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Just Be Rich

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Re: Just Be Rich

#791

Post by bkirkby »

mdorazio wrote: post #635
bkirkby wrote: post #561

As economist Russ Roberts often points out in these inequality discussions, the quintiles that are used to show growth only in the upper class does not refer to the same people over time. When you follow people over time, they generally move up into higher quintiles thus "getting richer." https://russroberts.medium.com/do-the-rich-capture-all-the-g... He also talks about "what happened in 1972" is more about demograp…

You and Russ both need to take a look at [1]. Socioeconomic mobility has massively fallen in the US over time. [1] https://www.weforum.org/agenda/2020/09/social-mobility-upwar...

Interesting. I'll have to fully grok it later. I've never thought about defining upward mobility as doing better than your parents.

Re: Just Be Rich

#792

Post by jcfrei »

refurb wrote: post #371
ElKrist wrote: post #254

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes that's very helpful. I cannot imagine any founder being deterred to start a company because of this wealth tax. With or without it you'd be very rich under PG's assumptions

It not a matter of a founder not starting a company, it doing it somewhere else than the US. Didn’t some study show a majority of founders are foreigners? They choose to come to the US. They can choose not to in the future.

They come to the US because it continues to be the largest free market in the world with a stable jurisdiction. That's the reason for the success of the American economy: Being the largest free-market economy with a stable jurisdiction for the past ca. 200 years. That's why entrepreneurs come to the US. Nothing to do with taxes.

Re: Just Be Rich

#793

Post by titzer »

jkingsbery wrote: post #555

> It's less a tutorial or analysis and more a thinly veiled attempt to ease concerns about wealth inequality. Given in Graham's essay he comes out and discusses the Gini coefficient, it doesn't seem like a "thinly veiled" anything. The point of the essay is to discuss how much inequality itself matters (as opposed to, say poverty, lack of access to health care, or other things other people are raising as legitimate c…

For 40 years, they've been telling me that a rising tide lifts all boats. As it turns out, that's false.

So what PG's saying now is "a rising tide doesn't really lift all boats, but the important thing is that the boats it does lift really deserve it!"

Paul, that's you and all your buddies' boats. Why does society need people who get insanely wealthy if no one else benefits? That seems like a bad deal for society. Society is waking up, and it's not listening to horseshit self-justifications from rich people anymore.

Re: Just Be Rich

#794

Post by Dracophoenix »

FlyingSnake wrote: post #197
muzani wrote: post #148

There's a little company called MyTeksi. My is a for-profit social startup with a mission to revolutionise the taxi industry. They started GrabCar, which killed off the taxi industry with higher wages, higher quality services, lower prices. To win the war against Uber, they'd lie about how long it took for a car to arrive, and they'd deceive drivers as well. A driver might be promised a $100 bonus for driving into an…

This is similar in vein to what DeliveryHero is doing in South and SE Asia. They closed shop in Europe once the regulations made it difficult to keep rider wages artificially low, and now majority of their operations are in the Developing world. The lax nature of regulations in Asia make it easier to do "naughty" things and move up the ladder.

Isn't doing it cheaper, faster, and better how most countries have risen to success since the industrial revolution? Regulations are a barrier to entry. Just because a government makes a regulation doesn't mean the reason behind is done with the best motives or outcomes in mind.

Re: Just Be Rich

#795

Post by gruez »

hellbannedguy wrote: post #627
adriancr wrote: post #588

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> The aristocrats and oligarchs of the olden days might have been corrupt, debauched and half-useless, but at least they knew it. Corruption is an incredible poverty multiplier, combined with debauched and half-useless is just insane. Living in a society led by such people isn't fair by any means. Arrogant new wealth is 100x better then old corrupt wealth that only seeks to entrench itself and friends. New wealth in…

Bill Gates 501c3 puts back less than 1 percent off their benovelent humanitarian money back to the United States. The country that coddled him, an his connected mother. Personally, I think these good ole nonprofit boys; Billy, Zuck, Warren, etc. are tax dodgers. Obama wanted to reform nonprofit regulations, but chickened out.

>Bill Gates 501c3 puts back less than 1 percent off their benovelent humanitarian money back to the United States. The country that coddled him, an his connected mother.

This is just a thinly veiled way of saying "america first".

Re: Just Be Rich

#796

Post by dls2016 »

plank_time wrote: post #719
hellbannedguy wrote: post #627

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Bill Gates 501c3 puts back less than 1 percent off their benovelent humanitarian money back to the United States. The country that coddled him, an his connected mother. Personally, I think these good ole nonprofit boys; Billy, Zuck, Warren, etc. are tax dodgers. Obama wanted to reform nonprofit regulations, but chickened out.

You make a good point that I never thought about. People who donate their money get tax breaks because it’s sorting offsetting government spending. But if they donate to a charity that spends the money outside of the US, should they get the full benefit of that tax break? It’s an interesting question that I never thought about.

Or maybe one person/immediate family shouldn't be allowed to hoard such vast resources? Perhaps he should've been taxed more so that it can be disbursed by the usual means.

Re: Just Be Rich

#797

Post by boringg »

nindalf wrote: post #151

OP mentions PG’s article arguing against a wealth tax. That article is short, simple and to the point - Modelling a Wealth Tax ( http://www.paulgraham.com/wtax.html ). It is so compelling, but also misleading and wrong. Its not easy to spot the sleights of hand he uses. I wrote more about it here - Modelling a Wealth Tax Correctly ( https://blog.nindalf.com/posts/wealth-tax/ ). And yet, I think the simplicity of PG’s…

Interesting article. I have difficult time grasping how the US government would every implement this with any real effect - even with their demanding reporting requirements. It looks like a colossal effort to gather that information and tax it appropriately. I don't see the IRS staffing up entire high specified units to go after and audit the super rich for wealth tax... the implementation of this would be painful and probably more money would go dark (my glass half full take).

Simple example that I use to wrap my head around: What are the implications on equities? If you hold a lot of stock in a hot market you have to pay taxs on that stock this year (?) What would happen if next year the stock went to half of that? Imagine there was a wealth tax during the dot com era. Maybe it would curb speculative markets?

I also think your point on first order and second order effects is also interesting. The ramifications of something like this, while appearing to be quite fair and simple is likely to be anything but once implemented.

Also - I don't disagree with fixing wealth inequality - but a wealth tax is a fundamental shift in how everyone thinks the government derives money from the population.

Re: Just Be Rich

#798

Post by kmeisthax »

McScroogy wrote: post #716
yarcob wrote: post #573

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The problem isn't a "housing shortage". The problem is that interest rates are so low, so everyone who has a bit of money on the side tries to invest in the real estate market. The result is that for every house thats sold, there isn't just someone who wants it as a living space, but also 5 people who want it as an investment. So 5 people outbid each other, the highest bidder gets it, and then the sucker who wanted t…

From your description, it seems to me that renting is cheaper than buying. So it seems renters get the better deal. It's a pity if a flat is empty for a year, but that in itself also does not cause a shortage. After all, it was rented out after a year. The market is supposed to deliver the flat to the person who needs it most. In that case, apparently it was you. Without the speculator, somebody would have rented it…

Debtors have to make even on their mortgage, at least, so an increase in prices also drags rental rates up - either because the landlord bought later and has higher costs; or because the increase in prices drives up property tax and thus increases costs on existing properties.

If the market worked, you'd see people building multi-family units everywhere until supply caught up with demand, and then you'd see a huge crater in prices as people who took a bath on real estate speculation were overrun with the resulting supply glut. This doesn't happen, for a host of various reasons. Governments want housing to be simultaneously affordable and an investment, which is impossible. Hence most cities wind up building a sort of shadow immigration system, through rent control, selective property tax moratoriums, and so on. People who have lived in a city all their life enjoy lower rents, subsidized by people who just moved in and have to buy at market rate.

Re: Just Be Rich

#799

Post by jb775 »

gruez wrote: post #795
hellbannedguy wrote: post #627

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Bill Gates 501c3 puts back less than 1 percent off their benovelent humanitarian money back to the United States. The country that coddled him, an his connected mother. Personally, I think these good ole nonprofit boys; Billy, Zuck, Warren, etc. are tax dodgers. Obama wanted to reform nonprofit regulations, but chickened out.

>Bill Gates 501c3 puts back less than 1 percent off their benovelent humanitarian money back to the United States. The country that coddled him, an his connected mother. This is just a thinly veiled way of saying "america first".

How so exactly?

Re: Just Be Rich

#800

Post by ryanianian »

benrbray wrote: post #788
px43 wrote: post #664

Earlier quoted context omitted.

My brilliant* idea to solve the real estate problem is to tax the hell out of properties that are sitting empty. Something like a 2x or 3x multiplier on property taxes or something, especially in densely populated areas, and especially in areas where there is rampant housing insecurity. The tax needs to be greater than the potential gamble of waiting for occupants. This should be both for residential and commercial u…

I have a different idea that maybe I can get some feedback on here. Maybe it's really dumb for obvious reasons, so please tell me. Construction companies that build residences are clearly creating value for society, so they should be allowed to make some kind of profit. Real estate agencies that buy property from construction companies are doing a very bad thing by renting them as "luxury" housing to people who other…

If we say "no more profit after 5x" then buildings will constantly be torn down and rebuilt or otherwise "re-constructed" to reset the clock. Renting property has its own ongoing risks as any landlord will tell you, and we reward risk with (potential) profit.

Many buildings are "luxury" in that they cost 15% more to build but then ask for 50% higher rent. It's not hard to find buildings that were once "luxury" but are now kinda gross since the veneer has peeled off. But there's not enough competition in housing to force the rent lower.

What gets people fed up is the seemingly universal constant of rents raising 10% every year despite no additional investment.

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