Is it possible to set a roof on private wealth? Everything above put into public funds? Give them a “you win at capitalism” trophy and let them into some other game to play.
Enforced, adequately high progressive taxation could do that, in fact we had tax rates closer akin to that prior to Reagan, and at one point our highest tax rate was close to 90% as it should be so as to limit accruing enough wealth to warp our society unilaterally beyond their single vote with media and political bribery, but that died a long time ago in the name of “turning the bull loose.”
But then the greediest fucks among us bribed our leaders to get their way, to thunderous applause by idiot conservative peasants and many so called democrats, today’s neoliberals, and here we are, planet burning, terminal stage capitalism, good fucking times. But hey, as long as Bezos can have a second mega yacht to keep his first mega yacht company (he really does look it up) I guess it was all worth our impending collapse.
You know what people did when the highest tax rate was 90%? They made sure they’d still “max out” 25 years from now. They invested in their company reputation and their workers.
The 1950s had a great thing going. Once you hit $100,000 in a year, anything beyond that was taxed at about 90%. Nobody wanted to give the government 90% of what they’d be making, so no one did, and the 1950’s were absolutely booming for the US middle and lower class. You could afford a new house, car, and two kids at a job you didn’t need a college diploma for (or often even a highschool diploma) on a single income household.
Without having to pay ridiculous sums of money to the ceo’s and executives and whatnot, companies were just left with the option of using the funds to invest back into their companies and their employees instead going after pocketing as much money as quickly as possible.
It’s called tax and all countries do it except for the fucking United States that has spread a disease of letting companies and billionaires just skip taxes, in a criminal mob act that is robbing the people of their money in an open corrupt way that nobody dares stand up against
All countries? Uh, Russian, Indian, and Chinese billionaires have much more freedom to do whatever they want.
In the US, Donald Trump (who claims to be a billionaire) is currently being fined $450 million dollars for underpaying his taxes. He accrues $110K per day in interest on that fine. And he was President of the US!
Not only would I be willing to give them a trophy, give them a fucking parade, shout-out at the next SOTU, let them sign the original constitution or some shit, whatever the fuck these mentally ill people need to stop destroying society.
Hell keep a leaderboard of who “produced” the most wealth and let them compete with each other. The winner every year gets their name carved in a new " Stanley Cup of Captalism" (the hockey one, not the crazy white lady one). All of that shit would be infinitely cheaper than having billionaires around.
Here’s the thing… Money is just a points system after you get into the .1%. A billion dollars, with 5% non-compounding interest (ridiculously conservative) would yield $50 million a year. That’s a metric fuckton of money, I can’t imagine a luxury (not based on rarity or shaping society) that you could personally enjoy.
So I agree, we should take all their shit, except a single home and personal possessions, and give them a $50 million dollar stipend each year. Let’s pin that to the minimum wage and call it absolute rich. Hell, let’s let them divide it up between their children… Their family would be set for generations, and any of them could go for the prize to add another one time prize to go even higher. Let’s make it fancy as hell, give them a special card or a jeweled broach they can pull out and buy anything without seeing a price… And let’s make it not roll over, because we want them to be post-money
Now, the finances work out easily if we let the government invest money (crazy that we don’t use that instead of taxes at this point), but the trouble is it’s not about money, they need a new game to play. We want to make sure they fuck off and measure dicks with each other in a way that doesn’t use our species as the playing board. They want to compete with each other for rank and social status, and we want them occupied
I don’t think there’s a one size fits all solution, so I’ll throw out some ideas. A children’s card game, next level Pokemon go battles, a monthly token that can be granted by anyone (with physical proximity) to signify they were helped by an unbillionare, unbillionare exclusive sports (I’d watch), maybe even points for how much of their stipend they don’t spend in a year
We can even let them prestige, and see if with a small gift of $5 million dollars they can do it again… By that point I’m guessing their brains have probably rotted, but I’d like to give them the option
Maybe we give them nicer badges that they can whip out based on points, maybe we make a points store where they can use the emergency alert system or rent out monuments for a pizza party… Just things that money can’t buy and don’t meaningfully hurt the rest of us
Personally, I really love the idea of video game duels and MMA matches (either we laugh or they improve themselves to a point it’s actually impressive, win-win. Let’s stream it)
Let’s bring back the nobility, but in a way that’s fun for us and doesn’t include ownership of people. Hell, let’s add in titles, and let you get in through capitalism, scientific breakthroughs, or social change
I think the absence of cap also makes super rich people motivated to invest in new projects that could make them even richer. If they don’t have this motivation anymore, it may reduce this investment source, they’d just keep what they have and don’t see the point in doing more with their money. Would the state do that better from taxes money? Maybe
But that means they seek projects that must be profitable and that’s exactly why I want the bloated investment power off their hands and into public projects that value psyche and society in the long run. Profit seeking leads to sick companies like Apple etc. with stances like “the customer should not be able to repair their shit”.
I think better regulation of the market so it benefits the consumers, like what EU tries to do, is more realistic than imagining a state being able to sustainably handle marketable innovation. I don’t think a state would have come out with efficient web search, smartphones or gen AI for exemple.
Is it possible to set a roof on private wealth? Everything above put into public funds? Give them a “you win at capitalism” trophy and let them into some other game to play.
Yes.
Enforced, adequately high progressive taxation could do that, in fact we had tax rates closer akin to that prior to Reagan, and at one point our highest tax rate was close to 90% as it should be so as to limit accruing enough wealth to warp our society unilaterally beyond their single vote with media and political bribery, but that died a long time ago in the name of “turning the bull loose.”
But then the greediest fucks among us bribed our leaders to get their way, to thunderous applause by idiot conservative peasants and many so called democrats, today’s neoliberals, and here we are, planet burning, terminal stage capitalism, good fucking times. But hey, as long as Bezos can have a second mega yacht to keep his first mega yacht company (he really does look it up) I guess it was all worth our impending collapse.
You know what people did when the highest tax rate was 90%? They made sure they’d still “max out” 25 years from now. They invested in their company reputation and their workers.
I can just picture every modern billionaire vomiting into their mouth at the thought.
The 1950s had a great thing going. Once you hit $100,000 in a year, anything beyond that was taxed at about 90%. Nobody wanted to give the government 90% of what they’d be making, so no one did, and the 1950’s were absolutely booming for the US middle and lower class. You could afford a new house, car, and two kids at a job you didn’t need a college diploma for (or often even a highschool diploma) on a single income household.
Without having to pay ridiculous sums of money to the ceo’s and executives and whatnot, companies were just left with the option of using the funds to invest back into their companies and their employees instead going after pocketing as much money as quickly as possible.
It’s called tax and all countries do it except for the fucking United States that has spread a disease of letting companies and billionaires just skip taxes, in a criminal mob act that is robbing the people of their money in an open corrupt way that nobody dares stand up against
All countries? Uh, Russian, Indian, and Chinese billionaires have much more freedom to do whatever they want.
In the US, Donald Trump (who claims to be a billionaire) is currently being fined $450 million dollars for underpaying his taxes. He accrues $110K per day in interest on that fine. And he was President of the US!
I knife it was hyperbole
Not only would I be willing to give them a trophy, give them a fucking parade, shout-out at the next SOTU, let them sign the original constitution or some shit, whatever the fuck these mentally ill people need to stop destroying society.
Hell keep a leaderboard of who “produced” the most wealth and let them compete with each other. The winner every year gets their name carved in a new " Stanley Cup of Captalism" (the hockey one, not the crazy white lady one). All of that shit would be infinitely cheaper than having billionaires around.
Here’s the thing… Money is just a points system after you get into the .1%. A billion dollars, with 5% non-compounding interest (ridiculously conservative) would yield $50 million a year. That’s a metric fuckton of money, I can’t imagine a luxury (not based on rarity or shaping society) that you could personally enjoy.
So I agree, we should take all their shit, except a single home and personal possessions, and give them a $50 million dollar stipend each year. Let’s pin that to the minimum wage and call it absolute rich. Hell, let’s let them divide it up between their children… Their family would be set for generations, and any of them could go for the prize to add another one time prize to go even higher. Let’s make it fancy as hell, give them a special card or a jeweled broach they can pull out and buy anything without seeing a price… And let’s make it not roll over, because we want them to be post-money
Now, the finances work out easily if we let the government invest money (crazy that we don’t use that instead of taxes at this point), but the trouble is it’s not about money, they need a new game to play. We want to make sure they fuck off and measure dicks with each other in a way that doesn’t use our species as the playing board. They want to compete with each other for rank and social status, and we want them occupied
I don’t think there’s a one size fits all solution, so I’ll throw out some ideas. A children’s card game, next level Pokemon go battles, a monthly token that can be granted by anyone (with physical proximity) to signify they were helped by an unbillionare, unbillionare exclusive sports (I’d watch), maybe even points for how much of their stipend they don’t spend in a year
We can even let them prestige, and see if with a small gift of $5 million dollars they can do it again… By that point I’m guessing their brains have probably rotted, but I’d like to give them the option
Maybe we give them nicer badges that they can whip out based on points, maybe we make a points store where they can use the emergency alert system or rent out monuments for a pizza party… Just things that money can’t buy and don’t meaningfully hurt the rest of us
Personally, I really love the idea of video game duels and MMA matches (either we laugh or they improve themselves to a point it’s actually impressive, win-win. Let’s stream it)
Let’s bring back the nobility, but in a way that’s fun for us and doesn’t include ownership of people. Hell, let’s add in titles, and let you get in through capitalism, scientific breakthroughs, or social change
I think the absence of cap also makes super rich people motivated to invest in new projects that could make them even richer. If they don’t have this motivation anymore, it may reduce this investment source, they’d just keep what they have and don’t see the point in doing more with their money. Would the state do that better from taxes money? Maybe
But that means they seek projects that must be profitable and that’s exactly why I want the bloated investment power off their hands and into public projects that value psyche and society in the long run. Profit seeking leads to sick companies like Apple etc. with stances like “the customer should not be able to repair their shit”.
I think better regulation of the market so it benefits the consumers, like what EU tries to do, is more realistic than imagining a state being able to sustainably handle marketable innovation. I don’t think a state would have come out with efficient web search, smartphones or gen AI for exemple.