91–100 of 236 posts
Earlier quoted context omitted.
Wouldnt it be easier just to tax all income above say $200,000 (minimum wage in SV) at 100%. If a net worth of $2 mil is considered outrageous then surely that kind of salary would be considered equally so.
Most net worths over $2 mil are created by growth in share value, not by income/salary.
Inheritance is in most cases the only way young people in a lot of European countries can even own their own home
That sounds like a lottery for housing, with extra steps? Hypothetical scenario: we have 100 houses, and 200 young families looking for one. Your solution in effect is: let's give 100 houses to the 100 young people with an inheritance. That sounds arbitrary. Lack of housing is a disconnected problem from inheritance taxes.
inheritance taxes are just mafia theft, no matter how you rationalize it
Inheritance is in most cases the only way young people in a lot of European countries can even own their own home
That sounds like a lottery for housing, with extra steps? Hypothetical scenario: we have 100 houses, and 200 young families looking for one. Your solution in effect is: let's give 100 houses to the 100 young people with an inheritance. That sounds arbitrary. Lack of housing is a disconnected problem from inheritance taxes.
Many in the US expecting an inheritance from their baby boomer parents are in for a rude shock. Why? Because their assets are going to get eaten up by retirement living and end-of-life care. If you still own your assets when you go into care, Medicaid is going to use up all those assets before paying for it and this could be tens of thousands a month with long-term medical care. You can avoid this is you plan ahead.…
> the average house price in London was £70k. Now it's >£700k. It doesn't have to be this way. It shouldn't be this way (for a healthy society) 10x in 35 years is compounded rate of return of under 7%, which is not far off the average mortgage rate over that period of time. Add in some maintenance and that might even represent a loss in real terms over that period of time.
Wages aren't 10x in that same period. All the increasing house price has done is transfer wealth from the younger generation to the older generation.
inheritance taxes are just mafia theft, no matter how you rationalize it
1) set a generous threshold over which your inheritance gets taxed, inflation adjusted (e.g, 2M not including the principal residence) 2) tax 100% above it. (should only concern a fraction of a fraction of cases) 3) put all this tax's proceeds in a sovereign wealth fund 4) at 21, a citizen gets access to her redistributed generational wealth 5) profit
There's a reason why countries, like Sweden, have scrapped the inheritance tax - it doesn't work like that anymore. The benefits of wealth are exercised long before the inheritance can be applied. Your first home down payment, your education, your wealth generation while being on support by your parents, etc. - will push you off the ground faster, than any inheritance in a world where people easily live to 80-90. Mos…
Agreed.
But isn't that an argument FOR a strong inheritance tax? Because inheritance doesn't actually help your children anyway? That seems like it was your argument.
With that argument taking 100% of the inheritance as tax and taking 0% is exactly the same, as the wealth transfer was done before anyway.
inheritance taxes are just mafia theft, no matter how you rationalize it
Earlier quoted context omitted.
You are confusing "if only I get a high inheritance tax" with "if everyone gets a very high inheritance tax". The inheritance tax has to go somewhere. It could go into science and infrastructure and then everyone gets richer. Or it could be paid out as a dividend, then everyone below the average gets richer. There are many options here. Just saying "inheritance tax bad" without talking about the output side of such a…
Boy can i tell you, it does not go to "science". It goes 99% to paying for social security.
So we shouldn't really argue for raising or lower taxes, we should argue for spending it better.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
Why make it on inheritance then? Tax wealth 100% above 2M. I do think this would doom progress but would be a fun exercise.
Wouldnt it be easier just to tax all income above say $200,000 (minimum wage in SV) at 100%. If a net worth of $2 mil is considered outrageous then surely that kind of salary would be considered equally so.
There should be no wealth tax, but above a certain threshold - there should be a maintenance fee associated with the wealth. I get charged maintenance fee by my mutual funds, for example.
One of the purposes of the government is to protect and secure property... and that is what ultra wealthy are getting for a fraction of what they should be paying.