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No one should work more than 40 hours/week at any job in the US to pay for food, clothing, housing, education, health care, child care and transportation. Anything less than that is a substandard wage.
are you thinking that folks that get ahead only work 40 hours?
why should 1 person be able to pay for all you're talking about (not sure what education you're talking about), especially "child care"?
I suppose this is what a "Social Democracy" is? You work 40 hours or less, the government provides all these things for you?
That's not true. Several countries offer single payer healthcare and subsidized college, and their citizenry aren't lazy
perhaps you can share these doubly-awesome countries with us, and confirm
*what the middle class pays there in taxes
*what % of all taxes do the rich pay
*what % of ~18 yr olds go to college using this subsidized plan.
here's one link and chart to help on point #3. You'll note higher education (tertiary) includes 2-year school and vocational training.
see, if they could be successful at it, the government would figure out a way to "invest in" a healthcare entity that provided great care, easy to access, and at a cost you could afford. You can't have all 3 though.
Stop the lies. Most employees are not voluntary, they go out of necessity. Otherwise there would not be clamoring from employers to end unemployment. Laura Ingraham spilled the beans on this in August.
And why shouldn't they be able to? Six individual men have more wealth than half the world's population. We have the money for people to work ANY job and not struggle. We just don't tax the ultra-wealthy, for some reason. I'm not sure you understand just how wealthy some people are. Elon Musk could end world hunger with 2% of his wealth, and he'd still be one of the wealthiest people in the world. Again, we have the money, it's just overly concentrated in a few people.
We're not asking to tax the business owner who is doing well. We're asking to tax the "creating a new space program is my quirky hobby" level of wealthy.
So you mean to tell me that these people pay no taxes as of today? That's news to me.
Starting a business requires revenue. Often in the form of a loan. Also you need to have the luck to not need healthcare, etc. just saying “employees can start a business does not mean it is feasible”.
oh my lollers.
Starting a business requires a product or service that someone will pay for. Having a successful business starts when someone pays more for the product/service than it costs to deliver said product/service.
Now yes, some businesses start with loans because the government wants to "help them". The revenue projections are built on best-case scenarios when the applicant has no prior experience running a business. The cost projections are generally much more accurate. But these businesses burn through cash (cost) without the ability to find folks to pay for their good/service (revenue).
Rich people think any amount of taxes are unreasonable, because they think they earned all their money in a vacuum, and that anything that is taxed will go to "those awful poors who don't deserve one crumb of it"
and you know this how?
Look, rich people have a variety of investment vehicles that are not legally or practically available to the "rest of us". There's not really a problem with limiting/eliminating those. But the "government" is who made these vehicles legally (regulations) or practically unavailable to the rest of us. Think of being able to buy stock slices $20 at a time instead of the per share cost of $1,000. We can all share proportionally in those stock increases ... but am I supposed to make the same $ as someone who invests 10X more?
The smart "rich" invest based on 2 criteria:
diversifying risk - because for ex, some days/years bonds (safe) are better than stocks (risk). And they balance this diversity given current conditions. You won't see any billionaires who invested everything - everything - in Bitcoin, even though it's up an astounding 400% in a year)
return after-tax. Sure, some of their investments are purposefully done because they are tax-free/deferred (what you claim above). But if all of their investments generate 0 taxable income, then that means they're not generating enough income for them to "live" on.
But you also should know that ESTIMATED wealth is essentially an opinion, right?
An estimated wealth is essentially an opinion. It maybe an informed opinion backed up by some data from somewhere, but it is an opinion.
If my land is guesstimated at $100 value, that mean my wealth is worth $100. Not that I have $100 in hand. But what if MY opinion is that my land is worthless? Why would you believe someone else's opinion over mine?
If the government want to tax that $100 estimation, that is cash out of my pocket, in other words, the government made something out of nothing. Or more accurately, the government EXTRACTED something from me out of nothing. It does not matter if the amount is $100 or $100 billions of opinionated wealth, you are still extracting something out of nothing.
For now, you are targeting the 'ultra-rich', but what prevents you from lowering the threshold to 'rich', then to the 'not-so-rich', then down to my level? Nothing.
If I sell my land for $100, that would be actual cash, likewise, if the 'ultra-rich' turned their intangible wealth into tangible cash, then tax. But let us say that the 'ultra-rich' gave you permission to tax their intangible wealth, would you seek our permission in the future? Why would you seek our permission in the first place? Why not just take?
Addressing at least some of your concerns - I found an intriguing article and I'll quote a bit of it showing how such estimates are used currently for calculating such things as depreciation, property taxes, etc. Things that are well-accepted...and could quite easily be applied to other types of wealth quite easily:
https://www.propublica.org/article/t...s-tax-isnt-new
"...
Today, businesses that buy equipment get to take a deduction intended to approximate the amount that it loses in value each year. This concept is called depreciation. In other words, you get a deduction based on an estimate, not when you sell something. You could call it an unrealized loss.
And then there’s the wealth tax on unrealized gains that millions of Americans already pay: property taxes, which every owner of a house or apartment is responsible for. Property taxes are a town or city’s estimate of the value of your home or land, almost always in a year you didn’t sell.
The proposal is not a wealth tax, but it has a similar goal of raising money only from the ultrawealthy. Its elegance is that it equates the gain in wealth with income. In theory, a wealth tax, which has its own complexities and constitutional questions, could be layered on top.
When people complain that the new billionaire tax is unconstitutional, they may be forgetting about all of these provisions that exist today that do similar things.
Another argument against such a tax is that it would be too hard to enforce because it’s difficult to value assets accurately. Stock markets reflect a clear value for publicly held companies, but the value of privately held companies, real estate holdings, art and other assets is harder to determine.
That may have been more true 40 years ago, but there are now entire industries dedicated to valuing private assets. Commercial real estate, for example, relies on the work of research and investment banking companies that analyze and value office buildings. And if banks are willing to lend to the ultrawealthy against their assets, presumably they are comfortable valuing them. If all these entities can do it, so can the IRS."
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