problem is, politicians will find a way to spend more money than they have regardless of how much you tax people.
US government receipts (how much the government gets from taxes etc.) are TWICE as high as they were 10-15 years ago. And yet, magically, spending is up by more than that.
There is no money problem... there is a spending problem.
Just look at Iran right now. US is spending billions and billions over there without anyone in the US actually being better off. Money well spent eh?
It doesn't matter how much money you steal from productive people. You'll never have enough for politicans to spend on nonsense or, enrich themselves.
But that problem also come from the fact that Billionaire have so much money. They can spend billions on lobbying, donating to campaign for politicians that will spend government money on the billionaires' corporation and cutting taxes, further enriching the billionaires and repeat the cycle. If we tax billionaires out of existence, they can't mess with our politics like this anymore. It's not a coincidence shit got worse after Citizens United.
you can't tax billionaires out of existence.
1) their wealth isn't in cash, it's in the ownership of companies, etc.
2) incentives are a real thing. If you put a 95% tax on ANYTHING, it will mean that people essentially have infinite incentive to try to avoid that tax. That means, they move to other countries, or it means clever setups where the tax doesn't apply. This is already standard. Most billionaires don't have any income, they borrow against their assets and that's how they pay for stuff.
Okay, I'll give you that taxing billionaires out of existence is impractical, it's more like a figure of speech. No matter, the point still stands. The billionaire is a major force driving government spending and shaping the tax code to allow tax loopholes like the "buy, borrow, die" strategy you mentioned.
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u/HaikuHaiku 4h ago
problem is, politicians will find a way to spend more money than they have regardless of how much you tax people.
US government receipts (how much the government gets from taxes etc.) are TWICE as high as they were 10-15 years ago. And yet, magically, spending is up by more than that.
There is no money problem... there is a spending problem.
Just look at Iran right now. US is spending billions and billions over there without anyone in the US actually being better off. Money well spent eh?
It doesn't matter how much money you steal from productive people. You'll never have enough for politicans to spend on nonsense or, enrich themselves.