I’m open to just about any kind of tax system as long as it’s fair (not necessarily equitable)
and most importantly it’s simple. Complicated tax systems benefit only the very wealthy. Simple tax systems are much harder to game.
Modeling a Wealth Tax
711–720 of 1001 posts
Re: Modeling a Wealth Tax
#712I would much prefer a 'cash on hand' tax that would tax yearly the cash on hand that exceeds $1B. That private companies can just sit on all this capital rather than putting it to work in the economy is a real problem. It harms GDP and it harms working class people. By some estimates its $325B[1]. If we forced companies to invest that cash in new ventures rather than sit on it, it would be a win. [1] https://www.inve…
Inflation will take care of it
Re: Modeling a Wealth Tax
#713Perhaps notable: Switzerland has a wealth tax (of up to 0.3%), and there is zero evidence that this has any deterrent effect on wealthy people settling in Switzerland or startups being created in Switzerland. Other features of the tax system more than offset the 0.3% wealth tax. Personally, I am a bit disappointed by the lack of depth of the discourse: Wealth taxes and their effect have been studied quite a bit in ec…
Also, some Swiss cantons have made special tax deals to get billionaires to reside there. Or at least that happened at least once.
Re: Modeling a Wealth Tax
#714After being one of the top-rated commenters on HN for some years, I have not commented in a long while. For what it is worth, here is my two cents on a topic - a wealth tax - that may seem on the surface to be benign but that is in fact just the opposite. Silicon Valley was founded in a spirit of freedom and flexibility but that spirit is clearly and dangerously on the wane insofar as the political environment surrou…
4 - Spain, Norway, Switzerland, and Belgium. I don't think it has stopped very wealthy people living in Switzerland or Norway in particular - but also I'm not sure how significant revenue it raises for the state.
I think it's becoming quite clear though that we need some more taxation on capital, particularly the rent-seeking kind, and more levelling of the playing field particularly in the field of education, which is primarily funded through taxes.
Re: Modeling a Wealth Tax
#715I would much prefer a 'cash on hand' tax that would tax yearly the cash on hand that exceeds $1B. That private companies can just sit on all this capital rather than putting it to work in the economy is a real problem. It harms GDP and it harms working class people. By some estimates its $325B[1]. If we forced companies to invest that cash in new ventures rather than sit on it, it would be a win. [1] https://www.inve…
How would you overcome loopholes like the $1 Trillion+ that Apple stores in the Channel islands after funneling it through Ireland and the Netherlands?
Apple has closer to $93b[1] on hand vs. $1t quoted.
Re: Modeling a Wealth Tax
#716I would much prefer a 'cash on hand' tax that would tax yearly the cash on hand that exceeds $1B. That private companies can just sit on all this capital rather than putting it to work in the economy is a real problem. It harms GDP and it harms working class people. By some estimates its $325B[1]. If we forced companies to invest that cash in new ventures rather than sit on it, it would be a win. [1] https://www.inve…
That probably creates another loophole. Even if they (big cash rich companies) hoard cash, it isn't really sitting as cash. I could claim everything except my bank's liquid cash of reserve of 10% is "invested" somewhere
Re: Modeling a Wealth Tax
#717I would much prefer a 'cash on hand' tax that would tax yearly the cash on hand that exceeds $1B. That private companies can just sit on all this capital rather than putting it to work in the economy is a real problem. It harms GDP and it harms working class people. By some estimates its $325B[1]. If we forced companies to invest that cash in new ventures rather than sit on it, it would be a win. [1] https://www.inve…
That much cash-on-hand is typically stored in a bank. Banks needs cash reserves for lending. The money isn't sitting idle.
Re: Modeling a Wealth Tax
#718Not that I support a wealth tax – I don't – but the article doesn't seem to appreciate that this kind of gradual redistribution of idle wealth is not an alarming side-effect of such a tax, it's exactly the point.
Re: Modeling a Wealth Tax
#719I would much prefer a 'cash on hand' tax that would tax yearly the cash on hand that exceeds $1B. That private companies can just sit on all this capital rather than putting it to work in the economy is a real problem. It harms GDP and it harms working class people. By some estimates its $325B[1]. If we forced companies to invest that cash in new ventures rather than sit on it, it would be a win. [1] https://www.inve…
Nobody sits on cash. Even cash on deposit in a bank isn't in the bank - a multiple of it gets loaned out to businesses and home buyers.
Re: Modeling a Wealth Tax
#720"Even a .5% wealth tax would start to keep founders away from a state or country that imposed it."
Is the author speaking for himself, or making a generalization about all wealthy people?