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You Are Jeff Bezos

direkris.itch.io

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Re: You Are Jeff Bezos

#11

Post by unethical_ban »

kardianos wrote: post #4

This appears to either be a sincere product of a socialist Utopian who doesn't understand basic physical processes and tax concepts, or a cleaver work of satire. I'm unsure which at this time.

I think it's pretty a humorous method of stating what many progressives have been saying for some time: Being a billionaire is inherently immoral. That you simply cannot accumulate that much wealth without underpaying or overcharging others.

I think the creator is aware that stock holdings are not legally bound to the income tax rate. That's not the point of the simulation. The point is that the rich have vehicles for their wealth that normal people don't have access to. The point is also that there are pressing, permanent problems in our society that cost less to fix than a quarter of the wealth of one person in our country.

Re: You Are Jeff Bezos

#12

Post by SllX »

iliekcomputers wrote: post #2

I decided to "pay off personal taxes" >Here's where we get into the dicey business of what "personal worth" is, and how that translates to taxable income. >Answer: It usually doesn't, because rich people are master frauds and charlatans who exploit loopholes in tax code to avoid paying their fair share. >Jeff Bezos is worth $156 billion? You're using the top tax bracket of 37% and paying out $57.72 billion of that. Y…

You are correct. Much of his personal wealth is equity in his companies, primarily Amazon. That’s tied up in Amazon’s business, not a piggy bank, and leaving that money in Amazon does leave it subject to rises and falls in the market valuation of Amazon. Realizing those gains from his initial investment and any subsequent personal investments in Amazon, or cashing out means selling on the market; and the act of selling on the market has an effect on the selling price on the market, particularly the bigger the sale.

Jeff Bezos has never earned $156B in income in his life, but on paper he could by selling everything he owns. On paper at least.

Re: You Are Jeff Bezos

#14

Post by coldpie »

belval wrote: post #8
iliekcomputers wrote: post #2

I decided to "pay off personal taxes" >Here's where we get into the dicey business of what "personal worth" is, and how that translates to taxable income. >Answer: It usually doesn't, because rich people are master frauds and charlatans who exploit loopholes in tax code to avoid paying their fair share. >Jeff Bezos is worth $156 billion? You're using the top tax bracket of 37% and paying out $57.72 billion of that. Y…

This is just another piece written by someone who does not understand how income tax works and is unable to appreciate that this problem is actually complicated. If Jeff Bezos net worth increases by 1 billion over a year, he hasn't realized any of the actual gains and that profit it purely on paper. If he chose to live on 1M$/year then he only has to pay 370k$ in taxes that's how it works for you and me and that's ho…

> Does it mean that we should tax wealth? Absolutely not.

I'm not so sure. Maybe we should. Wealth hording is a real issue. I'm at least open to the idea.

I agree with the rest of your comment.

Re: You Are Jeff Bezos

#15

Post by Lukas_Skywalker »

lprd wrote: post #3

I'm getting an error when I visit the page: > Apologies! A fatal error has occurred. Aborting. > Error: no valid storage adapters found. > Stack Trace: > e@ https://v6p9d9t4.ssl.hwcdn.net/html/1654035/index.html?v=157... @ https://v6p9d9t4.ssl.hwcdn.net/html/1654035/index.html?v=157... j@ https://v6p9d9t4.ssl.hwcdn.net/html/1654035/index.html?v=157... g/ https://v6p9d9t4.ssl.hwcdn.net/html/1654035/index.html?v=157...…

The creator mentions that this could be caused by an ad blocker: "This is usually the result of your browser's adblocker. Please disable your adblocking plugins and see if that helps things!"

Re: You Are Jeff Bezos

#16

Post by avianlyric »

leesec wrote: post #9
marcellus23 wrote: post #7

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It isn't that much more complicated than that — politics-wise, sure, but all you really need is housing and money to solve homelessness.

I wonder what kind of incentive it would create if we just started giving homeless people houses

What are you trying to suggest? That people only work to avoid homelessness? That homeless people deserve to be homeless? That providing homes to the homeless would cause people to stop being productive members of society?

Re: You Are Jeff Bezos

#17

Post by triceratops »

Swizec wrote: post #6
iliekcomputers wrote: post #2

I decided to "pay off personal taxes" >Here's where we get into the dicey business of what "personal worth" is, and how that translates to taxable income. >Answer: It usually doesn't, because rich people are master frauds and charlatans who exploit loopholes in tax code to avoid paying their fair share. >Jeff Bezos is worth $156 billion? You're using the top tax bracket of 37% and paying out $57.72 billion of that. Y…

> He's supposed to pay tax on income not on wealth. Yes. That’s the trap most of these arguments for taxing the rich fall into under the current system. Having money and making money are taxed differently. If you own a house and all of your neighbors sell theirs at a 30% markup, should you pay taxes on making $300,000 (for a 1mil house) this year? Maybe … seems kinda unfair though. You didn’t participate in those tra…

> If you own a house and all of your neighbors sell theirs at a 30% markup, should you pay taxes on making $300,000 (for a 1mil house) this year?

In most places (not California) your property will likely be assessed higher and your taxes will be commensurately higher next year. Your house's increased value isn't treated like realized income, but its effect on your taxes isn't 0 either.

Re: You Are Jeff Bezos

#19

Post by noja »

belval wrote: post #8
iliekcomputers wrote: post #2

I decided to "pay off personal taxes" >Here's where we get into the dicey business of what "personal worth" is, and how that translates to taxable income. >Answer: It usually doesn't, because rich people are master frauds and charlatans who exploit loopholes in tax code to avoid paying their fair share. >Jeff Bezos is worth $156 billion? You're using the top tax bracket of 37% and paying out $57.72 billion of that. Y…

This is just another piece written by someone who does not understand how income tax works and is unable to appreciate that this problem is actually complicated. If Jeff Bezos net worth increases by 1 billion over a year, he hasn't realized any of the actual gains and that profit it purely on paper. If he chose to live on 1M$/year then he only has to pay 370k$ in taxes that's how it works for you and me and that's ho…

> Does it mean that we should tax wealth? Absolutely not.

If he takes out a loan guaranteed by his wealth, how should that be taxed?

Re: You Are Jeff Bezos

#20

Post by leesec »

avianlyric wrote: post #16
leesec wrote: post #9

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I wonder what kind of incentive it would create if we just started giving homeless people houses

What are you trying to suggest? That people only work to avoid homelessness? That homeless people deserve to be homeless? That providing homes to the homeless would cause people to stop being productive members of society?

Merely that you must consider the incentives of policy as well as the immediate result of a policy.
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