this post was submitted on 30 Sep 2023
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Why do countries have wealth taxes and completely reasonable economies when it's supposedly impossible. I'm not saying let me design a US wealth tax I'm saying wealth taxes do make sense, do exist and at least do something and the US could certainly implement them given sufficient political will.
Two of the 5 OECD countries that have wealth taxes are neighboring countries to mine, they do have industry, services etc. certainly not dead places.
Also I've never seen any (proposed) wealth tax start at anywhere lower than 1M in assets and with higher than 1% taxation so I just don't see how any of the opposition is genuine. Why would there be such opposition to a topic that only impacts a few percent of the countries population. And that at the same time is actually properly understood by even fewer people.
Also have you ever moved country with a several billion dollar company, with the US federal government after you for taxes, I don't imagine it'd be particularly easy or cheap, the US has many massive subsidies for local companies, and some otherwise tax favorable conditions in some of it's states, I doubt it would be an easy decision for many of these owners.
Countries were trying to tax wealth since Ancient Rome times and it NEVER worked. 12 OECD countries had some kind of wealth tax. As of 2021 only 5 have it. I bet you that in 20 years none will.
The thing is that asset value is not money. It's just a number someone got out of their ass. And this value is volatile, it can change in any direction any day. And you have pretty much zero control over it. Here's an example from UK where I live. A lot of people bought homes to live in London in 1990-s for tens of thousands pounds. Today these houses are valued at over a million. You want to target those who have over 1M in assets? Well, most of London is now fucked for no reason and without any wrongdoing. How do you expect a nurse in retirement to pay such tax?
OK, you put a limit higher to target Bezos. But Bezos doesn't have cash to pay 1% from his billions. He will have to sell shares. That will tank Amazon share prices and potentially destroy the business. And who would want to buy shares and invest with taxes like that?
By the way, the five countries are Colombia, France, Norway, Spain and Switzerland. France is already abandoning this stupid tax, Norway started to think about it. Economies of Colombia and Spain are in ruins partially thanks to this tax. And Switzerland... Well, Swiss are gonna Swiss. Their economy is very non-standard.
Yes I've read the Wikipedia article as well thank you very much but you still don't seem to accept that taxes can and should be used to regulate the economy. That's the entire point frankly. Some business should be destroyed because it's bad for the people at large. Some people should need to get rid of one of their houses so that it doesn't remain empty half the year. That's the point.
And even if Norway and France abandon this policy and Spain and Columbia are supposedly in ruin couldn't their collective healt and happiness not be better even despite a smaller economy. Is it impossible for you to imagine a world where a smaller economy is better for it's people than a larger one.
And on the other side of the coin wouldn't you think not being sovereign over the world reserve currency and the largest economy in the world make it a lot harder to protect yourself effectively from capital flight.