a control on what people can do... how bout ... only Billionaires can smoke pot? .... silly huh?
what we are really looking for is balance... fair to everyone and everything...
if I want to privately design and build an airplane that takes tourist to the moon and back... why should I not be able to do that?
if I want to build a new hospital in some impoverished place....why should I not be able to do that?
if I want to spend my life trying to make beautiful Art... why should I not be able to do that?
think about wealth.... is wealth merely economic ....
is Art not a wealth? is Knowledge not weath? is Health not weath?
If your going to tax anything... Tax Greed & Corruption ... we have more abundance of that than anything :)
Yes lets give the government more money since they manage it so well.
Well, actually sometimes they do manage it better. Medicare has a very low overhead - around 3%. The private insurers complain by having to live on 20% overhead. That makes government almost seven times more efficient. When I was a naval officer we were paid well below what we would have received in the private sector. The CO of a carrier is in charge of a billion dollar asset, 5000 people and a million dollar a day budget as well as nuclear reactors and possible nuclear weapons. For all that they hardly pull in over six figures. Can you imagine what a Halliburton carrier captain would demand. He would demand a "competitive" salary of millions a year and would make the sailors pay for their war injuries on their own. We did our jobs for the pay of the knowledge we were serving the country and for the pride of a job well done. That kind of ethic is lost on the current private sector leaders.
Yes, rarely the government manages money well. On a bigger picture level though they mismanage money in a way that would leave us bankrupt.
I served as a USAF Combat Controller for 8 years. I never had any complaints about my pay. In fact, with all the perks taken into account I thought we were pad rather well.
Thanks for your service.
By the way Medicare is really not a good example. "An annual report issued last week by the trustees of Medicare said the program won't have enough funds to pay full benefits by 2024, a full five years sooner than last year's estimate and one that may yet be even rosier than reality."
http://www.naturalnews.com/032452_Medicare_bankruptcy.html#ixzz1as6OXXf6
Glorious idea. This would allow us to redistribute wealth for our causes deemed appropriate by our movement. Except why have only 10% tax on wealth per year, why not 50%?
We will be taking back what belongs to the masses!
Hard to define wealth frankly and usually this is not the issue in the long run. If all the wealthy were ethical and empathetic, no tax would be needed. But often those who have wealth are also those who are employing others and creating wealth. We need to recognize those individuals and not shoot ourselves in the foot while campaigning for social equality.
Here's my thoughts. If your father creates a great product, and over the course of his lifetime accumulates $1 Billion (in assets), and over the course of your life, you create several great products that everyone wants to have, and also accumulate $1 Billion, then between you and your father, you have $2 Billion.
Now say your father dies, and (due to you two being the last alive in your family,) leaves everything to you. You now have $2 Billion. At a yearly rate of 10%, that $1 Billion over the $1 Billion you have will be gone in 10 years.
So, in 10 years, you have either taxed away the equivalent of your father's life's work, or the equivalent of your own.
Unless you want to make inheritance impossible, which might be an idea to think about but would still be a completely jerk move, then you might as well just take it all away right now, and not be a jerk about it and drag it out over time.
But even if you do, that money still represents the work someone has done over their lifetime, or the work of others that they've financed (as is the case with investments). Taking it away is either stealing (if you view it as money) or slavery (if you view it as the time SOMEONE put in to make that money).
It represents the work of A LOT OF PEOPLE over time. No one accumulates a billion dollars all on their own.
They usually do it by exploiting other people in some fashion.
Thank you for your response. I agree with you that it is taking away someone's work, but our great grandfathers basically decided it was worth it to protect the people from large accumulations of wealth. Here are some instances. There are times and reasons why we need to keep people from tying up too much of the national assets even if they have great ideas. We have done that in the past.
I think enough is enough at a certain point. How many Rolls Royces do you need when your neighbor live on the street.
In my idea once you are taxed down to a billion you are done. I think that is enough for anyone.
Just out of curiosity, what keeps the people here then? If America says "well you can have only a billion dollars and no more", and somewhere like New Zealand says "you can have however much money you bloody well please", what's to keep the over-a-billion crowd from all moving to New Zealand, and taking their money (and tax revenue) with them?
Good question. I suspect people can leave if they wish and have the will to do so (which is harder than you think since you leave your family and friends behind), but they are already doing so by sheltering money in offshore accounts. UBS and Credit Suisse are already in deep trouble with the IRS for assisting the wealthy do this. At a certain point I think we have the right to ask people whether they are part of America or not. If they are really going to leave they will leave anyway under our current system by moving their money offshore.
In an increasingly global system nation states are diminishing while the wealthy and transglobal companies just hop around looking for the best deal because they can physically move unlike a hundred years ago when that was hard to do. At a certain point you have to take a stand and not always worry about what people will do otherwise it is a race to the bottom with the wealthy putting their tax money and corporations at the services of the lowest wage, the lowest tax, and the most greed enabling country. I say resistance to a race to the bottom should start now. Since the "Occupy" movement is going global, perhaps a similar international movement can resist a lot of this global tax avoidance and force people and companies to have some loyalty to the needs of people rather than greed itself.
"At a certain point you have to take a stand and not always worry about what people will do otherwise it is a race to the bottom with the wealthy putting their tax money and corporations at the services of the lowest wage, the lowest tax, and the most greed enabling country."
This. We have power if we choose to use it. This applies to trade policy, tax policy and many others. Huge wealth transfers out of the country, in all their forms, don't have to be allowed. Not offering any specific proposals, but we re still a sovereign nation and wealth is not generated in a vacuum...
I know I may be simplifying this down a bit much, but bear with me.
Say I make $1 million an hour, and work for 1000 hours. Then say I work another hour.
Where do you get the right to demand that I give you the pay I just earned for that hour because I've "got enough"?
I know that everyone complains "well that's enough money. They don't need any more." But say some little guy in Cambodia who's living off of $10 a week get the same idea, however his is: "Tax everything over $1500". Would you support him? Because morally, you have no superiority over him. You both are saying "that guy's got too much money. Take more of it away from him."
And the fact of the matter is that people don't want to leave right now because America is called the land of the free for a reason. There are plenty of freedoms that America has that very few other countries do. Though I don't know the laws of other countries, I highly doubt that any other country has freedom of speech to the point where you can spout just about anything you want, up to, and including, treason, and get away with it.
However, tell someone that you're going to force him to give up something that is his, simply because he has it and a lot of other people don't, and you bet a TON more people will want to move away from the united states.
And as for leaving friends and families behind, please don't insult me. If we're talking the level of money that this hypothetical is dealing with, moving a family is the least of their worries.
I'm sorry if I seem insulting, but It's just got past 6 in the morning here and I'm tired.
As for freedom of speech, a free press is one indicator here is the worldwide press freedom index for 2011, illustrated:
http://chartsbin.com/view/1329
Quite a few countries are rated "satisfactory" as is the US and a few countries, mostly Scandanavian, are rated higher.
We aren't as exceptional as we think we are sometimes.
Back before Reagan the tax rates on income were in the 90% range for high income earners. Ford, Nixon, Eisenhower, Carter, Kennedy all had very very high top tax rates. Would this be confiscatory in today's world or have we just got used to the idea that you get to keep all you earned. 90% tax rate is not far from a wealth tax. I think we have just gotten used to accepting wealthy people as entitled to their wealth. After the Roosevelt years that changed for a couple of generations till Reagan came in and we have now all become told those levels of taxation are wrong. Now we have seen what happens when wealth gets that high. The rich have too much power, the poor struggle for basics. Now people are apparently much more willing to chuck away their citizenship for a buck. I don't think that was the case in my grandfather's day. They were more loyal to their country.
I don't think all wealthy people are entitled to their "wealth", per say, but I think every income earner is entitled to their income, and to the ability to decide where that income goes.
So I'll tell you what. I'll agree that we should all be greedy little pigs and say that just because someone has "too much" (arbitrarily decided by those who have "too little"), if you'll agree to allow every person to be allowed to pick which department of the government their taxes help pay for. Yes, that would mean that all of us who DON'T abuse the welfare system (or even use it at all) can say we don't want out taxes to go to those who DO abuse it. If welfare was forced to pick and choose who it could help, I'm willing to bet that you wouldn't have people who basically LIVE off of unemployment, not even trying to find a real job.
And as to your last point... where have you been? There are very few people truly patriotic anymore. Most of the "Average Joe"s, or at least the ones that I work with and deal with on a regular basis, would sell the country out in a second if it meant riches or fame. I see it all the time, all over the place. Those who say we'd be better off in another country, totally ungrateful for the freedoms they've been given. It's sad, but what can you do?
about 47% of the world's millionaires live in the US. Many of the rest live in the EU and few places in the far east. The thing is: it is hard to find a good place to safely park money. Rich folks often loose their shirts in many parts of the world if they aren't real politically connected.
Hell, in places like Brazil rich folks need body guards because ransoming people is such an issue. I think the US might loose some rich folks if it starts taxing assets . The thing is: many of these folks are dependent on US capital sources and infrastructure-so they just won't move. NZ and switzerland are nice places, but there are real limits to what a billionaire can do there-and they do have taxes(Switzerland has even had asset taxes at times).
I'd like to asset taxes low enough they don't cause massive movement-but high enough the rich stop getting huge windfalls.
First, you wouldnt pay taxes over ten years at the same amount because the sum would go down after each tax season, so it would actually take twenty years. Second, nobody gets rich by themselves. If you have a great idea that will help society then great - you should be rewarded. But just remember, you moved that product on public roads protected by public security and employeed people to manufacture and produce that product. You are probably a product of public schools and had benefited in some form from public programs (Boys and Girls Club, community orginizations, neighborhood watch, etc.) Jefferson, Thomas Paine and other patriots of the Enlightenment fought for a 'progressive tax' system that was aimed at landed wealth (inherited) and accumulated wealth for the benefit of society. The only difference between feudalism that we sought to break from and capitalism in its purest form is democracy and the power of the people to impose their will...
A "product of public schools"? Surely you jest. If not then you insult me. But that's not the point.
If I am to remember the drivers and employees that moved and built my product, then can you also remember that I have already paid them for their labor? If I am to remember the public roads protected by the state troopers, then can you remember that I've already paid taxes, some of which pay for such things?
I'm not against democracy, and if our elected representation decide to say "okay, rich people have too much so we're going to take anything over a certain amount away from them", then I'll deal. But I'll still hold the position that to say that because someone has "too much" it should be taken away from them, not because it is needed to benefit someone, but just because they have it, is not the right thing to do.
Speaking of benefiting, who's going to benefit from this massive tax hike? Where will this money go?
I went to all public schools from grade school to grad school, so it is not that bad! The Social Contract is the basis of the Bill of Rights and the Constitution, at least that is what was sold to the people then and that is what we hold them to now!!!! A fair and progressive tax system is all that we ask for, not one that currently allows the discrepancy of wealth to reach levels that the average CEO makes 365 time the average employee. One that does not allow the top three percent to own 48 percent of the nation's taxable wealth, the top 20 percent own 85 percent of the nation's taxable wealth and allowing 98 percent of African-Americans in this country not to have ANY taxable wealth. The bottome line is that the vast majority of the people in this country owe more than they have for the vast majority of their lives because of an unfair tax system and corporate greed that charges the bottom 25 APR on a loan. If you have the good fortune to be in the upper percentile of the US population in terms of wealth - good for you. Nobody says you dont deserve it. All we ask is that you pay a fair and progressive tax that benefits all and not the corporate elite. It sounds like you do, so I would call you a true Patriot!
I've never argued against a progressive tax system. Obviously, a person who isn't even earning enough to make ends meet shouldn't be paying the same kind of tax that an owner of a company makes. However, to be honest I kind of lean more towards the Libertarians views on some issues. I honestly believe that the government should have a very strict set of things it does for us, and only take enough tax to do those things. I'm not a very big proponent of welfare because even though I know it's necessary, even (especially) in today's world, I've seen quite often how easily it can be abused, sometimes even by people personally close to me. I believe that the government shouldn't be subsidizing so many things, some of which don't have a chance (cough-solyndra-cough). Tax should only be taken by the government to pay for the services it has to provide. I personally believe that the government has a responsibility to its people to spend their tax money wisely. In my personal opinion, that means that they should stop trying to find more ways to spend our money and throw us into more debt, and start trying to find ways to cut programs that have either become obsolete or are just too unwieldy.
Sorry. I didn't mean to soapbox.
The tax I believe is wrong is where the government sets a cap on the amount of money a person is allowed to have, and then says "simply because you have more than this much money, we're going to take the rest away from you". Then you're not having the owner (government) charging a person for services provided (public services), you're having a highwayman (again, the government) robbing a person in broad daylight because they "have too much money". It's no different than walking into a bank that only rich people deposit in and pulling out a gun and robbing the place.
I know we come back to this $1,000,000,000, which is in and of itself a rather large number, but the fact of the matter is that it is an arbitrarily assigned number by the OP. He could have said a hundred million or ten billion, and either way, he's advocating the same thing. You have no moral superiority to a broke homeless man who says "let's tax everyone who's got over $5500, because that's plenty enough to live on". Again, as a matter of perspective, both the OP and the homeless man assigned what they consider an arbitrarily large amount of money, and said that anyone over that amount of money has "too much" and should have it taken away, albeit slowly, rather than all at once.
And just so there's no confusion: no, I am not rich. I work a day job in manual labor and am only not living paycheck to paycheck because I've learned how to carefully budget my money. Do I wish that someone would come up to all the rich people in the world and take their money and give me a portion? Yes, I do. Do I believe it to be a moral or ethical thing to do? No.
See, there is where we disagree. Do I want all the rich people to have their money taken and a portion given to me? No. Do I believe it to be ethical? Yes. Have a look at libertarian socialism and a man named noam chomsky at chomsky.info or go to youtube and type in noam chomsky manufacturing consent and see is this is the type of libertarianism that you find appealing. It advocates worker-led industry and community-led govt that limits the authotiy of the central govt and empowers the local govt and worker to run the world instead of big govt. and wall street. Worker-led industry removes the stockholder and gives the worker voting rights on the direction of the company and a share in the profits...
I tend to shy away from anything including the word socialism because I just cannot believe it works. Whether a corrupt government elite is handing down the orders or everyone voted on which orders to hand down, you still run into the fact that socialism believes that everyone will be working for the "greater good", because everyone had a share of the common wealth. I'm sorry, but that doesn't really work, ESPECIALLY if you involve direct democracy. I found a saying I heard about that a while back that I find appropriate: "A society that allows for complete control by the popular vote will only last as long as the populace doesn't realize that it can vote itself bread and circuses."
Also, I never said I was a libertarian, just that I lean towards their viewpoints on certain issues.
I dont understand your quote at all....but. Socialism is more closely aligned with democracy that capitalism...Is it best as a good mix? Of course. Worker-led industry allows privately owned businesses to operate and trade on a world market collectively, with the profits and direction of the company decided by employees - not shareholders who only see the bottom line. No worker is going to vote to send their job overseas because it increases the profit margins.
My quote basically says that if regular people are given the choice, they'll choose to give themselves what feels best to them, instead of what is good for them.
Bread and circuses is a metaphor for a a government supplying superficial appeasement of shallows "needs", rather than doing what is right for their people.
Just look at obesity in this country. Almost but not quite all of it is self-inflicted. Yes, there are people with diseases or injuries that result in them being fat, but for a hefty (pun totally intended) majority, it's just because they don't want to do the dieting and exercise necessary to stay in shape.
It works the same way in society. If you have a group of people working together, and they have to choose between making electronics they can use at home or tractors that someone else can use on a farm, it's pretty likely that they'll make the electronics for themselves, and screw the farmers.
Once their factories are all set to make electronics, do you really think that the group would be willing to pay the price to convert their factories to tractors once everyone has enough electronics? Or will they just continue to overstock electronics on the chance that a new market will open up and they'll be rolling in the dough again?
Of course, my quote has a secondary meaning as well.
If a community can get together and vote that the community will pay for their bills, or give them all free 52 inch LCD TVs, or provide them all with free food for the rest of their lives, then why wouldn't they vote for such things?
Like the great writer Robert Heinlein said: "Once the monkeys learn they can vote themselves bananas, they'll never climb another tree."
Things may seem to go okay at first, but what happens when the society votes themselves so many "rights" that even if they taxed the whole income of their constituents, they won't be able to pay for it? Would the people want to work so much harder to pay for their extra "rights", or would they be so indoctrinated by that time that "it's their right" that they feel that any extra effort on their parts should result in extra compensation?
Thanks for the clarification and I agree...pure socialism is hard to implement - maily because it would take years to reverse the learned behaviors that socio-economic status can best be achieved individually intead of collectively. We have feudalism and captalism to thank for that. However, worker-led industry is still driven by profit operated in a privately owned and operated market - it just eliminates the shareholder and their 'rights' in favor of the employees. No employee will vote to send his own job overseas because all he sees if the bottom line and an increase profit margin... This way whether you make electronics or tractors, you still operate a business of profit, it is just fairer and a more level playing field, thus reducing the authroity and wealth away from the one percent!
I don't really agree with you as to most of that, but I'll ignore it because I don't want to turn this into a philosophy debate wherein we both agree that there may be some small amount of evidence for the other's point of view but in the end we still believe our own economic theories.
But you also indicated (about 4 posts up) that you wanted a more direct democracy form of local government that overrides the national government, which still makes my second point valid.
Increasing tax does NOT increase wealth for the community. This has been proven time and again. It lowers productivity. You look at all consumer nations in the world that increase their wealth through consumption and capitalism and all the countries that have some sort of economic controls, China, North Korea, Eastern Europe 30 years ago Africa, I could go on and on, i know where i would rather live.
Stoid idea. Fucking drop this "tax everyone" mentality you people sound like morons.
Wealth is the sum total of all assets. Why not tax a % of all assets over say $10,000. That way most of us will pay some. Richest pays most. No exemptions, no credits, no ifs ands or buts.
The thing is: the upper 1% have had extraordinary returns the last 30 years. Also, small holdings are typically already taxed via local property tax. I would exempt the first Million which would let folks own a house, save for education, own tools they might work with and have a retirement fund-it would still leave about 80% of assets subject to taxation(the assets owned by the upper 5%). I think as a society we'd benefit if more people were able to do all those things on their own ticket.
I'd also go easy on the folks with $1-5 Million. The real problem are the top 1%
That's double taxation and I'm all against it. This is simply class warfare.
I hear the word greed thrown around here all the time. When I hear people that believe in redistribution of wealth, these words come to mind..... envy, jealousy, haters, leaches.
A guy builds up a company from scratch and makes a nice fortune and the jealous haters throw out any justification they can that separates that man from his money HE earned instead of building wealth themselves.
You know what the international symbol of liberals is?!? It's an outstretched hand demanding somebody else put something in it.
"Build wealth" from where? There's no middle class left to fleece. We're fighting for scraps, silly.
Define middle class and where has it gone??!?! I love when people call it fighting for scraps. That's so melodramatic.
You build wealth by saving. If you aren't making enough in your chosen occupation to save then learn something new that will allow you to build that wealth.
Not everyone is going to be rich nor should they be. I don't hate on people that are rich, but the left makes an industry out of doing so.
Not everything is easy in life and when it isn't, it makes it only that much sweeter when you accomplish it. And when you don't... well life goes on. No need to whine and cry about.
Ah yes... the whine-nification of America. When I hear this stuff, I can't help but think of this picture.....
http://3.bp.blogspot.com/_OR8dKL3XDN8/THOr-W1YfrI/AAAAAAAAF7E/ETJnSt4Ss3E/s1600/democratic_crybaby_seal.jpg
When did this become about right/left? If you want to be an entrepreneur you need to have someone to sell to. No middle class means no market. I'm not talking about some bullshit "hard work" I'm talking about entrepreneurialism being dead, because you can't compete on one side, and can't make enough of a return on the other side.
But hey, that's the cost of an aristocracy. When there's only so much to go around, and you want to make sure no one can ever take it away.
The war on the middle class was started by the 1% a long time ago. Middle class income has stayed flat for a generation while the top end has gone up exponentially. It is not greed to need the basics of life. It is greed to demand that others live on less to support one person's lavish life style. It is not being a leech to work two jobs and still be in poverty and ask for help. It is being a leech to suck on the labor of others to support a lavish lifestyle. All of these class warfare arguments can be made by either end of the wealth distribution spectrum. The issue is one of values. Do you believe in sharing the benefits of your work with others or not. If you do not believe in sharing at all, the word for that opinion is selfishness. It is a balancing act. Giving people the incentive to work and innovate but not forgetting that others may not be as lucky or smart or that they helped get you there with their labor.
I think instead of a tax on wealth, there should actually be more tax deductions for charitable giving. I don't think the government has the right to ask for any more tax money considering how poorly it manages what it already has. Let people give it to an approved, transparent, charity of their choice in return for tax breaks. As someone who pays a ton of taxes, I can attest that people would much rather donate to their favorite charities than to an inefficient government.
But they were paid wages and are owed no more. Now if somebody wants to give them more, that's their right. But somebody telling ME what's fair when opinions very on what's fair and what's not is pointless. If somebody wants a company like that.... they should start one up their selves or find like minded people that agree with them and start such a company together.
I could never be shamed into such a concept. If I personally owned a company, at some point when I'd built up a certain amount of wealth, I'd make profit sharing for my employees. When the company makes money, we all make money. If we don't make money, don't come to me asking for a raise to make up for it. We float or sink together.
If we had asset taxation, bosses that acted like you propose would do well-and those that didn't would have problems.
To the life wasting losers of "Occupy Wall Street" When you finally come down from your last hit of "insert whatever crap drug your loser bud just passed you" Read about what it means to be a hero. http://washingtonexaminer.com/opinion/columnists/2011/10/sunday-reflection-protestors-should-try-occupying-reality-real-change
My thought process on this is that it would be more feasible to simply target the yearly earning of individuals as opposed to trying to track down all the houses they own spread around the world or the yacht that spends most of its time in international waters.
I say choose a number... say $1 million a year. Anyone who makes over a million is no longer taxed asa private citizen but now has too apply for taxes as a corporation. You inherently have created a paycap for private american citizens.
I know it doesn't sound like it would do much and by itself it wouldn't. I feel like the second part is to offer companies and corporations tax relief based on how many full time jobs they offer to americans. This way the mom and pop store that employs 5 people and makes the same this year as random football player won't be taxed as hard because they created jobs.
we have to start creating the value that with great wealth comes great responsibility and if you do things that help other we'll let you keep the money.
Most assets are either a) real estate b) financial instruments.
The SEC already regulates financial instruments. What I would do is just issue say 2% of ALL US financial instruments to the treasury each year. Those with less than $1 Million in assets would get a rebate via their brokerage accounts. Those with $1-$5 Million would get a partial rebate.
The really wealthy and foreign investors would just have to pay the tax.
I'd handle real estate via capital gains taxes specifically on real estate.
Now in this regime, I'd like to gradually eliminate all payroll taxes. The one broad based tax I think we may need are some pollution taxes-so polluters don't pass costs onto the public. However, I think we can really elminate virtually all other broad based taxes-and still bring in the revenue we need because the trickle up effect of tax reduction is so strong-and the increase of GDP from removing low end taxes is also quite real.
One estimate I've seen on GDP increase from eliminating payroll taxes is 40% or so.
$16.538 x 1012 - $5.600 x 1012 = $10.94 trillion in excess of $5M each owned by top 0.999% of American Households in 2004. From the further concentration of wealth since then, we can infer that less taxes for the top-floaters did not raise all boats. Ours and our government's debt made the top 1% richer. Cuts in entitlements and social spending for 90% of us will further exacerbate the ill distribution that has already impoverished or imperiled most Americans. The imbalance grew with every bubble and “cyclic downturn” that collapsed or brought down the economy. It's time to reverse the flow. Tax the rich until there are none! http://www.agkaiser.org/posts-2011/Where-Is-the-Money.pdf
If we switched from taxing income to assets-but kept the overall level of taxation the same, the net worth of the very rich might not change that much. The trickle up effects of tax cuts are huge-and the economy does tend to expand when we have low end tax cuts.
Now life might get interesting for Bill Gates paying $500 Million in taxes ever year, but I'm sure he'd do ok.
Taxation is theft, not something to be advocated. A better idea is call for an end to all taxes.
I am not aware of any organized large scale society able to function with an end to all taxation. There is always a need for a common fund for defense, policing, enforcement of agreements.
All of which can be provided for privately paid for by voluntary payments. After all, taxation is what enables the govt's crimes & ends up destroying society.
this is ludicris and shameful... focus on your self and those around you, not taking from anyone, ANYONE, rich or poor... build, don't take
The thing is: wealth past a certain point puts the holders in the position of the house in a casino. This effect has gotten huge in recent years-to the point the only folks gaining ground are the upper 1%.
agreed with your point.. although "taking" is not the proper methodology.. convincing to spread the wealth.. the notion of taking even the very suggestion of it... can lead to violence, hence nothing new.
Its not fair. You cant take other people's property. Unless you can prove it was gotten by unfair means. All this talk about taking money from the rich by force is not good. It reminds me of the "first they came for ...." verses.
The reagan tax cut trickle up into the hands of the top 1%. Many of them contributed to that campaign. That seems "unfair" to me.
How did it trickle up?
Here are some academic papers that describe the phenomena. www.levyinstitute.org/pubs/wp_589.pdf www.levyinstitute.org/pubs/wp_502.pdf
Reagan lowered taxes-including quite a few on folks that weren't rich. The thing is, in a world of globalization, there are limits to how much of a gap there can be in US wages and wages outside the US. Reagan helped decrease that gap by signing a major amnesty- and reducing some trade barriers. Bush ramped up NAFTA-which clinton signed. We'd already had massive increases in immigration from 1965 on-but in the early phase of that, the US economy was strong enough to absorb it-but we saw mens wages starting to stagnate even then.
Now, in a world with mobile labor and mobile capital what can change? Property values are one thing that can change. We also have a few companies that are natural monopolies-Microsoft, Intel, Oracle are examples(Facebook is another one with a strong network effect)
Land outside of folks homes tends to be concentrated among the rich. The rich also seem to get better returns on their managed funds. There are funds like Berkshire Hathaway, that you have to be fairly well to do to even get into at all. Also, there is a tendency of the wealthy to pay politicians to write legislation that specifically benefits them. I actually helped with investigation of one such case(the Riscorp illegal campaign donations scandal). This stuff has gotten way too typical-and it happens on many levels.
I think the best thing to do at this point: transfer taxes away from the middle class and onto the big asset holders.The rich will scream, but if this is a tax transfer and not a tax increase they won't be much worse off.
I'd do this but removing payroll taxes and having a tax on high net worth folks. I'd also like taxes on pollution, and real estate capital gains that aren't reflective of investment or sweat equity. .
Intel is an interesting example. Why is it a monopoly?
Any company that doesn't have at least 20 direct competitors has a degree of monopoly power. It isn't a black/white thing-there are many shades of gray. There is also an issue when a company has a huge market share-which Intel does in key areas.
How do we handle that? Forc others to invent things Intel does?
Sen Bernie Saunders has suggested that drug patents be assessed and bought via eminent domain so all drugs could be generic. Something similar could be done with computer chip technology. Just open sourcing the key schematics on these chips would open a lot of potential for smaller players in the game-just like open source has with some OS's.
I've been an advocate of this approach for a while now. oreilly.com/catalog/opensources/book/appa.html
I'd like to gradually move towards a system of government funded prizes and away from patents-and for that matter copyrights(Henry George talked about this in the 1800's). I think the improved efficiencies would be substantial. Small companies can compete in an open source regime much more effectively.
I
Eminent domain says hello.
Tax all wealth, or just a tax on the evil Koch Brothers and their kind? Lets not forget there are organizations and people like the Labor Unions, Moore, Soros, and others that are sympathetic to our cause and lobby for our interests. Don't want to weaken ourselves here.
Agreed. But we need to keep an eye on them all. George Soros was not particularly a good man when it came to the collapse of the UK financial system--and one can even wonder how much his altruism comes to bear on this current campaign. Does he want Wall Street to fail--and for what reason? We MUST be critically constructive and understand bigger and bigger pictures--and motivations--without being unduly paranoid. Not easy!
Yes, but this thread really isn't about Soros. Its more about the evil Koch brothers, and more generally about just taxing those with large amounts of wealth to make them a bit more like us. I just want to make sure we don't lump Soros, Dominique Strauss Kahn, Al Gore, Michael Moore, Arriana Huffington, Nancy Pelosi, or any of the other people who defend our beliefs into that mob mentality, or we may lose our popular support in the media.
This thread ISN'T about Soros? If I'm reading the first post right, it basically says that NO ONE needs over 20 billion dollars, and according to Forbes in September, Soros has about 22 billion. That's a crapton over the cap of 1 billion that the OP was suggesting.
The moment you start saying "well, we want to tax the rich people EXCEPT the ones who agree with us", then you become one of the most corrupt forces in economics. It's pretty much saying "agree with us or get taxed up the wazoo".
Unlike the evil Koch brothers, Soros uses his wealth to sponsor a variety of humanitarian causes. Obviously green energy should not be taxed at the same rate as big oil, Next you will be asking for union health care plans to be taxed at the same Cadillac rate as those of corporate executives. There is a difference here.
Again, I don't really agree with the OP's suggestion (for a variety of reasons), but if you DO get it implemented, then do it all the way.
From what I've heard, the Occupy movement has a huge beef with all of these "corporate loopholes" in the tax code. Saying that those who spend their money in certain ways (i.e. humanitarian causes) WON'T get taxed while everyone else will sounds like a gaping "fit-a-blue-whale-through-it sized" loophole.
Like I said earlier. If you're going to implement a tax, please do it fairly or don't do it at all. Saying that you only want to tax those you DON'T like sounds pretty bloody corrupt to me.
Let's start with Soros and Buffett. I'm not sure if Al Gore has over a billion yet, but if not we can have a special category with a lower threshold for people of his ilk.
Here is the list of Billionaires: http://www.forbes.com/forbes-400/list/
I've heard George Soros is working with the Chinese . Here is rather a long interview with Soros talking about the BIS (IMF is a middle man) and SDRs (new currency): http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ba0-rRr1y_c . He takes a rather dim view of America.
I think my idea is really more of an attempt to avoid politically distorting amounts of wealth. That is why I suggested a very high threshold. I am not sure Bill Gates or Soros would object at the 1 Billion level. I think Gates is planning on giving most of his money away. Let me tell you a story. Here in the Seattle area where I live the Seahawks wanted to build a stadium. A popular vote by the people voted it down. Paul Allen really wanted the stadium so he financed out of his own pocket another election. He then got what he wanted and they built the new Seahawks stadium. Do you know anyone else who has the money to buy his own private election? This is what I am talking about.
Yes, you are correct it would alienate some wealthy people, but I think so would higher taxes. My point is to eliminate grossly disproportionate amounts of wealth which distorts the political process and which creates a class of people who no longer have to work like the way it was in Europe when there was royalty.
I am not sure we can only take the money of evil people alone, and I doubt there is a labor union with a billion in assets. Billionaires are a rarified breed. Not too many of them at all, but they rule the world.
"I am not sure we can only take the money of evil people alone, and I |doubt there is a labor union with a billion in assets. Billionaires are a rarified breed. Not too many of them at all, but they rule the world."
Very true, but lets not forget the billionaire Warren Buffet, and Bill Gates actually support this movement. Buffet has been encouraging a higher tax rate on the wealthy. I just fear that asking to tax his wealth may go a step further, unless we exempt him and focus on the Koch brothers.
Bill Gates has been calling for higher income taxes not asset taxes. The only very wealthy person I've ever seen call for asset taxes was Sol Price-founded of a company that got bought by Costco.
Asset taxes scare folks like Bill Gates and Warren Buffet. Frankly they are lying weasels. They want to tax their competition-because it gives them a more protected position.
I share your concern. Good thoughts. Perhaps it is politically more appealing simply to argue for higher tax rates on millionaires and billionaires. We could request a high end tax rate at the Eisenhower level 91% and settle for the first term of Reagan 50%. We could then argue these were both Republican presidents. Hard to argue with Reagan if you are a Republican.
50-90% income taxes always left millionaires alone. They could always move money offshore, create foundations that were really fronts for their interest(Joe Kennedy was a master at this).
If you want to tax the rich:
tax all US financial assets Give each citizen individual a rebate on taxes of assets under $1 Million Give legitimate non-profits a rebate proportional to their membership tax real estate capital gains not accounted for by improvements
Income taxes simply DO NOT touch entrenched wealth. That is why folks like Gates and Buffet talk about raising income taxes. It is a con.
Do you really think Buffet or gates would get behind a 91% tax, even if it did catch the Koch brothers? I think we need something more targeted.
Don't let Gates and Buffet con you-they are part of the enemy too. Gates has bought a LOT of political influence to make himself richer.
A stupid idea with no actual insight. Lose this notion of trying to forcibly remove others rights, don't you understand where this leads?
Actually it doesn't have to mean redistribution. It might mean phasing in asset taxes as we see increases in the assets of the rich that exceed the gains of the bottom 75%. In that situation the rich wouldn't get any richer-but they wouldn't get any poorer either.
I think it leads to redistribution of excessive wealth but still allows sufficient incentive to innovate - $1 Billion net worth. People can disagree, but it is really no different that the high tax rates between 1936 and 1980 which never got below 70% on the top income earners and which peaked at 92% in 1952 and 1953. There is really little difference between taking money by high tax rates and taking money classified as excessive wealth. Many of the presidents in those years were Republicans - Eisenhower, Nixon, and Ford. All taxation is a forcible taking whether it is an income tax or a property (wealth) tax. The question is how much to take and who will be taxed. I am ok with taxing ten percent of a persons property at the billion dollar level.