Why do you have such a hard-on for Paris Hilton? And no, she wouldn't go to the poorhouse because she's not relying on society for her money. You're the person who needs to know what her bank account balance is before you decide whether she is "worthy" of money or not. If she were trailer trash instead you'd be falling over yourself to take money from some other poor schmuck to give to her in the name of "inequality." What difference does it make if her rich daddy gave her money, or Uncle Sam gives her money? You think one is great and the other terrible, are you schizophrenic or just honestly think you're helping someone when you shield them from accountability?
No, read what I wrote. You seem to think if someone is rich the are responsible creators of value. You ASSUME it. It's in your various retarded posts like comparing responsible-value-creator-rich with parents and parasitic-worthless-poor with children. You even had the gall to imply that poor people just want the equivalent of sugary cereal or whatnot.
Look bud, nobody can do it alone. Did you make the electronic device you use to post your drivel? Sew your own shirt? Grow your own food? Nobody does everything themselves, and it's been that way since we left ape-dom forgood, and people began to specialize in farming, hunting, gathering nuts/berries, etc. It's because of specialization and cooperation that we have a surplus... so the inventor doesn't have to spend every moment hauling water, growing her own food, disposing his own sewage, etc.
Obama very clumsily made this point with his "you didn't build that" speech. The point being that the US govt infrastructure (highways, internet, etc.), investment in education, enforcement of property rights, etc. made it possible for businesspeople to identify wants and needs and create wealth.
His point was that some people need to face reality, that nobody does it alone and that the rich need to get the fuck over themselves and be more okay with paying taxes, because they didn't create wealth in a vacuum.
I'm not saying that we should completely disincentivize economic activity. I am saying that wealth is often inherited, and I have no problem with taxing capital gains at a more reasonable rate. Right now you have guys like Romney paying ~15% on their income taxes while middle class people pay more like 25+%.
I don't even want to hear your three-times-repeated argument about double taxation on this, because you don't get taxed on an asset until you sell it (appreciation over time), and with dividends, the government is taking its cut of an ongoing stream but you are retaining the bulk of the benefit. (Not to mention you can reinvest dividends tax-free, and with retirement accounts, if you save money in a 401K you don't even get taxed on it till much later and it can keep appreciating; with a Roth you get taxed once and then it's tax-free forever.) The argument that cap gains tax penalizes investment would make more sense in an environment where we had too little savings, but for over a decade we've had too MUCH savings with nowhere to go. There just isn't much demand for capital hence low interest rates. There is PLENTY of room for a higher capital gains tax. At least bring it on par with ordinary income taxes, for crying out loud.
The thing is, people WANT to work and be productive. It's in our DNA to think of ourselves as good, productive people. It's a myth that most people want to sit on their asses. They only do that if they are completely disillusioned/depressed. That's why so many lotto winners keep their jobs, or leave and then go right back after several months. They are bored and want to feel like they are doing something meaningful.
As it stands, the USA is like a poor, middle class, and rich guy. The rich guy has 9 cookies, middle class guy 1, and poor guy none. The rich guy deflects attention away from this by telling the middle class guy "watch out, middle class guy, that lazy bum poor guy is eyeing your cookie!"
The people who believe the Republican talking points are the morons who worry about losing their one cookie when they should be asking tough questions about how and why those 9 cookies are with the rich guy. It's not like even Dems are proposing 3.33 cookies each, but more like 1-2-7 cookies. But the sheeplike Republicans pretend like even modest tax reforms will make it 9 cookies for the poor 1 for the middle and 0 for the rich guy. Bullshit.