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Millionaires call for an emergency tax on billionaires

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Re: Millionaires call for an emergency tax on billionaires

#21

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Few more steps and you"ll reach communism.

Why think of ways to improve society when we could just keep suffering through what we have now?

It reminds me of Mark Fisher's line that the problem with capitalism is it leaves no room to imagine alternatives.

Re: Millionaires call for an emergency tax on billionaires

#22
post #16
post #10

Earlier quoted context omitted.

A progressive tax.

Taxes usually only apply to income, not assets.

So wealth tax then! It’s really just a question of finding metrics and then sending people bills to force them to liquidate or whatever

Re: Millionaires call for an emergency tax on billionaires

#23

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Why think of ways to improve society when we could just keep suffering through what we have now?

Do you not think society is improving? Over the past 20 years we had the greatest drop of poverty ever seen. Everyday society is improving.

For whom? In the US, we just had four years of people saying their lives were not improving and they had been left behind.

So they voted for an administration that would keep things that way. The world is weird.

Re: Millionaires call for an emergency tax on billionaires

#24
post #3

Until there's a wealth floor -- until everyone is fed, sheltered and has access to education, there needs to be a wealth cap. We, as a collective humanity, should not allow anyone to have more than, say, $20 million, until the basic needs of others have been met.

Let's say I start a Saas company and it does really well. Somebody offers to invest at a valuation of 25$ million bucks. By most standards of evaluation net worth- I'm worth $25 million bucks now.

who seizes ownership of my company?

What's to stop me from offering you $10 bucks for .0001% of your company and making you illegally rich?

Taxes on net worth won't work because net worth is abstract

Re: Millionaires call for an emergency tax on billionaires

#25
post #3

Until there's a wealth floor -- until everyone is fed, sheltered and has access to education, there needs to be a wealth cap. We, as a collective humanity, should not allow anyone to have more than, say, $20 million, until the basic needs of others have been met.

Okay, so then people will start to invest in gold. A cap on raw materials? Let’s keep a herd of cattle or two. And ad nauseam.

As someone from a post-communist country: when you put a limit on capital, another form of accumulating one will be created. Some people will be more able and motivated to get the new form of the value, others will be less able or simply not interested in it, some will inherit it over time. And we will end almost exactly where we had begun.

Limiting ways to accumulate wealth will not get rid of the desire to do so. Such a law will only force it to change the way it is manifesting.

Re: Millionaires call for an emergency tax on billionaires

#26
post #3

Until there's a wealth floor -- until everyone is fed, sheltered and has access to education, there needs to be a wealth cap. We, as a collective humanity, should not allow anyone to have more than, say, $20 million, until the basic needs of others have been met.

Few more steps and you"ll reach communism.

The wealth always gets redistributed. The only question is when and how.

Re: Millionaires call for an emergency tax on billionaires

#27
post #4

The wealth distribution hockey stick is getting so extreme pretty soon it's going to be "workers... and upper middle class professionals... and millionaires... of the world unite!" Anyone with less than a billion dollars is the proletariat.

All you have to lose is your Lexus!

Re: Millionaires call for an emergency tax on billionaires

#28
post #3

Until there's a wealth floor -- until everyone is fed, sheltered and has access to education, there needs to be a wealth cap. We, as a collective humanity, should not allow anyone to have more than, say, $20 million, until the basic needs of others have been met.

Such weird logic; we should level down everyone. I don't live in a nice house, so everyone should be stuck like me in an old flat until everyone can get nice house. I'm not happy -> Everybody should be unhappy

Re: Millionaires call for an emergency tax on billionaires

#30
post #9
post #3

Until there's a wealth floor -- until everyone is fed, sheltered and has access to education, there needs to be a wealth cap. We, as a collective humanity, should not allow anyone to have more than, say, $20 million, until the basic needs of others have been met.

Most basic needs are or could be met already. Apart from Housing / Shelter. Which some how no government plans to tackle because the world economy is quite literally built or based on land and property prices. Even talks about UBI completely neglect housing prices. Which I came to the sad conclusion, those that understand housing wont talk about it, those that dont understand will never talk about it.

A single child-tax-credit payment decreased the number of families with children who were having trouble affording food by 3%. https://www.census.gov/library/stories/2021/08/economic-hard... There's room for improvement.
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