We are publishing the tax secrets of the .001%

The problem isn't that it hurts the sheep as well, it's that it hurts the sheep almost entirely. Raising capital gains would be a decent idea that forces the rich to pay more. Basically zero support for it. Closing loopholes helps too, not what we're seeing in tax policy discussions which focus on rates instead.

Raising the top rate on income when most of the ultra-rich's money comes from investment isn't making sense. There is also little interest in creating ultra-high tax brackets. I agree in principle with someone earning $5 million/year paying a higher percentage than someone earning $1 million/year. Many countries the top rate starts at $120,000ish in local currency.

Taxes on the sale of a primary home is not as rare as you think. It may be a twice in a lifetime event for many people but if it costs you a fortune each time people are discouraged from buying starter homes and then upgrading as their family grows. Make this too expensive and people even choose to have fewer children rather than get a bigger house. People may also choose to avoid the real estate market early to wait for a realistic home and risk getting priced out entirely. Admittedly, capital gains taxes are less punitive than land transfer taxes in this regard but it's still a factor. A capped to $500K of capital gains on a primary residence of tax avoidance is useful for middle and upper middle class Americans. It's not a measure designed predominantly for the rich unless your definition of rich is so broad that it includes any property owner. We've seen what happens when you create markets where people can't move and it looks a lot like San Francisco. That's not something I'd want policies to try and replicate.

If you are in the US you should brush up on your personal finances.

But the article lays out wealth as a baseline, stating that taxes paid are a small percentage of the wealth increases. Wealth is mostly unliquidated because it is stock.

If I'm understanding the argument correctly, the proposition is that we should ( morally, not legally ) have levied additional taxes on these folks because their net worth has gone up as calculated by the value of things they own, like stock. I find that surprising and somewhat unintuitive. Thanks for clarifying.

Every single time someone tries to make a tax targeting the ultra rich, someone writes a comment just like this. Every. Single. Time.

As far as I can tell, this comment is semantically identical to:

"Every time someone tries a new cancer therapy, it ends up not helping the worst cancers."

"The sting operation was a failure because it only caught low- and mid-level criminals."

"We shouldn't use automated tests because some bugs cannot be caught by it."

"Look, this bully is ten times stronger than my kid. He's gonna beat him up whether my kid wants him too or not. We should just accept that the kid is gonna get pummelled."

There are at least four flaws I can see:

1. The obvious "perfect is the enemy of the good" argument. Unless you have an alternative proposed tax that is flawless, then the comment does not get closer to a world where people pay a share of taxes commensurate with their point on the wealth continuum.

2. By framing it as "hurting" the moderately wealthy, it applies a narrative that taxes exist to punish, that the extremely wealthy deserve that morally, and that the moderately wealthy do not. Every piece of that narrative is wrong. Taxes exist to fund services, not enforce moral orders. It's not like we have a higher tax rate for convicted criminals. The moderately wealthy also have a capacity to afford taxes higher taxes without lowering their quality of life, so a tax law that hits them too has not "failed". Even if taxes were punishment, this comment presents no actual evidence that the moderately wealthy are morally purer than the ultra-wealthy.

3. Some fraction of today's moderately wealthy are tomorrow's obscenely wealthy, so applying some tax pressure on them today is a step towards preventing them from escaping that tax burden tomorrow.

4. Equating people who make 500k in a year with "the working class" is... I don't even know what to say about it.

5. Forcing the ultra-rich to do extra work to dodge this new law is a net good. Defeatism, which seems to be the counter-proposal here, makes it even easier for them to retain and acquire wealth. We should keep passing laws. Every time they find a loophole, close it. Vote out politicians that get bought. Make them keep jumping. Wear the fuckers out because eventually some will lose if you keep trying. If you let them win... well you let them win.

I find it absolutely fascinating that your arguments are shot down on this board, because it's business, but that is literally what you're told on a constant basis if you want to go into the education field in the US.

You don't do it for the paycheck, you do it because you like it. Why education, social work, and other human services fields, but not business? That is odd to me.