121–130 of 378 posts
Fascinating to see how many tech people, as soon as they get rich, turn to extreme. Name them all - they mostly all are very active on X, and each new tweet pushes the limits of what was previously deemed unacceptable. I'm rich, so my opinion must be more important, right?
Well, they did /something/ right ...
Why don't we tax stocks like we do homes with a property tax? Why am I paying property tax on the majority of my net worth, but billionaires are not?
Also, I know all about the buy/borrow/die strategy and I have an idea for that too. Let's tax all loans as income. They are, in fact, income. "B-but they have to be paid back!" That's income again, the bank should pay tax on it.
Money is power. That is the problem with extreme wealth. It provides unaccountable power outside the democratic process. It is not surprising that an already powerful man wants even more power, but I do not understand why anyone else would go along with this.
It's a structural problem in our socio-technical system. You can't separate money and government, because "corruption" to some degree is the default state. Yes there are exceptions, but the opposite if the bad apple concept. You have to get lucky to find the good apples. Which means there is some structural insufficiency in the concept of money and government.
> one that would strip voting rights from anyone who pays no income tax It could be an interesting thought experiment to consider the second and third order consequences, even if, from first principles this is a non-starter in a democratic society. First off all, what percent of people do not pay any taxes on income? What portion of them are poor vs. hedge fund managers or other super wealthy people who have structur…
It would be interesting to see the class of doctors, lawyers and small business owners fighting against the class of large cap c-suite and the billionaires.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
It's a structural problem in our socio-technical system. You can't separate money and government, because "corruption" to some degree is the default state. Yes there are exceptions, but the opposite if the bad apple concept. You have to get lucky to find the good apples. Which means there is some structural insufficiency in the concept of money and government.
> It's a structural problem in our socio-technical system. it has always been like this, has it not? almost by definition the more resources you have the more power you have. this is how the universe works.
How much more evidence do we need that there is in fact a class war going on and the rich are winning? The biggest con they ever pulled off is making working class people (and yes, that includes you, fellow tech workers!) hate unions. Unions are the only way workers can fight back - they may be able to tell individuals what to do, but they can't control the collective. This is also why they're so feverishly trying to…
> one that would strip voting rights from anyone who pays no income tax It could be an interesting thought experiment to consider the second and third order consequences, even if, from first principles this is a non-starter in a democratic society. First off all, what percent of people do not pay any taxes on income? What portion of them are poor vs. hedge fund managers or other super wealthy people who have structur…
This is all very beneficial for big business including Shopify: businesses can pay lower wages since the government steps in with benefits, including food, cash, housing, energy, medical care, and so on, for people with lower incomes, and then that means they have more money to spend as consumers (relevant to Shopify).
> one that would strip voting rights from anyone who pays no income tax It could be an interesting thought experiment to consider the second and third order consequences, even if, from first principles this is a non-starter in a democratic society. First off all, what percent of people do not pay any taxes on income? What portion of them are poor vs. hedge fund managers or other super wealthy people who have structur…
I dont think its a good model for America but if I were starting a country from scratch I might consider it. But I would also do stuff like a heavy death estate tax and disallow most generational wealth transfer.
There are some "reasonable" exceptions one could argue for, but as soon as you start making exceptions, you open yourself to abuse of the system. For example, using the tax code to enact social policy. I think it would be more honest for the government to take in all the money as taxes and then turn around and distribute money for socially beneficial programs such as green energy, schools, public health, et cetera. If you look at who screams about this, you'll probably find that most of them are opportunistic people who are afraid somebody will cheat the system better than they do.
This would also be a good opportunity to create an independent, transparent organization that audits where the money goes and provides raw data they use to justify their actions to the public so that others can double-check their conclusions.
#IfIWereKing