How the Richest 400 People in America Got So Rich

[CLite]

cool tax-rate chart

That is a pretty great image you linked. First things first, this shows the 1% earning 21% of income but paying 21.6% of all taxes, this is pretty fair. However, this ignores the "wealth accumulation", which I think neither political party has a good viewpoint on.

The main gripe about how much "wealth" these guys have is unfair in a lot of ways. For instance it's not like Bill Gates is just sitting on tens of billions of dollars, rather the company he created has increased in valuation. Short of demanding for Bill Gates to give away his shares as the company increases in value there is no real way to prevent him from "hording" wealth accumulation.

However, once Bill Gates passes away I think those shares have to be taxed at a fair rate somewhat proportional to what anyone's income tax rate would be. I don't think a family should just continually add wealth in the form of increasing share values, without realizing income at some point and being taxed on it. Obviously for small businesses there should be some exemptions to help prevent destroying a family business, but once you get into the 10's of millions you are talking about a real business that should have gains taxed.

tl;dr
0% estate tax is absurd in the case of billions of shares that have never realized a tax, but demonizing people for their company's increasing value (i.e. hording wealth) is equally absurd. Tax rate on income is not really going to do anything to prevent big-time "wealth accumulation".

 

[zephyrprime]

Microsoft Co-Founder Bill Gates took the No. 3 spot in 2012, raking in $7 billion after Microsoft’s shares rose 2.9% last year

The way they say it makes it sound like he made that $7B from MSFT stock rising 2.9%. It's actually all his other investments which made much more than 2.9% that made him that $7B. He has about $70B so he made about a 10% gain off his investments in aggregate. However, I believe he also gave away a lot of money so his investments must have made even more than 10% last year to yield a net gain of $7B.

 

[BoberFett]

Inflation kills the wage earner and rewards the asset holder.

Who is responsible for inflation?

 

[DCal430]

That is a pretty great image you linked. First things first, this shows the 1% earning 21% of income but paying 21.6% of all taxes, this is pretty fair. However, this ignores the "wealth accumulation", which I think neither political party has a good viewpoint on.

The main gripe about how much "wealth" these guys have is unfair in a lot of ways. For instance it's not like Bill Gates is just sitting on tens of billions of dollars, rather the company he created has increased in valuation. Short of demanding for Bill Gates to give away his shares as the company increases in value there is no real way to prevent him from "hording" wealth accumulation.

However, once Bill Gates passes away I think those shares have to be taxed at a fair rate somewhat proportional to what anyone's income tax rate would be. I don't think a family should just continually add wealth in the form of increasing share values, without realizing income at some point and being taxed on it. Obviously for small businesses there should be some exemptions to help prevent destroying a family business, but once you get into the 10's of millions you are talking about a real business that should have gains taxed.

tl;dr
0% estate tax is absurd in the case of billions of shares that have never realized a tax, but demonizing people for their company's increasing value (i.e. hording wealth) is equally absurd. Tax rate on income is not really going to do anything to prevent big-time "wealth accumulation".

My excess wealth tax of 10% tax per year on all wealth you over 100 million will, if you have to liquidate assets to pay for it then so be it.

 

[TastesLikeChicken]

Eating and drinking DOES remove wealth from the world. Consuming anything removes wealth from the world. This includes missiles and sandwiches.

Well there yah go. You have solved the problem. If everyone stops eating sandwiches, and thereby stops removing wealth from the world, we would be way wealthier and there'd be plenty to go around.

Brilliant!

 

[werepossum]

Evidence shows otherwise.

http://www.taxpolicycenter.org/taxfacts/displayafact.cfm?Docid=161

Note the 1986 tax hikes when revenue from the tax went down from $52 Billion to $33 Billion and as low as $24 Billion in 1991.

You can also see in the late 90's and in the 2000's when the rates drop, revenue increases.

The current 15% I think might a bit too low but raising the rates discourages investment.

There's no doubt that low capital gains rates are a boon for the economy. However, as a philosophical point I don't think one can justify taxing the max whose sweat earns his bread at a higher rate than the man whose saved capital earns his bread. I say tax all income equally and accept the hit to tax revenue.

And if we must tax capital gains at a lower rate, let's be smart about it and favor investments in productivity. There is absolutely no valid rationale for taxing speculation at a lower rate unless the positive benefits of speculation would not otherwise occur.