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Just Be Rich (2021)

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Re: Just Be Rich (2021)

#311

Post by immibis »

nec4b wrote: post #301
immibis wrote: post #296

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Go on. Which economics text book would tell me that if the government incentivized investments to 100x their actual value, the resulting investments wouldn't be bullshit?

Any economic textbook will tell you increasing taxes on capital, decreases investments. No need to make up silly analogies which are false equivalences.

Then decreasing taxes on capital increases investments. Decreasing them all the way to negative ten thousand percent would increase investments a lot. Is that a good thing?

Re: Just Be Rich (2021)

#312

Post by nec4b »

immibis wrote: post #311
nec4b wrote: post #301

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Any economic textbook will tell you increasing taxes on capital, decreases investments. No need to make up silly analogies which are false equivalences.

Then decreasing taxes on capital increases investments. Decreasing them all the way to negative ten thousand percent would increase investments a lot. Is that a good thing?

You really aren't making an argument you think you are. If you are truly interested about macroeconomics there are plenty of good books out there from many different ideological viewpoints. Most of them explain what you are trying so vehemently disapprove with weird analogies.

>> Decreasing them all the way to negative ten thousand percent would increase investments a lot.

A physicist would say you have just invented perpetuum mobile.

>> Is that a good thing?

Does it matter if what you suggest is impossible?

Re: Just Be Rich (2021)

#313

Post by skybrian »

dragonwriter wrote: post #305
skybrian wrote: post #197

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If you’re going to be that picky about the definition of “capital” then maybe the question is why would anyone be against farms and factories? :) So okay, for capital, substitute “ownership of a claim to the profits from capital.” I think it might be fun to imagine an economic system very different than ours, but I suspect it’s going to need cultural institutions that fulfill similar roles, because they serve human n…

> If you’re going to be that picky about the definition of “capital” then maybe the question is why would anyone be against farms and factories? No one is against farms and factories. Some people are against ownership of farms and factories by private parties separate from working in them. > For example, suppose that in the system you’re imagining, a retired worker goes to the store to get something to eat. Then they…

When people start talking about economic systems other than capitalism, I’m never really sure how different those systems are supposed to be, so thanks for clarifying that your imagined system does include money.

I’m still pretty unclear on how it works, though. Who makes decisions about factories and farms and how do they get funding? What are the sources and sinks for money in this system?

(For example, one simple model has money being created via government spending and drained via taxes. The taxes create the demand for money.)

Re: Just Be Rich (2021)

#314

Post by dang »

throwaway22032 wrote: post #246
soared wrote: post #208

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes, so it’s completely out of your children’s control whether or not you chose those decisions. Therefore, they are lucky you are doing that. They have zero impact on whether or not the actions of their grandparents resulted in generational wealth.

Nonsense. You posted this comment 7 hours ago. Current you has zero impact on whether you posted it. Time flows forwards, not backwards.

Please edit swipes out of your HN posts. This is in the site guidelines: https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html.

Re: Just Be Rich (2021)

#315

Post by robocat »

rightbyte wrote: post #304
robocat wrote: post #106

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Wealth tax 2% at $1million was a platform policy of the very left Green Party in New Zealand - and NZD $1M is about USD600k! Although they did increase it to NZD2million asset limit. Governments (or maybe voters) don't seem to understand incentives: New Zealand government and its taxation structure discourages building or growing a profitable business. Why should anyone build a business when any winnings will be slow…

> Why should anyone build a business when any winnings will be slowly taken from you over the years? Because the payout might be better than wage labor and you only pay the tax if you win big?

Yeah, I need to make a simple spreadsheet and try and figure it out.

The problem is that the risks are high: the usual figures are less than 1 in 10 businesses succeed or that a 30:1 payout is the minimum sensible financial payout (VC figure).

Winning is hard even though we don't have a CGT. Marginal tax at 39% doesn't encourage marginal business building. And once you have the house and the bach, the marginal utility of money drops for an individual: the marginal happyness from the next million is a lot lower than the first million (also see "income satiation"). The discount rate, and the personal cost are other huge factors, and the average person doesn't like a financial winner.

Investing money and time in a high risk activity like starting a business is not fiancially sensible from what I have seen. We do it to chase status, not because it makes sense on a spreadsheet.

Re: Just Be Rich (2021)

#316

Post by immibis »

nec4b wrote: post #312
immibis wrote: post #311

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Then decreasing taxes on capital increases investments. Decreasing them all the way to negative ten thousand percent would increase investments a lot. Is that a good thing?

You really aren't making an argument you think you are. If you are truly interested about macroeconomics there are plenty of good books out there from many different ideological viewpoints. Most of them explain what you are trying so vehemently disapprove with weird analogies. >> Decreasing them all the way to negative ten thousand percent would increase investments a lot. A physicist would say you have just invented…

Can you answer the question? No, you can't.

Re: Just Be Rich (2021)

#317

Post by dragonwriter »

skybrian wrote: post #313
dragonwriter wrote: post #305

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> If you’re going to be that picky about the definition of “capital” then maybe the question is why would anyone be against farms and factories? No one is against farms and factories. Some people are against ownership of farms and factories by private parties separate from working in them. > For example, suppose that in the system you’re imagining, a retired worker goes to the store to get something to eat. Then they…

When people start talking about economic systems other than capitalism, I’m never really sure how different those systems are supposed to be, so thanks for clarifying that your imagined system does include money. I’m still pretty unclear on how it works, though. Who makes decisions about factories and farms and how do they get funding? What are the sources and sinks for money in this system? (For example, one simple…

> Who makes decisions about factories and farms and how do they get funding?

The least dissimilar version to the modern mixed economies that dominate the West currently would be a system in which the firms employing workers were (in the ideal state; real systems -- even "capitalist" ones -- are rarely platonic ideals of the underlying concept, and so in practice exceptions, e.g., for sole proprietorships of certain scale and with defined worker rights, are possible as a matter of convenience rather than right) universally labor coops; "financial capital", which is not capital in the sense being discussed, would still exist, but labor would rent financial capital rather than capital renting labor; money would be essentially unchanged from how it works in the modern West.

Re: Just Be Rich (2021)

#318

Post by nec4b »

immibis wrote: post #316
nec4b wrote: post #312

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You really aren't making an argument you think you are. If you are truly interested about macroeconomics there are plenty of good books out there from many different ideological viewpoints. Most of them explain what you are trying so vehemently disapprove with weird analogies. >> Decreasing them all the way to negative ten thousand percent would increase investments a lot. A physicist would say you have just invented…

Can you answer the question? No, you can't.

The government can't incentivize investments up to 100x times or make negative 1000% taxes on investments. I thought my reference to perpetuum mobile made that clear.

Re: Just Be Rich (2021)

#319

Post by immibis »

nec4b wrote: post #318
immibis wrote: post #316

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Can you answer the question? No, you can't.

The government can't incentivize investments up to 100x times or make negative 1000% taxes on investments. I thought my reference to perpetuum mobile made that clear.

Of course the government can.

Re: Just Be Rich (2021)

#320

Post by nec4b »

immibis wrote: post #319
nec4b wrote: post #318

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The government can't incentivize investments up to 100x times or make negative 1000% taxes on investments. I thought my reference to perpetuum mobile made that clear.

Of course the government can.

No, they really can't.
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