IMO its a useful populist slogan because it solves a different problem: The power that comes with being a billionaire. E.g. its all well and good to focus on fixing democracy instead, but if (some specific) billionaires are focused on deploying their wealth to destroy democracy, then what?
replyI've generally come around to believe that we need to limit wealth from a purely power / control point of view.
I think it's a great system of checks and balances- billionaires are only created by dealing with a lot of people and successfully solving a lot of problems. Once they have it, it's work to hold on to the money though. Politicians don't really produce anything measurable to show if they've helped or hurt society, and so they work to devalue the meaning of the dollar.
replyIf you get rid of wealthy people's power, what takes its place other than politicians?
> Confiscating 100% of all billionaire wealth (~$8.4T) covers - ~1.1 years of federal spending (~$7.4T) - ~4.4 years of deficits (~$1.9T) - ~23% of debt (~$36T):
replyAdding a wealth tax doesn't mean eliminating existing income taxes.
> Cities like NYC pretty much can afford UBI (look at per capita spending on homelessness, public schools etc).
Perhaps , but what about poor states like West Virginia or Alabama. It's not universal if they don't receive benefits also.
Just remember those states are already handout states. They take more money in than they give back. They also have some bizarre cultural hatred for the blue states and cities that make this country an economic superpower. The idea NYC shouldn't do its best to take care of its own because people in Alabama aren't getting enough is nonsensical. Imo they already get far more than they deserve.
replyIt mostly goes back to when mortgages (then other debts) were handled by local banks by law, then people in NYC changed those laws so all the money was routed to them. It's not like NYC is just purely more productive, it just found a way to ensure all money must go through them, and they take some of it as almost a form of a new tax. Not that this more central form of banking is all bad, but when almost all the "real" work (farming, building, factories, etc) is done outside the city and they have no real say in the matter it leads to resentment.
reply> The idea NYC shouldn't do its best to take care of its own because people in Alabama aren't getting enough is nonsensical. Imo they already get far more than they deserve.
replyAbsent a federal wealth redistribution, yes NYC must do its best for it's residents. I'm not disagreeing with that. A federal wealth tax, however, would tax Alabama billionaires as much as it would tax NYC billionaires.
Good point. It is a good thing as you point out to remember that even so called "poor states" also suffer from pretty severe wealth inequality, in some cases perhaps more stark than one would find in the blue cities, if only because the floor can appear far wider and lower.
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