How the Rich Reap Huge Tax Breaks From Private Nonprofits • Hacker News Board

Re: How the Rich Reap Huge Tax Breaks From Private Nonprofits

#191

Post by jcfrei » Sun, Jul 30, 2023, 4:15 PM UTC

Swenrekcah wrote: post #139

00ff wrote: post #129

Earlier quoted context omitted.

False, we never stopped taxing the rich. We reduced top marginal income tax rates though, so they moved more money into income and stopped hiding as much in shell companies and inventory. The top 1% earn 20% of national income, but their taxes comprise 40% of federal income tax revenue. US Gini coefficient (inequality measure) decreases by a third after accounting for taxes and transfers.

Assets should be taxed progressively. Capitalism results in the power coming from capital. Therefore capital taxes should be the primary taxation mechanism. There are issues with it such as cashflow problems and more, but all systems have issues and they can be overcome.

Exactly, taxing assets instead of income is a no-brainer. All income that is not used for consumption becomes an asset itself and if people cant consume all their income then that should be taxed. The reason it isnt done is that any country that introduces wealth / assets taxes experiences immediate wealth flight (see Norway for a recent example). A wealth tax can only be done at a global level for example through the OECD.

Re: How the Rich Reap Huge Tax Breaks From Private Nonprofits

#192

Post by rcme » Sun, Jul 30, 2023, 4:15 PM UTC

tommiegannert wrote: post #65

dools wrote: post #10

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The bigger problem is a fear of public spending because of perceived incompetence. The stigma comes from a time when only governments had run big bureaucratic systems. Now we can see there is little difference between public and private bureaucracies except for a lack of oversight on the latter. Still the stigma remains and all public spending is filtered through a profit making entity.

The big difference is that I can choose not to pay a company I don't like, and that's fine. Governments will happily make my life crap if I don't pay taxes. I dislike greed as much as the next person, but the monopolized incarceration powers of governments are not to be forgotten. For some services, collective funding makes sense, like having hospitals that can stop the spread of diseases, or forcing pooling of money…

It’s ironic that you’re complaining that you can’t avoid paying the government when the only reason you can pay for anything at all is because the government uses its monopoly on violence to protect your property rights. Paying the government is the price of participating in commerce at all.

Re: How the Rich Reap Huge Tax Breaks From Private Nonprofits

#193

Post by klyrs » Sun, Jul 30, 2023, 4:17 PM UTC

dantheman wrote: post #179

JKCalhoun wrote: post #100

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> incompetent and wasteful actions on huge scales As others have pointed out, this is independent of whether we're talking about the government or private sector. Regardless, when I see workers on a road crew standing around I don't think "wasted tax dollars", I think "money going back into the economy." Of course in my view of a fair society it would be a preponderance of idle, wealthy money that is going back into…

There is a fundamental difference between public and private and that is one of consent. We have no consent when it comes to government actions. Look at the amount of money wasted on the the war on drugs. Where do you think wealthy money is if not in the economy?

> Where do you think wealthy money is if not in the economy?

Being leveraged to extract rents, the very enemy of productivity.

Re: How the Rich Reap Huge Tax Breaks From Private Nonprofits

#194

Post by WarOnPrivacy » Sun, Jul 30, 2023, 4:19 PM UTC

missedthecue wrote: post #187

dools wrote: post #10

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The bigger problem is a fear of public spending because of perceived incompetence. The stigma comes from a time when only governments had run big bureaucratic systems. Now we can see there is little difference between public and private bureaucracies except for a lack of oversight on the latter. Still the stigma remains and all public spending is filtered through a profit making entity.

I don't think it's a stigma. It's observable. Government agencies are created to fix problems. If they fix the problem they are downsized. As an extreme example, the Department of War got very big in WW2, fixed the problem of Nazi Germany and Imperial Japan, and then shrunk. From 40% of GDP, to about 5%, and today a little over 2 or 3% For most government agencies, it doesn't work this way. They get lots of funding,…

> Government agencies are created to fix problems. If they fix the problem they are downsized.

Typically, sizable problems that need solving do not stay fixed. Issues that have broad impact are likely either chronic or will morph into new problems.

Downsizing in the face of a chronic problem seems unwise. So does downsizing to ignore the the offshoot (or new variant) of the problem.

Re: How the Rich Reap Huge Tax Breaks From Private Nonprofits

#195

Post by nobodyandproud » Sun, Jul 30, 2023, 4:25 PM UTC

cscurmudgeon wrote: post #185

nobodyandproud wrote: post #167

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes, by underfunding auditers and accountability. Or throwing out money without any sense of accounting. Yes, fraudsters will take full advantage of it. Your example shows why we need more auditers and more frequent auditing, not less.

> Your example shows why we need more auditers and more frequent auditing, not less. Yes more auditors for govt. Not more govt. auditors for business. More auditing != govt auditing of private business There is a jump of logic there to go from left to right of the equation.

> Yes more auditors for govt. Not more govt. auditors for business.

It was your example.

Explain then the point of your example, beyond “see, government must be incompetent.”

Because I see a leap of logic in saying “government (org) +government (audit)” incompetence implies “private (org) + goverment (audit)” incompetence.

Nevermind that all nuance was stripped away in making a one-liner.

Re: How the Rich Reap Huge Tax Breaks From Private Nonprofits

#196

Post by [deleted] » Sun, Jul 30, 2023, 4:28 PM UTC

laserlight wrote: post #186

almost_usual wrote: post #126

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You’ve got it backwards, the rich should fear the masses. There’s a reason Leland Stanford moved to Palo Alto.

> the rich should fear the masses Only if the masses could coordinate, which doesn't happen easily.

[deleted]

Re: How the Rich Reap Huge Tax Breaks From Private Nonprofits

#197

Post by sesuximo » Sun, Jul 30, 2023, 4:30 PM UTC

00ff wrote: post #124

Most commenters here seem to have a false impression of the distribution of taxation. "The rich pay little taxes" is disinfo. The truth is more like "the rich pay most of the taxes." The US has had progressive taxation since 1913. Today, taxes on the top 1% of earners comprise 40% of federal income tax revenue, top 5% comprise 60%, while the bottom 50% comprise 2% (however note income taxes are only half of federal r…

I think “top income earners” might be misleading? For the people in the article who donate say 40mil to their foundation and write off that 40mil from their income… if they earned 30mil that year, would they still be counted as a top 1% earner for the year in your metrics?

I think you’re right overall about top 50% and top 1%, but I think as you consider ultra wealthy people it might not be as simple (or at least i wonder about more edge cases; maybe I’m wrong)

Re: How the Rich Reap Huge Tax Breaks From Private Nonprofits

#198

Post by amatecha » Sun, Jul 30, 2023, 4:32 PM UTC

dantheman wrote: post #179

JKCalhoun wrote: post #100

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> incompetent and wasteful actions on huge scales As others have pointed out, this is independent of whether we're talking about the government or private sector. Regardless, when I see workers on a road crew standing around I don't think "wasted tax dollars", I think "money going back into the economy." Of course in my view of a fair society it would be a preponderance of idle, wealthy money that is going back into…

There is a fundamental difference between public and private and that is one of consent. We have no consent when it comes to government actions. Look at the amount of money wasted on the the war on drugs. Where do you think wealthy money is if not in the economy?

Oh, but tons of people totally believe in the war on drugs and voted for politicians who directly support that crap. So it's "kinda" consented to, in fact explicitly sought. Just like all the "tough on crime" crap we get to hear about, so many of us think it's utterly ridiculous and the absolute wrong approach, but many are also all about that philosophy and absolutely want the government enacting such policies.

Re: How the Rich Reap Huge Tax Breaks From Private Nonprofits

#199

Post by mihaic » Sun, Jul 30, 2023, 4:32 PM UTC

Honestly, why isn't there a general indignation against the concept of tax breaks for any charitable contribution?

I'm generally not aligned with the libertarians, but let's just lower taxes and simply let people give wherever they want.

The only real benefits that non-profit structures like a 501(c) should be that their donations aren't taxed as income, and that's it.

Re: How the Rich Reap Huge Tax Breaks From Private Nonprofits

#200

Post by amatecha » Sun, Jul 30, 2023, 4:36 PM UTC

brigadier132 wrote: post #53

afavour wrote: post #50

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Think about how important roads are to just about every facet of keeping the country running. I also think the relevant question here is “compared to what?”. The built in assumption is that the public sector is extremely wasteful compared to private but large private companies are also extraordinarily wasteful. Think of the amount of money Meta pisses away every year on frivolous stuff that goes nowhere.

Our roads suck and they were created 100 years ago. Can we talk about effective use of government money from the past half century at least? And can we at least show a pattern of competency rather than a pattern of waste?

Uhhhhh.... what? New roads are being constructed literally every single day. I think you'd have an impossibly difficult time finding a single road in NA that is actually 100 years old and hasn't received repeated expensive maintenance.