When the Rich Said No to Getting Richer • Hacker News Board

Re: When the Rich Said No to Getting Richer

#151

Post by 11thEarlOfMar » Tue, Sep 05, 2017, 2:52 PM UTC

harryh wrote: post #136

11thEarlOfMar wrote: post #117

As CEO of GE, Jeffrey Immelt earned $17,744,236 last year. GE has 330,000 employees. If Immelt decided to take $0 and share his income equally with the remaining GE employees, he'd increase each worker's income by $53.77 per year. That's not going to do much to close either the wealth or income gaps. Part of what we are seeing is simply that corporations are getting so much larger than they've ever been in history. T…

GE employed 304,000 people in 1955. http://247wallst.com/investing/2010/09/21/americas-biggest-c...

Walmart employs 2,200,000 today.

McMillon's total pay is $19,800,000.

Per employee, that's $9.

Re: When the Rich Said No to Getting Richer

#152

Post by harryh » Tue, Sep 05, 2017, 2:54 PM UTC

11thEarlOfMar wrote: post #151

harryh wrote: post #136

Earlier quoted context omitted.

GE employed 304,000 people in 1955. http://247wallst.com/investing/2010/09/21/americas-biggest-c...

Walmart employs 2,200,000 today. McMillon's total pay is $19,800,000. Per employee, that's $9.

I agree with your top level point about CEO pay not being significant compared to corporate budgets. I'm just saying that companies that employ a lot of people aren't exactly a new phenomenon.

Re: When the Rich Said No to Getting Richer

#153

Post by brianwawok » Tue, Sep 05, 2017, 2:57 PM UTC

sharemywin wrote: post #131

jazzyk wrote: post #81

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What if you make the rules so simple that there are NO loopholes and there is no/little possibility for tax avoidance?

If you believe that too much wealth equates to too much power in a democracy then the simplest tax code would be all wealth over X is taxed at 100% all transgressions are punishable by death. Personally, I think that's a little harsh but some people only see black and white.

Hah my hft bot would double stock value of apple for 1 second and a bunch of automatic deaths would be handed down to investors.

Re: When the Rich Said No to Getting Richer

#154

Post by Consultant32452 » Tue, Sep 05, 2017, 2:57 PM UTC

quickConclusion wrote: post #42

"The theory behind all those high-end tax cuts [...] was that it would unleash entrepreneurial energy [...] The first half of that theory may well have come true. Many of the world’s most successful companies are American — not only Amazon, Apple, Facebook and Google, but also Exxon Mobil, Walmart, Johnson & Johnson and JPMorgan Chase." The article fails to mention that even when the tax code was 90% on the highest e…

Anecdotally I have some involvement in a private school here in the US that caters to foreign exchange students from China. These are the cream of the crop with the best education from wealthy backgrounds and are highly intelligent. NONE of them plan on becoming doctors. Every single one of them is going to business school because doctors are paid relatively shit compared to what they will make on the business side. And being a doctor is itself a relatively high paying gig. The idea that the difference between $2 million and $20 million isn't going to impact the life choices of the greatest minds in the world is lunacy.

Re: When the Rich Said No to Getting Richer

#155

Post by Flozzin » Tue, Sep 05, 2017, 2:57 PM UTC

baursak wrote: post #61

chollida1 wrote: post #2

I wrote this a few years ago in response to a similar piece: The problem is that the rich have the ability to take their income in alot of different ways. Tax income more, they'll take it as dividends. Tax dividends more, they'll take it as capital gains. Tax capital gains, they won't realize their capital gains until they can offset them with realized losses or they'll just get bank loans again't their stock holding…

There's a simple solution to it, no? Abolish all taxes on income, dividends, or capital gains. Introduce a single tax on wealth. Every year tax a certain percentage of one's capital holdings, whether capital gain is realized or not.

If you are wealthy and have a lot of holdings, create an offshore company and move all your wealth to it, then just get a company credit card. All your wealth and possessions is now owned by that company...

Spit balling here, but I'm not sure a wealth tax will fix it.

Re: When the Rich Said No to Getting Richer

#156

Post by TeMPOraL » Tue, Sep 05, 2017, 2:57 PM UTC

chollida1 wrote: post #2

I wrote this a few years ago in response to a similar piece: The problem is that the rich have the ability to take their income in alot of different ways. Tax income more, they'll take it as dividends. Tax dividends more, they'll take it as capital gains. Tax capital gains, they won't realize their capital gains until they can offset them with realized losses or they'll just get bank loans again't their stock holding…

> The problem is that no tax code can close all loop holes because you just can't foresee the creative ways people will out maneuver the tax code.

Especially that they can use their wealth to hire teams of world-class specialists and pay them to figure out creative loopholes. It's something regular people can't do.

Re: When the Rich Said No to Getting Richer

#157

Post by quickConclusion » Tue, Sep 05, 2017, 2:59 PM UTC

sol_remmy wrote: post #135

quickConclusion wrote: post #42

"The theory behind all those high-end tax cuts [...] was that it would unleash entrepreneurial energy [...] The first half of that theory may well have come true. Many of the world’s most successful companies are American — not only Amazon, Apple, Facebook and Google, but also Exxon Mobil, Walmart, Johnson & Johnson and JPMorgan Chase." The article fails to mention that even when the tax code was 90% on the highest e…

> So increasing tax rate beyond a couple of millions a year, or even before, seems a no-brainer to me, at least until everybody gets healthcare and free education. How much money do you think that will take? I'm willing to bet your estimate is too low by a factor of 100. I've known multiple family friends who have easily used $500k+ a piece in government healthcare.

>How much money do you think that will take?

Most developed countries pay $3,000 to $4,000 per capita, according to Wikipedia. US pays about $7,400 per capita. So that would be the costs I guess. Beware there are more "capita" than taxpayers, and that all taxes are not paid through income taxes.

Hopefully we can find ideas from other countries to pay less than current prices.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Health_system#International_co...

Re: When the Rich Said No to Getting Richer

#158

Post by baursak » Tue, Sep 05, 2017, 3:03 PM UTC

Flozzin wrote: post #155

baursak wrote: post #61

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There's a simple solution to it, no? Abolish all taxes on income, dividends, or capital gains. Introduce a single tax on wealth. Every year tax a certain percentage of one's capital holdings, whether capital gain is realized or not.

If you are wealthy and have a lot of holdings, create an offshore company and move all your wealth to it, then just get a company credit card. All your wealth and possessions is now owned by that company... Spit balling here, but I'm not sure a wealth tax will fix it.

If you're an owner of an asset, and your primary residence is in the country of wealth taxation, you pay a wealth tax on the value of that asset, no matter where that asset is located.

Another problem though is valuation of that asset. There will be huge incentives to show lower valuations, but that's already a case for things like real-estate property taxes, and somehow the system still works.

Re: When the Rich Said No to Getting Richer

#159

Post by dhuramas » Tue, Sep 05, 2017, 3:03 PM UTC

chollida1 wrote: post #2

I wrote this a few years ago in response to a similar piece: The problem is that the rich have the ability to take their income in alot of different ways. Tax income more, they'll take it as dividends. Tax dividends more, they'll take it as capital gains. Tax capital gains, they won't realize their capital gains until they can offset them with realized losses or they'll just get bank loans again't their stock holding…

I was trying to see if there is a way to fix this- "no tax code can close all loop holes", and my first thought was Formal methods- and lo and behold Google points me to http://snapl.org/2015/abstracts/hsu.pdf

It sure looks promising. But still wondering if it has been applied in practice.

Re: When the Rich Said No to Getting Richer

#160

Post by baursak » Tue, Sep 05, 2017, 3:06 PM UTC

naveen99 wrote: post #140

baursak wrote: post #61

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There's a simple solution to it, no? Abolish all taxes on income, dividends, or capital gains. Introduce a single tax on wealth. Every year tax a certain percentage of one's capital holdings, whether capital gain is realized or not.

What about a business that is worth 10 million dollars but has a bad year and makes no profit. So now the owner has to pay a tax on the 10 million dollar wealth and liquidate his business ?

Why would they liquidate their business? I'm not advocating for a 100% rate. If they continuously lose money year after year, then the wealth tax would just be an additional incentive for them to shutdown, yes.