Wealth Taxes...an intelligent discussion

[LordAnubis]

On 3/16/2026 at 7:12 PM, El Presidente said:

• We love democracy. 

Do we? I don’t think it’s working. Democracy plus capitalism that creates straight up bullying corrupt politics and atrocious one sided “reporting” is creating absolutely moronic systems in my mind. 

Taxing “wealth” in my view is taxing unrealised income. Which to me is stupidity. However, I think the problem comes where an Elon as example uses this unrealised asset as collateral for a loan then uses the costs of that loan to deduct income. If you’re using it as collateral then it’s “realised” in my book and you should pay tax on it. 

The problem with tax is it’s unfairly proportioned to the middle class who don’t have a structure to minimise theirs. Not everyone has a business they can immediately write off a cost with a 30% effective discount from the government. For this reason I’d be more in favour of scrapping all company and personal income tax and apply GST on goods. Of course, some items like groceries and health and education should be entirely exempt of gst and other like a lamborghini should be slammed with a huge gst. That will force those who are buying bullshit fancy stuff to pay what they owe. No dodging. 

Also, of course make the royalties system better and stop companies using Australia as a free pilfering zone. 

I look forward to that 'ranga' from Queensland running this country into the ground. Will be hilarious as I’m watching it from wherever she send me to. 😂

[El Presidente]

You miss the point Mus...that's why the populous loves democracy! 

• You can vote in politicians who will maintain or increase handouts. 
• You can eventually tax the rich out of existence because there are more of you. 

There is nothing wrong with Democracy in tandem with Capitalism. The third spoke to that wheel is a moral/social compass-compact. That spoke went missing some 15 years ago.

[LordAnubis]

Maybe it is the morals but the way the system has developed around the world right now, I’d rather live in a country led by Gadaffi than practically any global politician. I think there’s a growing portion of people who try to stay informed who are realising the voting system isn’t worth the time to cast your vote.  

I don’t think voting achieves any objectives because of corruption and the reality of what capitalism has created of politics and “news”. Voting is mostly based on sensationalist information rather than an informed vote. Voting for me these days is more about “least harm”. Well maybe my obvious priorities and beliefs are just in the grey area of Australian politics.

But for sure I’ve not had anyone say how amazing it is how much they love democracy and their voting is impact real change. 😂

[TheGipper]

Much of the discussion is poisoned by the "top 1% control 95% of the wealth" myth. Note the use of the loaded emotional term "control" instead of the objectively accurate "have" or arguably somewhat subjectively accurate "created".

First "study" of this was many years ago, pushed by Oxfam. It used outrageously misleading methodology, like excluding primary residences and retirement funds.

Ah yes, if you exclude the middle class's homes and 401ks, voila, you get a wild wealth imbalance. Terribly misleading. And the studies just like just keep on coming.

The corollary "bottom 30%" or so in developed countries have zero or negative net worth by any methodology. This includes children, young adults, even the just-graduated-from-medical-school doctor just starting up in practice. With his giant medical school debt, he's statistically in the bottom 1%! 

Consider what that means. That homeless guy you just gave $20 to? The fact he's got a current net worth of $20 means he has more wealth than the bottom 30% combined! Outrageous, no?  Emotional reaction!

Well, of course not, it's plainly meaningless and misleading. No one should be setting public policy based on irrational, meaningless comparisons. Yet this equally meaningless and misleading "top 1%" stuff does lead people to want to make public policy in reaction to that.

And don't forget, you can confiscate the entire net worth (100% wealth tax) of the world's billionaires (~14.2 trillion USD), and distributed evenly to the entire world's population (8.3 billion), it amounts to $1710 USD per person. Be honest with yourself, is that about the amount you thought it would be, or way less?

[RedLantern]

10 hours ago, TheGipper said:

Much of the discussion is poisoned by the "top 1% control 95% of the wealth" myth. Note the use of the loaded emotional term "control" instead of the objectively accurate "have" or arguably somewhat subjectively accurate "created".

First "study" of this was many years ago, pushed by Oxfam. It used outrageously misleading methodology, like excluding primary residences and retirement funds.

Ah yes, if you exclude the middle class's homes and 401ks, voila, you get a wild wealth imbalance. Terribly misleading. And the studies just like just keep on coming.

 

I wouldn't say it's misleading to exclude primary residences and retirement funds if you're attempting to isolate wealth that can be used to exert real power and influence (control) in society. 

[El Presidente]

19 hours ago, RedLantern said:

I wouldn't say it's misleading to exclude primary residences and retirement funds if you're attempting to isolate wealth that can be used to exert real power and influence (control) in society. 

70% of the average Americans Net Worth is made up their home and retirement accounts. The charts I posted take this into account. 

19 hours ago, RedLantern said:

 if you're attempting to isolate wealth that can be used to exert real power and influence (control) in society. 

Like creating jobs? 

[RedLantern]

Sure.

[chasy]

Happy Tax Day!!

Where the top 10% in America pay 76% of the taxes!

[thehat484]

As an accountant, I hate taxes. That's why I work as a controller instead so I don't have to deal with it. Not that I don't understand it, but because something very American in me gets enraged when I see the amount we are taxed and the extent of these taxes. 

The real problem is the corruption and government spending. The government spends too much and provides too little. The idea that if we tax wealth we'll be able to suddenly pay for everything is stupid and will only increase government spending. Give it a decade or so then the next topic will be some other new tax. 

Government officials need term limits. There needs to be something in place that automatically removes people from office if the government spending is not in line with revenues. 

Another big problem besides the political side of things is that average people don't have money. Why? We sent all the manufacturing jobs overseas, and now we are offshoring white collar work too. Give it another 20 years and Eastern Asia and South East Asia will be booming economies while the western world will devolve. It needs to be illegal to offshore any work that handles sensitive customer information. In my opinion that should include peoples' shipping and billing addresses.

[chasy]

For those that want to pay more taxes, you can! There’s a voluntary gifts to the United States fund that was created in 1843!

[treberty]

I live in Canada and therefore I pay a lot of taxes… about 53% in my case. I don’t think I’m radical leftist. In fact, I’m for fiscal responsibility (personal and governmental). Taxpayers with young families benefit from the system in place for sure. Not so sure about DINKS though.

That said: how much does one need to be happy? My portfolio is doing just fine. We own a few properties. Our kids will be ok. I get to live life on my own terms. What more can I ask for? That’s why I can’t comprehend how a handful human beings can be worth more than the GDP of many poor countries combined, where millions of people do their best to survive, every single day.

In the end, it’s only a matter of perspective, IMO. I’d gladly pay more in taxes if our governments had a sound societal project (they don’t). 

[chasy]

1 hour ago, treberty said:

I live in Canada and therefore I pay a lot of taxes… about 53% in my case. I don’t think I’m radical leftist. In fact, I’m for fiscal responsibility (personal and governmental). Taxpayers with young families benefit from the system in place for sure. Not so sure about DINKS though.

That said: how much does one need to be happy? My portfolio is doing just fine. We own a few properties. Our kids will be ok. I get to live life on my own terms. What more can I ask for? That’s why I can’t comprehend how a handful human beings can be worth more than the GDP of many poor countries combined, where millions of people do their best to survive, every single day.

In the end, it’s only a matter of perspective, IMO. I’d gladly pay more in taxes if our governments had a sound societal project (they don’t). 

Totally fair view. I’d say give it away to the causes you believe in, or in the US, you can voluntarily give to the Treasury.

[PuroDiario]

Wealth taxes sound fair until you look at what actually happened when countries tried them. Most of Europe moved away: France, Sweden, Germany, Denmark...Capital leaves, valuations off, and tax revenue misses the promised number. That’s been the track record.

What has actually moved people up the ladder, across very different contexts, is making it easier to build a business. Post-war Germany, Korea, Taiwan, Poland after communism, even China’s more capitalist phase. The progress comes from enterprise, not redistribution. More jobs, more owners, more consumption, and ultimately a bigger tax base.

To me the real question isn’t whether wealth should contribute (it does), but what actually lifts people. If we care about solidarity, it’s creating the conditions for more people to become self sufficient via education, healthcare, childcare, access to capital. 

So I’d argue that while taxing wealth feels like justice to many, enabling people to create wealth is justice to many more. 

[Chitmo]

I think the biggest problem is that all these “rich people” aren’t rich. They’re allowed to leverage controlling shares of companies as collateral to get sub prime loans and never pay taxes. Stop allowing people to use unrealized income as collateral and force them to take incomes to get paid like the rest of us. 

[PuroDiario]

[Kaptain Karl]

There needs to be a change to the tax code in the US. The wealthiest (not those who make 500k-5 mil a year, those with $100 million + in assets) really don’t pay taxes. They leverage tax free liens against assets. I have a good buddy who’s the right hand guy for a billionaire developer…who hasn’t paid income taxes in 30 years. There’s too much tax burden on the middle class while the system really caters to the super rich. With our spending deficit we need to come up with $500 billion+ or more a year in tax revenue. 

AI can make this much easier by tracking all financial transactions and find where the super rich are using safe havens to shield tax burdens.

Also using the consumer base of America as a tool. If you’re an incredibly wealthy American businessman, pay our taxes or your companies won’t have access to our consumer market. 

If someone can just move out of country but still access our consumer base, then it makes no sense.

[Namisgr11]

On 4/6/2026 at 6:41 AM, El Presidente said:

70% of the average Americans Net Worth is made up their home and retirement accounts. The charts I posted take this into account. 

Like creating jobs? 

When the wealth disparity is as great as today's and growing still, there's a tipping point when, despite paying workers, the ultra-wealthy don't pay a living wage to enough of their workforce to be a net positive. Creating jobs is far from the same thing as creating good jobs.

And since wealth 'redistribution' to aid ordinary workers by giving them livable wages and providing the most vulnerable and needy citizens with safety nets isn't going to happen voluntarily very often, some vehicle(s) for collecting more from the ultra-wealthy is the approach that makes the system more supportive to society as a whole and less predatory, greedy, cruel, and obscene. And they sure as hell can afford it.

[yuppie]

People are going to start wondering what they're even getting paid in or what assets they're holding that are of any worth. When the government simply prints more money out of thin air, the only value of that is the threat of violence. The same is true for taxes. We're living through a transitional period of the current financial system. We're all drowning in this thing called "inflation". It doesn't have much time left.

[joeypots]

And, not for nothing, the SCOTUS holds that spending money to influence elections is a form of constitutionally protected speech under the First Amendment.  So, as the concentration of wealth becomes more acute the disparity in the ability to spend to promote candidates from the bottom half suffers proportionally.  

[Namisgr11]

In think I understand some of what you're saying.  But I wouldn't characterize the ultra-wealthy as 'drowning' in any financial sense. Quite the opposite. It's more the bottom 98%, on whose backs the super-rich have stood while exploiting and leeching to get there.

As for inflation, I'm on the old side and so lived through my college and graduate school years in a decade in which inflation ran almost continuously at 8-15% annually. Yet when that runaway inflation subsided, standards of living thereafter were very good, at least through the remainder of the century.

[joeypots]

3 minutes ago, yuppie said:

People are going to start wondering what they're even getting paid in or what assets they're holding that are of any worth. When the government simply prints more money out of thin air, the only value of that is the threat of violence. The same is true for taxes. We're living through a transitional period of the current financial system. We're all drowning in this thing called "inflation". It doesn't have much time left.

Except my old man used to say the exact same thing when I was 17. That was 50 years ago.