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Just Be Rich (2021)

keenen.xyz

61–70 of 320 posts

Re: Just Be Rich (2021)

#61
post #4

Noahopinion has a very recent interesting article on wealth and taxation. It makes me mad because it contradicts a lot of cherished ideas I have about the rich and taxation, but probably makes sense in this conversation: https://www.noahpinion.blog/p/theres-not-that-much-wealth-in...

one of the interesting things to me is that the concept of wealth isn’t finished.

not only is private wealth improving, wealth that is exchangeable for other things is improving as well.

its fine for other people to work on improving its distribution while keeping a finite set of resources affordable, because I dont have the solution to that and taking other people’s private liquid or illiquid wealth doesn’t solve that either

but its very interesting to me to see how abysmal liquidity is in every market outside of some US markets, and how we got here, and how many more things can become liquid wealth. It makes me not be able to take simpler proposals of solving out of control public spending very seriously.

Re: Just Be Rich (2021)

#62

> Paul paints a rosy picture but doesn't mention that incomes for lower and middle-class families have fallen since the 80s. These analyses never mention the fact that the consumption of wealth by the government has vastly expanded. Where does one think that wealth came from?

[deleted]

Re: Just Be Rich (2021)

#63

I live in a country with wealth tax (Norway), and I'm a bit conflicted on it. On one side, it is effectively the only real tax a many in the "ownership class" are paying - relative to their wealth. On the other side, it is a really problematic tax for entrepreneurs. It is downright horrible for startups and scaleups - critical funds that should be used to grow your company, has to be given out in dividends to founder…

Sweden, France, California, Washington state and NYC have discovered once again that taxing the heck out of rich people causes them to leave.

And when they leave, they take their spend/invest/hire money with them.

Re: Just Be Rich (2021)

#64
post #4

Noahopinion has a very recent interesting article on wealth and taxation. It makes me mad because it contradicts a lot of cherished ideas I have about the rich and taxation, but probably makes sense in this conversation: https://www.noahpinion.blog/p/theres-not-that-much-wealth-in...

[deleted]

Re: Just Be Rich (2021)

#65
post #4

Noahopinion has a very recent interesting article on wealth and taxation. It makes me mad because it contradicts a lot of cherished ideas I have about the rich and taxation, but probably makes sense in this conversation: https://www.noahpinion.blog/p/theres-not-that-much-wealth-in...

Wealth is unelected power, a bug. It’s reasonable to say there should be limits on wealth, considering most wealthy people were lucky (either by birth or “right place right time”) but attempt to post rationalize it as anything else. Would you want someone who won a lottery ticket to have power over your life at scale? Because that’s what excess wealth is, a power dynamic powered by a suboptimal system masquerading as…

That's such a simple, yet profound analogy. It's a great bit of framing for these types of conversations.

Re: Just Be Rich (2021)

#66

> false claim that wealth inequality is solely due to more startups and not a real problem says a lot. The article assumes that wealth inequality is bad, but never explains it. The thing is, people all have different abilities and make different choices in life. These lead inevitably to different results. In order to make everyone equal, peoples' freedoms must be taken away.

There's copious amounts of ink spent on why wealth inequality is bad for a country. The author doesn't need to rehash all of those arguments to make his point.

Re: Just Be Rich (2021)

#67

> false claim that wealth inequality is solely due to more startups and not a real problem says a lot. The article assumes that wealth inequality is bad, but never explains it. The thing is, people all have different abilities and make different choices in life. These lead inevitably to different results. In order to make everyone equal, peoples' freedoms must be taken away.

[deleted]

Re: Just Be Rich (2021)

#68

I live in a country with wealth tax (Norway), and I'm a bit conflicted on it. On one side, it is effectively the only real tax a many in the "ownership class" are paying - relative to their wealth. On the other side, it is a really problematic tax for entrepreneurs. It is downright horrible for startups and scaleups - critical funds that should be used to grow your company, has to be given out in dividends to founder…

The US had same problem with family farms. The farm itself was very valuable, so when being left to the children as inheritance, it was heavily taxed. But, this is a problem, because what is left is not enough for the kids to make a living. So in the act of trying to tax the rich with inheritance, there are some lower/middle layers getting hit very hard. Taxes don't have to be a flat number, there should be exemptions carved out like for family farms. But of course, anything can be gamed.

Re: Just Be Rich (2021)

#69

I live in a country with wealth tax (Norway), and I'm a bit conflicted on it. On one side, it is effectively the only real tax a many in the "ownership class" are paying - relative to their wealth. On the other side, it is a really problematic tax for entrepreneurs. It is downright horrible for startups and scaleups - critical funds that should be used to grow your company, has to be given out in dividends to founder…

Is it a big problem for country that wealthy people are living? I thought most country wealth comes from oil and gas. And until it’s no longer the case it somewhat makes sense to avoid large wealth gaps.

Re: Just Be Rich (2021)

#70

I live in a country with wealth tax (Norway), and I'm a bit conflicted on it. On one side, it is effectively the only real tax a many in the "ownership class" are paying - relative to their wealth. On the other side, it is a really problematic tax for entrepreneurs. It is downright horrible for startups and scaleups - critical funds that should be used to grow your company, has to be given out in dividends to founder…

Sweden, France, California, Washington state and NYC have discovered once again that taxing the heck out of rich people causes them to leave. And when they leave, they take their spend/invest/hire money with them.

Sure. If you can move to another state to live cheaper, why wouldn't people. That is the argument for a more nationally consistent tax code, so the 'rich' can't just game the system by moving to the one cheap state where they bought off the politicians.

And same goes internationally, if all countries would enact laws against money laundering, or at least enforce it, then the rich wouldn't so easily move their money around.

Just because they can avoid taxes doesn't mean it is the governments fault for having taxes.

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