Billionaires should face a minimum tax rate, report says • Hacker News Board

Re: Billionaires should face a minimum tax rate, report says

#21

Post by Eumenes » Mon, Oct 23, 2023, 1:51 PM UTC

harimau777 wrote: post #10

Eumenes wrote: post #3

Government economists say the government needs more tax money. Very convincing. Instead of making people dependent on social welfare systems, and funneling money to useless bureaucracies, how about we force the billionaires to put that money to use in the markets? Not just stocks and bonds. Most certainly not NGOs/non-profits (they siphon enough public money). Venture capital, urban renewal projects, interests that p…

Things like venture capital, research, and urban renewal projects could produce new technologies and companies (which might help the economy). However, they wouldn't necessarily do much to address inequality. It's the difference between making a bigger pie and distributing the pie more evenly. As I see it, the best strategy is to try to balance both approaches.

The same governments that created this so-called inequality should receive billions to address the inequality they apparently created? I don't really buy that. And we all know that inequality, from a western perspective, means addressing "equity", which is a fancy term for wealth redistribution, likely along racial/ethnic lines, and not class.

Re: Billionaires should face a minimum tax rate, report says

#22

Post by jackmott42 » Mon, Oct 23, 2023, 1:52 PM UTC

HPsquared wrote: post #17

jackmott42 wrote: post #15

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Elon bought twitter with unrealized capital gains.

Surely they became "realized" in the process.

Nope, because he used a loan, so he was able to buy twitter and not pay taxes. He will have to pay taxes if and when he pays off the loan, maybe.

Re: Billionaires should face a minimum tax rate, report says

#23

Post by VikingCoder » Mon, Oct 23, 2023, 1:52 PM UTC

scythe wrote: post #11

This seems to ignore the fundamental reason that billionaires don't pay taxes. It's not that governments don't try to tax billionaires. It's that they're able to avoid claiming income when they make money. But following this reasoning, they would likely develop ways to avoid claiming wealth as well. Consider, for example, Warren Buffet's own example of his California properties which have a taxable value well below t…

I love the ancient trick of taxing goods on a ship.

You tell me how much the goods are worth.

Then it's my choice whether to charge you the tax on that value, or to just hand you the value and the goods are mine now.

Re: Billionaires should face a minimum tax rate, report says

#24

Post by specialist » Mon, Oct 23, 2023, 1:53 PM UTC

The moral reason to tax wealth is because gross (and accelerating) inequity is unfair. We're way past the era of the landed gentry extracting rents from the poors. Err, I mean we should be.

The practical reason to tax wealth is to keep the money moving. Idle capital (hoarding) is its own special badness.

Keep the money moving. Either the wealthy spend their money (R&D, philanthropy, building cool new stuff, ice cream for all) or the people will spend it for them.

Re: Billionaires should face a minimum tax rate, report says

#25

Post by rjsw » Mon, Oct 23, 2023, 1:54 PM UTC

scythe wrote: post #11

This seems to ignore the fundamental reason that billionaires don't pay taxes. It's not that governments don't try to tax billionaires. It's that they're able to avoid claiming income when they make money. But following this reasoning, they would likely develop ways to avoid claiming wealth as well. Consider, for example, Warren Buffet's own example of his California properties which have a taxable value well below t…

I think we will need to abolish trusts as well as imposing a wealth tax.

Re: Billionaires should face a minimum tax rate, report says

#26

Post by claudiulodro » Mon, Oct 23, 2023, 1:54 PM UTC

pclmulqdq wrote: post #7

Unrealized capital gains are not income. This article wants a wealth tax because they think this is "income" that is going untaxed.

Why is it unthinkable to make billionaires generate some income to pay taxes? I pay property taxes on the "unrealized capital gains" of my house, and somehow I make it work.

Re: Billionaires should face a minimum tax rate, report says

#27

Post by RyanAdamas » Mon, Oct 23, 2023, 1:55 PM UTC

Taxation does not equal better quality of life for citizens. The only ones proposing this myth are the ones who need more revenue to justify the obscene amounts of debt they leverage with it - and, that's governments.

Re: Billionaires should face a minimum tax rate, report says

#28

Post by s5300 » Mon, Oct 23, 2023, 1:55 PM UTC

RyanAdamas wrote: post #27

Taxation does not equal better quality of life for citizens. The only ones proposing this myth are the ones who need more revenue to justify the obscene amounts of debt they leverage with it - and, that's governments.

[dead]

Re: Billionaires should face a minimum tax rate, report says

#29

Post by clarkmoody » Mon, Oct 23, 2023, 1:56 PM UTC

claudiulodro wrote: post #26

pclmulqdq wrote: post #7

Unrealized capital gains are not income. This article wants a wealth tax because they think this is "income" that is going untaxed.

Why is it unthinkable to make billionaires generate some income to pay taxes? I pay property taxes on the "unrealized capital gains" of my house, and somehow I make it work.

Perhaps you shouldn't have to pay unrealized gains on your house?

Re: Billionaires should face a minimum tax rate, report says

#30

Post by ndsipa_pomu » Mon, Oct 23, 2023, 1:56 PM UTC

I think we need to start treating extreme wealth hoarding as a mental illness. If someone has a net worth of more than a $billion for an appreciable amount of time, then they should be locked up to protect the world from their malfeasance and prevent them exploiting yet more people. A possible exception would be when someone inherits a vast fortune, and maybe they should be allowed some time to demonstrate that they are giving away wealth, though obviously a billion dollars is such an obscene amount of money that giving it away is going to take years.