At this point? Literally just killing the mother fuckers (through the legal use of state punishment of course).
I really don’t want my childrens children having to deal with this as we try to debate more liberal based policies that will inevitably be chipped away at again in the future. We can’t leave the class structures in place that got us to this point again. If we do, we are absolutely failing future generations.
People talk about FDR like we need a “new new deal”. Nah. Fuck that. We need a “burn it the fuck down and put the pedophile capitalist in a prison cell Deal”
The policies we need don’t really have to do with taxation at all. And really what we need is beyond just policy changes too.
I suppose the main difference is philosophical, if it’s logical or fair to tax someone on unrealised gains. It problematic to me for a number of reasons. Mechanically, how and when do you assess that, and how can it be done fairly? Much more importantly though, is the political achievability, and I think you lose too many people off the bandwagon if you go down that route.
The same goal could be realised both more deterministically and in a way more palatable to the electorate by closing the loopholes you mention, thus forcing the realising of a gain (and a taxable event) as the only means of using one’s assets. In this way you don’t create a divisive wealth tax, rather you ensure that the existing taxes on capital are actually applied. This can be augmented by moving from a flat capital gains tax rate and instead taxing it progressively as income, another deterministic and more objectively fair approach.
I believe we could also implement a significantly higher inheritance tax rate, as it’s much easier to build consensus around punitive tax rates for wealth not personally generated. Why not something like 90% above $10m? There are many people that will fight taxation of entrepreneurs, claiming they’ve earned their wealth. However, it’s much harder to argue that some rich guy’s descendants who did nothing more then be born deserve huge sums of money to do fuck all.
If you do both of those, you ensure that the very wealthy pay their fucking taxes, and that huge intergenerational wealth transfers instead become huge taxable events.
To oversimplify: they can’t hide the real-world things in which they store their wealth. So for example tax land, tax stock ownership, tax pollution. Legalize heists from unreported gold hoards.
If you tax income then the ultra wealthy can find some financial construction to ensure that they have zero income. Of course, this is also true for wealth (see: the Gates Foundation), so maybe there is no good solution. 😅
Land value taxes. Other forms of wealth can be moved. There are too many different countries to move to and take wealth with you and hide it. Land can’t be moved.
Land value taxes also put a heavy cost on the most egregious forms of economic rent-seeking: collecting rent on people’s shelter. Collecting such heavy rent on mom & pop restaurants that they keep going out of business in a never-ending cycle of turnover. Destroying all kinds of small stores and cafes and restaurants which would otherwise build character in a community.
That’s pretty interesting. I don’t think it works right now though. A billionaire could buy up all the land in town and kick everyone out, then being the only voter just get rid of the tax after voting himself as the mayor (or just give himself back the tax money he paid).
At a federal level it may be interesting, but that would require scrapping everything and redoing the entire structure of the levels of government, since normally cities have the power to set their own property taxes, not other levels of government.
What I like about land value taxes is that there aren’t any games to play with assessing the value of land incorrectly (too high or too low). Land is addresses value based on its location, not what’s built on it. That means a parking lot in the middle of Manhattan is assessed the same taxes as the office building across the street. This also means people can’t get rich by just buying land and holding it to sell at a later date. Their taxes go up while the land doesn’t produce anything, so they lose money until they sell the land or build on it.
I’m interested in the debate between wealth taxes versus closing other loopholes (like using untaxed assets as loan collateral).
What are the arguments for both sides?
At this point? Literally just killing the mother fuckers (through the legal use of state punishment of course).
I really don’t want my childrens children having to deal with this as we try to debate more liberal based policies that will inevitably be chipped away at again in the future. We can’t leave the class structures in place that got us to this point again. If we do, we are absolutely failing future generations.
People talk about FDR like we need a “new new deal”. Nah. Fuck that. We need a “burn it the fuck down and put the pedophile capitalist in a prison cell Deal”
The policies we need don’t really have to do with taxation at all. And really what we need is beyond just policy changes too.
I suppose the main difference is philosophical, if it’s logical or fair to tax someone on unrealised gains. It problematic to me for a number of reasons. Mechanically, how and when do you assess that, and how can it be done fairly? Much more importantly though, is the political achievability, and I think you lose too many people off the bandwagon if you go down that route.
The same goal could be realised both more deterministically and in a way more palatable to the electorate by closing the loopholes you mention, thus forcing the realising of a gain (and a taxable event) as the only means of using one’s assets. In this way you don’t create a divisive wealth tax, rather you ensure that the existing taxes on capital are actually applied. This can be augmented by moving from a flat capital gains tax rate and instead taxing it progressively as income, another deterministic and more objectively fair approach.
I believe we could also implement a significantly higher inheritance tax rate, as it’s much easier to build consensus around punitive tax rates for wealth not personally generated. Why not something like 90% above $10m? There are many people that will fight taxation of entrepreneurs, claiming they’ve earned their wealth. However, it’s much harder to argue that some rich guy’s descendants who did nothing more then be born deserve huge sums of money to do fuck all.
If you do both of those, you ensure that the very wealthy pay their fucking taxes, and that huge intergenerational wealth transfers instead become huge taxable events.
That was one of the objections to land value taxes before property tax assessments became commonplace.
To oversimplify: they can’t hide the real-world things in which they store their wealth. So for example tax land, tax stock ownership, tax pollution. Legalize heists from unreported gold hoards.
If you tax income then the ultra wealthy can find some financial construction to ensure that they have zero income. Of course, this is also true for wealth (see: the Gates Foundation), so maybe there is no good solution. 😅
If magazines like Forbes can make up a system to measure the wealth of the richest, then there is a way to tax them.
deleted by creator
deleted by creator
As long as you make the conversion from “financial construction” to “personal benefit” a taxable event, I’m not sure I have a problem with that.
Land value taxes. Other forms of wealth can be moved. There are too many different countries to move to and take wealth with you and hide it. Land can’t be moved.
Land value taxes also put a heavy cost on the most egregious forms of economic rent-seeking: collecting rent on people’s shelter. Collecting such heavy rent on mom & pop restaurants that they keep going out of business in a never-ending cycle of turnover. Destroying all kinds of small stores and cafes and restaurants which would otherwise build character in a community.
I’ve often been curious about a Harberger Tax for land use…
That’s pretty interesting. I don’t think it works right now though. A billionaire could buy up all the land in town and kick everyone out, then being the only voter just get rid of the tax after voting himself as the mayor (or just give himself back the tax money he paid).
At a federal level it may be interesting, but that would require scrapping everything and redoing the entire structure of the levels of government, since normally cities have the power to set their own property taxes, not other levels of government.
What I like about land value taxes is that there aren’t any games to play with assessing the value of land incorrectly (too high or too low). Land is addresses value based on its location, not what’s built on it. That means a parking lot in the middle of Manhattan is assessed the same taxes as the office building across the street. This also means people can’t get rich by just buying land and holding it to sell at a later date. Their taxes go up while the land doesn’t produce anything, so they lose money until they sell the land or build on it.