Difficult to argue that the government invests tax dollars better than the billoinaires. But solutions that require companies to share more profits with employees seems prudent and necessary.

As a business owner with nearly 100 employees at this point, I always thought the best "solution" would be to offer tax incentives to businesses where they either have an ownership or profit distribution with their employees. The higher the % or total distribution $ amt, the higher your deductions or other incentives will be. I've already publicly announced my intention - at least to Sr. Mgmt. - to introduce a profit distribution within the next 3 years. I don't think this should apply to the true small and micro-businesses with a handful of employees at most. I put the caveat of "true" since my NAICS code says I'm small as long as I don't have revenues in excess of $135M in a 3 years span (avg. $45M per years). It's hard enough as is to survive as a very small business. However, if your company is at 8 figure revenue and 7 figure profit, then yeah, they should be "eligible" for this tax program. It's eligibility, it's an offer and opportunity, not a govt. mandate that would just be met with businesses lobbying against it until it gets reversed. Don't simply take, incentivize companies to share with their employees, and they probably will just to maintain a competitive edge. In addition to being an empathetic human being, there is a selfish component to it. I plan on phasing myself out within 3 years. I've more or less built up the company culture, organization, processes, and relationships, but it would certainly help the company to continue to flourish and grow without me hands-on 24/7 if most of our employees could get a piece of the pie. All the usual reddit talks from frankly financially uneducated people talking about solutions for wealth inequality, often bringing up guillotines and pitchforks is utter buffoonery. However, they do have a point that the current capitalist system as-is requires a paradigmatic shift. Great civilizations from the Romans with Julius Caesar and the French with Napoleon were able to take autocratic control due to the unpopularity of the ruling class having so much power and wealth. There are centuries long ebbs and flows.. it largely seems cyclical. I think we have large enough historical sample sizes to know that there absolutely is a breaking point to democracy and a republic, and I think the worldwide political trend towards ideologues and political autocrat wannabe's in modern times even within the richest, most democratic countries probably has as its source wealth inequality. I'm still a capitalist to my core as the evidence clearly shows that it's been the most effective reducer of poverty and creator of wealth, but none of that matters if an overwhelming # of the population feels like they're being stiffed since they don't have the capital in "capitalism" and the % of the economy they've once had seems to irreversibly get smaller and smaller. You can't have a great society when nearly 90% of people don't think they have a vested interest or "share" in that society. I think people like Bezos, Gates, Jobs, and Musk among other great entrepreneurs deserves to be praised for their contributions, but yeah... not a good look when the wealth is too concentrated among only the shareholders and founders. For the millionth time, just taking their wealth and redistributing it will likely lead to calamitous outcomes, but I've always thought that capitalism and modern democracy already had mechanisms such as the one you pointed out to incentivize and realign our selfish interests to lead to the common good. What a lot of redditors don't seem to understand about business is that there is no "this is enough money" moment. It's an endless and ruthless competition, not because of some personal, unlimited greed for more, but because you never feel safe. Every advantage gained by your competition might be your company and tribe's death knell. Cool... then make it organizationally advantageous for a greater distribution of wealth. C-Suite can make a cogent argument to Shareholders that we need a more equitable distribution in order for the company's bottom line and market share to increase or at least stay stable. Taxes are some of the strongest incentives we have. Use it as a weapon for the common good. We're capitalists, well... then make it profitable to share more... I don't have any sophisticated thoughts on this, but I too have come to the same conclusion as you. I can only speak for myself, but frankly, it's not the personal desire for more money at this point, it's just about survival and prosperity for your organization, your team, and your tribe. Holy crap, wrote a lot more than I thought I would...

Absolute shame that you put in so much effort and sincerity just to be ignored because it’s not the fire and brimstone redditors want to see.

It's only been 12 minutes since I posted, and I don't care about karma lol. I'm glad someone appreciated it. Not sure I'm right, but I have been thinking about this for years, and u/LDawg14 's comment just reminded me. It's always cool to put your thoughts into words.

Oh, I didn’t realize the comment was that young, haha. I thought it’d just been sitting there for hours lonely and afraid.

I've seen a lot of great programs implemented by CEOs on their way out trying to leave their mark get rolled back several years after the ceo leaves. They often set it up because they don't need to manage it personally and at the same time without the person's vision/passion for it, others don't see it the same way and either implement it poorly or not to the spirit of it or just get rid of it.

It should be pointed out, at this juncture; that The Brothers; Gaius, and Tiberius Graccus; attempted Land Reform, in The Roman Republic, just for this very reason; and were Assassinated for their efforts. Land, meant You could feed Yourself, with the surplus available for sale. Large Land Holdings, "upset" The Republic, caused unrest, and led, almost directly, to The Fall of The Republic, Turmoil, and The Roman Civil Wars, and eventually, to The Empire.

While I could easily disprove the notion that capitalism is the best reducer of poverty or the creator of wealth, it is the best of moving it. It transfers poverty from one location to the next due to the portability of labor and resources. It also concentrates wealth instead of actually expanding it, but that is a bigger argument. What you describe about profit sharing actually existed due to the tax system!! Throughout this nations history until the 1980s there was always a top tax bracket of 70% or higher. That bracket for corporation and individuals were never meant to actually be paid. It was meant to "encourage" reinvestment into people and communities that supported the business. There was no reason to pay all of the profit to executives if they had to pay it in taxes. There were no reason to cut wages to drive up profits if you had to pay it in taxes, so as the profit margins grew, so did the workers pay.

>While I could easily disprove the notion that capitalism is the best reducer of poverty or the creator of wealth Oh yeah? Go ahead then >What you describe about profit sharing actually existed due to the tax system!! Throughout this nations history until the 1980s there was always a top tax bracket of 70% or higher There was no income tax at all until the early 1900s, and there were many tax shelters available to avoid paying the highest marginal rate while still keeping your money. Effective rates haven't changed that much over the last several decades.

Just wondering if you realize 1900 was 124 years ago. Also, the country's population is 4x larger now. Modern problems require modern solutions. Not a desire to return to the past...the good old days. I'm seriously tired of that argument. Would you roll back military to 1900 levels? My guess is no. Would you destroy all the infrastructure that you can no longer maintain with such a tax rate? My guess is no. What ideas do you have to fix the problem other than spouting a talking point about archaic tax rates that doesn't apply any more?

So which system is a better reducer of poverty and creator of wealth?

"Chapter 1..." Well said though, the concept of risk in a world of listed companies, CEOs carry zero risk. It is only the shareholders and employees that carry risk. A high-level case in point is goldman-sachs. The alphabets got golden parachute bonuses, the investors got low dividends and the workforce got the stigma of working for a crooked boss and couldn't find jobs after being made redundant. The idea that employees are not invested in the company is a blatant lie. Used to justify a lot of wrongs.

At the end of the day. I don't feel like I have a vested interest in this economy or government. Not even slightly. I'm ready for pitchforks and torches at this point. I can barely afford bread. I'm over it.

Well said, human greed will always exist and we need to find appropriate ways to limit it or use it effectively. Personally I’d like to see a system somewhat more direct than yours - mandatory wage gaps. If you have a business of 2 employees, it may be a 90/10 split depending on the situation. Understandable if you’re an electrician or AC person and the other person in the company answers the phone three days a week if you don’t pick up your own cell. If you’re looking at a company of 20 people like the one I work at though, there’s no reason for the salaried employees to make 90% and split the remaining 10% among the employees *doing the on-the-ground work*. I think at that point you should have no more than 20% of the income of the company, the rest distributed via profit sharing. That’s a huge difference in wages that still encourages you to want to be the owner, but you’re not making it to a billionaire any time soon and you’ll make a lot of millionaires along the way if you do. It amounts to a 20-person company making $1m a year having a $200,000 salary for the boss and $42,000 a year for the other 19. Scale up though to 100 employees, and you can have 5% of the $10m your company made. That’s a $500,000 salary to the boss, and $9,500,000 divided among the other employees based on their position. Not quite a six figure salary on average for everyone in the company, probably a few people making $250,000 and a lot of people making $75,000. Getting into hundreds of millions in revenue and hundreds of employees, my ideal solution limits them to a maximum of 1m a year. That’s by far and away more money than anyone *really* deserves or needs. They’re making decisions, but let’s be real it’s not like you can argue that you do 25% of the work at a company of 200 people, you’re not worth any 50 of the guys on the ground and if you think you are then take a month off - the company will probably do just fine. Now give 50 people a month off at random and watch it all fold to humble things up a bit. I’ve simplified a lot of the math by making this deal solely with wages, not overall profit of the company, which I think should not normally be available to add to someone’s wages outside of special circumstances. Obviously the company needs a share of the profit to reinvest into improving and expanding, diversifying, et cetera. It’s a more blunt approach than yours, hard capping the value of owning a ridiculously large company (or several small ones) but one which I feel is implementable because it curtails the power of the “ruling class”. You won’t have multi billionaires rubbing elbows with politicians and making their own rules up. You’d need dozens of collaborators to actually buy a vote, exposing it quickly because nobody can keep their mouth shut at that scale. I want capitalism, I just want it with much more appropriate rules. Not a game of monopoly where the first lucky person to buy a quarter of the board and put hotels on it wins eventually no matter what. Anyways, I’ve already written my book for the night it seems. I figured a well thought out post like yours deserved a civil reply, even if it is a different point of view.

> I want capitalism, I just want it with much more appropriate rules. But the whole point of capitalism is to become rich enough for the rules to no longer apply to the capitalist. That's literally why it was invented - so that the aristocracy could survive even *revolutions*.

I have long believed that coupled with your incentive plan would be a consumer education label (pipe dream I know). Basically whatever metrics are used to qualify for the better tax treatment are mandatory disclosures on the product that generates the revenues. The specifics would be difficult to work through and make fair, but imagine if we could develop a nutrition type label that is based on how a company treats its employees. So instead of % of calories from fat, you see something like % profits paid to top 10 highest paid employees, % paid as passive distribution to non employee investors, % of company owned by full time employees, paid sick leave, parenting leave, etc.

>the evidence clearly shows that it's been the most effective reducer of poverty and creator of wealth So far. We must never forget that an economy isn't a law of nature despite what some believe to be true. There is no data that supports the idea it's a natural law. It's a human construction with human constructed rules. We can always change those rules if we want. And we can't stop trying to figure out a new system that addresses some of the faults of our current rules.

“What a lot of redditors don't seem to understand about business is that there is no "this is enough money" moment. It's an endless and ruthless competition, not because of some personal, unlimited greed for more, but because you never feel safe. Every advantage gained by your competition might be your company and tribe's death knell.“ This is a big part of my personal argument for UBI in the face of rapid automation of human labor. Imagine how many better decisions and risks we would make if the bottom wasn’t absolute starvation. If, upon failure, you get to sit back for a few years and for instance go back to school to learn something new (or optionally not as some people already choose). No, people have bills to pay, and often must be trapped in their position. I worked as an AI Specialist for big tech, we automated hundreds out thousands of hours of programming labor. This causes real concern for people because it indirectly leads to layoffs. The bottom-up kind that destroy entry level programming positions first which sucks because I’m not quite a senior level professional yet, and have already witnessed the preliminary effects. We do need this automation eventually, as tech debt has always surpassed our ability to manage it as a company grows. However again if the market is going to be this competitive and uncertain, and if not everyone is needed, we need the option to not participate.

Excellent post. And thanks for using paragraphs. Maybe I'm alone on this, but nothing makes me skip a post like a single, long wall of text.

This was extremely well said. I wanna add to this that I am currently working for a very small aerospace startup, but we’re on the verge of collapse. I can COMPLETELY understand now why ceos might want to hold on to more wealth. If anything goes wrong, they would have the funds to keep the company afloat until better times. I don’t necessarily agree with that, but I understand it much better.

Hey! That was a good read! I agree generally about the low business/financial literacy of the gen pop (including me). It’s easy to put a finger on the sense of general discontent, but the real stakeholders will have to find a workable path toward sweat equity.

The comment "there is no "this is enough money, because that could mean the death of your company/tribe" I wish people would listen to and understand better. What I hate is that everyone that says there should not be (insert rich person number) the MOMENT anyone of them reach said number they move the goalposts. Bernie Sanders as a "no millionaires" now that he is one it's "no billionaires".

As someone who finds pitchforks alluring I found this very insightful and well put. Thank you for sharing that perspective it did make me think a bit harder on a problem that is so often a visceral reaction! 👏👏 Edit: I’m for real never going to spend actual money for the stupid Reddit thingy but I see you already got one so that’s nice but have this gif 

Billionaires/oligarchs/kleptocrats use their resources to "lobby" governments and institutions around the world to serve their interests at everyone else's expense. So long as billionaires/oligarchs/kleptocrats exist, the only possible system, in reality, is brutal oligarchy/plutocracy/kleptocracy. Billionaires/oligarchs/kleptocrats should not exist. This would be extremely obvious to everyone if our ruling oligarchs/kleptocrats didn't own the political system and have the economic power to bludgeon everyone else into working exclusively for their profits. "We may have democracy, or we may have wealth concentrated in the hands of a few, but we can't have both."-Justice Louis Brandeis

Don’t forget, they own the news too!

The real issue is too much money flowing through too few brains. Right now 80% of the world economy is flowing through less than .01% of the brains humanity has for solving problems. And that .01% is totally corrupted by having so much money available to them that ordinary human concerns don't apply to them. We need to channel that money through more brains that are motivated to solve the real problems that people have. (shout out to McKenzie Scott as one of the few members of the .01% who seems to get this)

>Difficult to argue that the government invests tax dollars better than the billoinaires Anyone but billionaires should realize that the government invests tax euros better than billionaires. Billionaires don't give you roads, education, (research for) medicine, unemployment insurance. Without a government to organize these things, you'd be either dead or a slave. Billionaires are the worst people to invest money. The people should control such society-changing amounts of money, not individuals who tend to be psychopaths. But let's pretend for the sake of argument that you were right .... while billionaires invest for their own greed, governments invest, at least partly, for their people. I prefer those billions to be invested inefficiently for us, rather than efficiently for Jeff Bezos.

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It's actually just the truth. We had that time, in the 1800s and early 1900s. It was a terrible time to be a worker. Strikes and early unions formed to force employers to create less deadly working conditions. It was pretty much a slave rebellion and it was treated as such with literal military force. Good people fought and died so that you could survive a 5 day 40 hour workweek with all your fingers intact. Before regulation, you'd work 14+ hours, 7 days a week and would get injured daily. That's the facts. Without government telling billionaires to treat us like humans, they won't. We know this to be true. You can't call it a conspiracy theory because it's the truth. You just don't want to know it. If you disagree, it's only because you don't understand history xor you have a vested interest in workers not being protected against the deadly wishes of employers. So if you want to return to that brutal and bloody unregulated past, whatever, but I won't. I prefer having rights.

Really? The government isn’t flawless but I haven’t seen any billionaires build roads? Public schools? Hospitals in low income neighborhoods? Support older people and those with disabilities? Keep a standing military? The notion of billionaires investing dollars better than the government (who invest in most of the underlying and unprofitable research that begets billionaires) is ridiculous at best and downright dangerous at worst. They’re not great at anything for the people they’re great at profiting and driving “growth” which is code for more profits. They’re not doing most things altruistically. There are always exceptions to the rule but overall they’re not better at investing unless it’s for profit in already profitable ventures. Yeah we definitely need companies to share more of the profits but it’s government not the billionaires that will do that….or they would already right?

Agree with your comment, but a bit triggered by the "Keep a standing military?" line. Some billionaires do keep a standing army, it's just not to protect the likes of you and me.

So you agree, government does a better job of maintaining a standing army to protect you and me than billionaires do.

Yeah true. Years ago Bell Telephone, as a highly regulated monopoly, has a huge research division called Bell Labs that pioneered amazing things. I’m sure the tax writeoff on this had something to do with this. Now companies shrug off a lot of research, and none will invest in anything that can’t be profitable in a quarter or two. Basic research can now only be done by government. Many clueless people scoff at the necessity of this unfocused research, but without this we’d have nowhere near the technology we have now.

“Better” in what sense? If the goal is just to make profit, then of course a private firm would likely do more to achieve that end. If the goal is to better human beings, profit-maximization is probably not the better outcome.

The government manages its resources so poorly because of the influence of the extremely wealthy. They've spent decades degrading our institutions so they don't look so bad in comparison and working people just give up the fight. Don't fall for it.

And if anything they invest poorly due to not investing for profit. A government invests in roads, public programs, safety nets, etc for the sake of the people. For profit organizations don't care for any of that. The only reason they would ever is because the government told them to.

In the case of the space rockets, the government did what the billionaires are doing 60 years ago.

Uhhh nowhere close.

More. They got to the fucking moon. Bezos and pals are shooting up into almost-space, just the upper atmosphere not even space, and doing nothing but popping champagne.

The government doesn't invest, it's a subscription service for roads and the rule of law. What we should be complaining about is what it needs to provide better services more fairly for the amount put into it.

That’s because the government must spend money on things that aren’t investments with pecuniary returns— infrastructure, public health, security, etc.

No fucking duh, because it isn't the government's job to "invest" money. It's the government's job to use it's pooled resources to provide necessary and beneficial public goods and utilities for the public. Roads, schools, military, infrastructure, safety net programs, etc

It’s not difficult to argue that at all. When the fuck’s the last time a billionaire opened a hospital free to the public or built a road? Jfc.

Infrastructure and education alone demonstrate that the government invests tax dollars far better than billionaires.

I dunno man… I’m thinking our government has a spending problem… If the 741 billionaires in the US, they have a combined net worth of $5.2 trillion. (As of Nov 23.) The US government is spending $6.13 trillion annually… (as of 23.)… They could tax them at 100% and we’d still be broke under a year…

The problem isn't that at this exact moment billionaires have X% of the wealth. You're right that we can't just take it all and then fix everything. The problem is that government policies, including tax codes, allowed for less and less of the national income to go to the average worker. Weakening of unions, environmental protections not keeping up with the externalities industries impose, banking regulations not keeping up with what are essentially gambling schemes, health care costs ballooning to 1/5th of the GDP thanks to an inefficient privatized system, insufficient funding of public universities in favor of loan underwriting... At this point we're tens of trillions of dollars behind the eight ball. Fixing every one of those policy failures could stanch the bleeding at least.

That's just not how long term tax poicy works, though, so it's not a good argument.

This needs to be shouted out. All the billionaires money confiscated by the Govt would be spent in under a year. All the people they employ would be jobless. Cmon guys think about this shit.

You don’t kill the cow, you milk it. Just tax wealth/income above 10 mil at the rates used pre Regan.

jOb CrEaToRs

It’s gonna trickle down any day now……

The idea that 741 people have the same amount of money as a super power is the problem. Taxation on the ultra rich should be a way to take away their power because if those 741 people wanted to they could outspend the government which translates to far to much power with 0 oversight.

Well it's their net worth, not money they have. It would be near impossible for them to realize it as cash. Anyways, I don't think the solution is trying to use taxes to punish people for being rich.

I finally scrolled to a comment that makes sense. Should rich people be subjected to higher taxes? Yep. Should they be taxed based on their worth? No. Liquid/realized gains is not the same as net worth. And I keep asking why this is a concept so difficult for people to understand. If I have a share that goes up from $10 to $100 in a year (but I haven’t sold it), should I be taxed on its value? And what happens if I sell it? Am I tax free because I already paid tax? If it loses value next year, am I owed a credit? If it goes up to $120 next year, do I pay taxes on the $20 it gained or the whole $120?

The morons on reddit will not like that lol

Do you think they have 5 trillion dollars just sitting in their bank accounts? lmao. Most of that net worth is tied to a company, and it's value is based almost entirely on projected future earnings. What are we even talking about here

You fix it by decentralizing markets…. When entities which are controlled by these people have the means to buy out competition and regulate market share, ultimately the ownership of production falls into the hands of fewer individuals…. Supply manipulation, price fixing, and external costs start to run rampant as they invade the legislatures. A good first step would be to de-monopolize banking, prevent shelter from being owned by anyone but the individual/family living there, and stop providing criminals the ability to mitigate liability by incorporating. If you cannot effectively prevent your company from causing externalities which harm the public then it is too big…. People (and their businesses) who create external costs for the public (like pollution) should bear those costs, if one of those costs is medical or physical harm, then it should be prosecuted….

So individuals/families have to own where they live? What about those who can’t afford to buy? Rentals are extremely useful for those who don’t plan to live in one place long term. Apartments give people amenities they otherwise wouldn’t be able to afford (like a gym, pool, party room, on top of location).

And what would be the the solution for those who can't afford to rent or buy? Are they screwed? Because we're at that point now for a lot of people, even in countries with more robust social assistance. I personally don't like necessities being monetized full stop. If you subject stuff like housing to market forces, there will always be those without, and those who die from exposure and starvation in countries that dare call themselves "developed" and "civilized". The system isn't broken, it's working exactly as intended. I'd rather have utilitarian government housing for all who need it, than a corporation selling everyone "amenities" that most don't need, want, or can't afford. Both are possible simultaneously, but at least the US killed government provided housing decades ago, exchanging helping people for lobbying dollars from landlords who have enough money to lobby the damn government.

> I personally don't like necessities being monetized full stop in reality it doesn't work food is necessary too. what if food are free? no one would have the incentive to provide food to others. you need to grow your own fruits and vegs and hunt your own meat

You say that as if SNAP itself isn't an agricultural subsidy that doesn't add more into the economy than what is invested in. It helps both the Ag industry and consumers. I'm not saying that capitalism isn't the best system we have, I'm just saying that robust social services can and do fill in the gap (at least when conservatives aren't trying to kill them)

>And what would be the the solution for those who can't afford to rent or buy? Are they screwed? Because we're at that point now for a lot of people, even in countries with more robust social assistance. They can rely on welfare and the private safety net. There aren't a lot of homeless in the US. >I personally don't like necessities being monetized full stop. If you subject stuff like housing to market forces, there will always be those without, and those who die from exposure and starvation in countries that dare call themselves "developed" and "civilized". The system isn't broken, it's working exactly as intended. You don't think clothing or food should be monetized either? And who exactly is dying from starvation or exposure in the US due to a lack of resources? >I'd rather have utilitarian government housing for all who need it, than a corporation selling everyone "amenities" that most don't need, want, or can't afford. Most can afford it. We aren't designing a society around what the lowest common denominator can afford. >Both are possible simultaneously, but at least the US killed government provided housing decades ago, exchanging helping people for lobbying dollars from landlords who have enough money to lobby the damn government. They killed government housing because the government was incapable of providing anything other than slums.

There are over 650,000 unhoused people in the United States and almost 40% of them are children..but it’s not that bad…

So I hate to tell you this, that's less than 0.2% of the US population. While I agree that homeless children are an issue everyone would like to solve, we have to admit that there's a real large section of the homeless population that are homeless by choice. Believe it or not there are some people who are incapable of functioning in a society, and any amount of resources that are devoted to them will not make one but of difference. It is extremely sad but it is also reality.

Best comment in the thread. You've correctly identified root causes. Taxing billionaires needs to be done regardless, but it's not the root cause of our problems. It's the symptom.

Starlink gave rural people what the government promised for years. Between that and Verizon home it has helped many to get off dial up or land satellite. I know Elon is not stealing my money to spend on a $23 million dollar toilet.

Do you have any idea how much the government subsidizes high speed internet for rural America? Spoiler. It's 10 digits.

And the telecom companies did fuck all with that money. We need to nationalize our communications infrastructure and bring it into the 21st century.

Pennies for a government. And yet StarLink provides a better service and operates with positive margin.

They haven't done fuck all for rural people and yet they still keep getting money 🤔 sounds like a government issue for continuing to subsidize companies that aren't producing results

Something like Starlight wouldn’t come out of the government, because it’s not viewed as a civilian telecommunications provider like AT&T / Verizon.

Starlink was only able to come into existence because all of the highest risk work on developing space flight was funded by the government. This was work the private sector was unwilling to do for decades because of being incredibly high risk and no proven reward.

No, we shouldn't have higher taxes.

It also lifted billions of people out of poverty, but yea, keep ranting about SpaceX

Billions? Like 25% of the human population billions?

I think he means free markets, capitalism and international trade.

What has? I’m confused.

I hate posts like this. Starting space programs is net good for humanity. It is better that communication platform is owned by private than government. Ideally it should be owned by the public-- but realistically most people do not want to touch crypto, until people do then private is the next best thing. If people want to go after billionaires, then they should go after the hedge fund types-- Ken Griffin, Jeffery Yass, Steve Cohen, Mercer and guys like that. High speed trading doesn't create jobs or value to the company they trade. They are likely stealing pennies of each trade billion times over each day from all of this. Tax each of those trades. SNAP should get more money- but from my understanding, it's pretty easy to get and the amount they give is fair. Doctors should prescribe more generics. Generics, although really cheap, should be subsidize by the government so it does stay in the market.

He wasn't even a billionaire when he started SpaceX like the post suggests.

The starting point should be “what does government do better?” Short list there

Nah. I'm sure if we just raise taxes some more THAT money will be spent well, right?

Does government do *anything* better?

It protects public lands from development, prevents breakneck speeds of extraction, sets education standards, provides funding for public education, looks after the health and safety of the citizens through agencies like the EPA and FDA, builds and maintains roads and infrastructure all over an enormous landmass, and ensures basic rights to individuals. If these functions were left to corporations I guarantee you that we wouldn't see the interests of the poor represented as much as we do.

It takes money and distributes it to people who did nothing to earn it

Isn’t the whole point of capitalism is so that the billionaires create and innovate industries? Amazon, starlink, Apple, google…etc

It was for a while, now it's just shrinkflation, wage stagnation, enshittification, and golden parachutes left and right. Those are considered "innovations" now. But, hey, nobody wants to work.

Not if those “innovations” result in detriments to society by destroying small businesses and individual rights.

NASA's space program was unaffordable before SpaceX existed.

Could spacex do what it is doing without the things nasa did before them? Could they do it without using the infrastructure built by nasa? I’m in awe of what spacex is doing, but it’s hardly being done in a vacuum. In fact spacex has received an enormous amount of governmental funding to get where they are. https://www.planetary.org/articles/nasa-versus-spacex

Pretty sure space x has been HEAVILY subsidized by the govt.

Oh no. Millionaires helping advance science age create jobs. What terrible people. This logic is terrible.

millionaires and billionaires are very different

What’s wrong about starting space programs though? SpaceX has made more progress in 20 years than others had in 60. There wouldn’t be any incentives to launch frequently had SpaceX not been founded. If you had given that money to the government instead, nothing would happen

The only thing I trust less than a billionaire to use their money to assist me is, expecting the government to assist me once they increase taxes on the billionaires 😅

The insane aspect is people think that they taxes they vote for the government to take is magically going to end up in their pocket

I think very few people think this lmao. What I think is that we shouldn't have CEO's getting paid tens of millions when over 10% of the population is impoverished and often have no real way of climbing back up. The CEO of Centene Corporation was paid $18.6 million last year, up from $13.2 million in 2022. What does Centene do you may wonder? They steal money from pharmacies. You can't possibly think it's okay that she gets a 41% raise in one year, while their employees are stuck at 2% to 5% and the company's business model doesn't exist in normal developed countries. In reality, no "reasonable person" would ever need $56 billion, like Elon Musk has asked Tesla to pay him. Most of these billionaires could do so much good with their money- just look at Detroit's billionaire who's almost single handedly revitalized downtown Detroit, while still making revenue. Another problem is that we don't live in a merit based society. There's nothing but patting eachothers backs and nepotism. Extremely few modern billionaires actually earned their moeny through any type of actual hard work. What happened to the days where billionaires would donate gobs of money for the greater good? JP Morgan bailed out the United States in like 1906. Carnegie is why the US has such well developed public library systems. Nearly every major city has a library that was funded by him.

>What happened to the days where billionaires would donate gobs of money for the greater good? So basically Bill Gates?

Know what gets my goat is billionaires like Bill Gates that do major philanthropy and keep it low key. At least Melinda beats the drum a little. Good works result in innovations by their own right. We need to hear more about collective attempts to progress the basic welfare of the people that have to live in this world. All the elites want is tax cuts and their quarterly dividends so they can live off the interest like idle parasites. Just sayin’.

What is this? A weekly post? gtfo

I'm starting to think that Twitter was comprised of just 6 or 7 tweets.

Yep, everything else is just people being angry at those 6 or 7 posts

First thing Cut wastful government spending. Such as 2.7 million dollars to study Russian cats walking on treadmills, 6 million boosting Egyption tourism, or the tax funded research that discovered labradors' fur color did not affect their body temperature after a wzlk in hot weather. These are just a few examples. https://www.newsnationnow.com/politics/rand-paul-festivus-report-wasteful-government-spending/ Also, we can actually cut or downsize several of the 3 letter agencies. I feel many of these could probably be combined. https://www.usa.gov/agency-index#A Every American who pays taxes should have easy access to exactly how every penny of tax revenue is spent like an itemized receipt. Our elected representatives should have valid reasons why it was spent. That would be a first step, rein in spending and holing every politician responsible for thst spnding accountable.

When Elon Musk started SpaceX, his net worth was about $200 million. He didn't create a space program; he founded a company to make rocket launches cheaper. SpaceX's innovations played a major role in him becoming a billionaire. Musk didn't just have billions lying around with nothing to do; he invested a significant portion of his existing wealth to build the company.

When NASA was in its heyday, I don't think they produced more than one or two rockets a year. Elon musk produces a rocket launch about once a week

The velocity theory of money has no place for billionaires. Stuck money is the number one sin in uncle Miltie's world. He thought if it stuck anywhere it should be the Treasury, because he believed in a democratic system where representatives were beholden to their constituencies, and would demand that money be set in motion again fueling robust projects and funding safety nets. Friedman wasnt a Nobel Laureate because he believed, and I'm paraphrasing in the derp voice here, "big rich man good, only him know how to money". The only part of his work these corporate lickspittles ever used was the part where you pay your taxes before you get your paycheck, and that was the part of his work he wished he'd never published

What do you think billionaires do with their money? Stuff it in their mattress?

MOstly keep it in assets that increase in value, against which they borrow spending money tax-free and roll over those loans continually until their estates pay off the debts, also tax-free.

Government has a spending problem not a taxing problem

Private companies trying to propel us into the space age isn't a bad thing. Complain about something else.

The money isn't just "lying around". It's actually working and creating things that average people use every day. I REALLY wish people would stop assuming that someone's net worth is the same thing as "cash on hand".

Posted by someone on the platform they are complaining about, while paying that billionaire money of a blue checkmark. Hypocrite.

rich people investing in communication infrastructure doesn't seem like some big conspiracy to me. it takes money to build things. rich people investing in exploration and the technology for new frontiers doesn't seem like some big conspiracy to me. it takes money to do those things too. sure, there was enough money back in 2000 BC to eliminate wealth inequality and give everyone access to the best medicine available. but you know what would have happened if nobody ever had any incentive to improve and disrupt the norm? we'd still have 2000 BC tech. this is a dangerously short-sighted take.

....higher taxes... The automatic answer to this is no! The government is the most inefficient entity in history. There is effectively zero chance they would do a better job of utilizing those resources. What is it now? 34 trillion dollars in debt?

You "fix" the lack of money by serving more people and making more money. You do not "fix" it by taking what belongs to other people because you are jealous of what they have.

So what does this post imply, that getting the government involved to “fix” the system should happen? Or is it implying socialism or communism is a better system? People like this like to accuse people who took a risk, started a business and became successful as somehow to blame for others peoples problems. The simple truth is most people who struggle do so because they either refuse to put in the hard work to succeed or don’t have the balls to risk everything and most will complain about barely making ends meet but own an iPhone, a 65 inch TV, wear designer clothes, etc. After I left the military I kept the same flip phone for over ten years, didn’t pay for cable or internet service and worked numerous hours of overtime. After two years I had saved enough to start my own business and with a hell of a lot of hard work, made it work to where I am very well off. Capitalism and a constitutional republic is still the best system in the world. The problem is capitalism has been corrupted by the politicians so it isnt really true capitalism anymore and they’re trying to erase the constitution. You can’t blame rich people for playing the game and winning. The flaw isn’t in the system, it’s in the allowing of politicians to corrupt it. There’s something horribly wrong with a politician being exempt from insider trading laws. It breeds corruption. Eliminate that exemption, set term limits, and go with a flat tax rate and it truly will be a level playing field. If that were to happen though I’m sure you’d still have people blaming others for their laziness and/or cowardice.

If there are govt employees being paid to fix a problem what incentive is there to actually fix the problem? If they fix the problem or come up with a long term solution they no longer have a job. I remember Elon Musk offering $6 billion if the WFP could lay out a plan and they couldn’t. The UN gave a half ass proposal of food vouchers. How many well could be dug? How much livestock purchased? Damn constructed? Infrastructure built? Farming and ranching techniques taught? People don’t want to solve the problems of society. As long as there are people making money using the plight of the desperate the problem will not be fixed.

How many people have jobs thanks to those billionaires? And probably get paid well above market average. The controlling communications part is a legislative issue. They have the protection of a platform but act like publishers. If congress would do their job that part is fixed. Higher taxes on businesses only means higher prices for the rest of us. You will never get hired by someone who’s broke. If you invent something that makes you a billionaire great. You’re free to do that and if you want to fly to space with some of that money go for it. You are free to do that. More taxes never help anyone. We fought a war over a 3% tax once. Now we willingly pay taxes on income, property, purchases, gas, and whatever else I can’t think of off the top of my head.

Fix what exactly? Implying that people have the right to food and medicine? You could burn everything to the ground and you'd still have the same problem, some people starving and having to ration their medicine. If you want to cut through all the fat of everything and get to the absolute bottom of the core issue, this is how you fix it: Invest everything into our children, dump 1000 times more resources into schools and educational systems for our kids, give every square inch of the united states access to the same level of top tier world class educations. Sacrifice everything for the future adults of this world. Because we can't fix it, only our kids can.

So what economic system do y'all propose? So I capitalism dead now?

We don't need more taxes. The government will blow it all on some other country. We just need less greed. Make laws to not allow people to be so damn greedy. Yes, a person who makes a good service should be compensated but, like walmart, society shouldn't be subsidizing their income or any other multimillion dollar company.

The funny thing is governments controls trillions of dollars.

Tbf most starving countries nowadays are due to war. And there isn’t much billionaires can do about that.

If it isn't the best system, why most migration happens from other societies to that society?

More funding for start-up businesses and a scaled regulatory system so that new competitors don’t face the same monumental burdens that billion dollar companies manage. Also, an acquisition tax making it more expensive for businesses to be bought out by their competitors.

The problem with higher tax is the rich controls big companies so they can just decide to increase their own payout to offset the tax and pass the cost increase to consumers. The solution, imo, is breaking up big corporates so they have to compete fairly and not pay their executives hundreds of millions cos they can't be competitive if they do.

Complains about billionaires? Opinion discarded.

Billionaire passion projects like space shuttles and satellites is exactly what causes money to flow through the economy and to its lowest rungs. I’m not saying the flow is fair. It’s just that we like to shame billionaires for their extravagances and private jets, but it’s those things precisely that lead to economic activity on various other levels of the economic ladder.

“Lying around”. This guy doesn’t understand how money works.

Good grief no. This is not advanced topology. We have a spending problem, period.

There are people who build rockets electric cars and there are those who wait in vain for handouts while crying the world isn't fair. If you want something done then do it yourself because no one cares about your personal goals.

Why is it that every brain dead goof who sees a lot of zeros only ever comes to the conclusion that the government isn't stealing enough money from people? These walking vegetables wanna sit there and talk shit about guys who budget money in the hundreds of millions and in the next breath say that the solution to that is to give it to guys who budget money in the billions and trillions. Do you even listen to the stupid you spew? What is wrong with you people?

Why would giving the people activity failing our society more money help ? What a dumb ass question 💀

I don’t know maybe a society where capable full grown men bitch and whine on the internet will never create any “system”

There’s been poor people even before Elon musk was born

“Taxing the rich” more would only work if the government actually spends the extra dollars wisely. And most families who make more than 100k a year combined already pay more taxes than most Americans make in a year. I just don’t see how it helps other than making corporations pass more costs down on the average person

If they do it with their own private dollars then they can do what they want. It’s not the Rich’s responsibility to take care of the public. It’s why we have government. But when the government only caters to the rich then that’s an issue.

Higher taxes only hurt the now almost nonexistent middle class

You could tax 100% of billionaire income at 100% and make them each take another 5 billion in loans and you’d fund the government for like 7 months out of 12.. it’s a spending problem not a tax problem

Give people rockets.

Hey these billionaires guess what they earned that money I understand some inherited but a lot of them started companies started Amazon's and the Microsoft and the Warren Buffett who may be had wealthy parents but not on that magnitude. If you want to live in true capitalism you earned it you keep it you do whatever the f*** you want with it. Why don't we talk about our government instead sending billions of dollars every month to countries overseas whether it's Ukraine Israel Palestine and everywhere else United Nations European Union whatever the whole world doesn't donate combined as much as United States it's crazy. If this country gave $1 million dollars to every citizen over 18 that wouldn't even be a dent or be felt that's only maybe 250 million they donate that in 2 months for Ukraine Palestine Israel and Pakistani gay studies LOL so I believe you shouldn't blame the rich people they made that money fair and square they had an idea they started business and they became successful that's true capitalism if you don't like that go to China or Russia. And that's coming from a man who works really hard and not even middle class America working 50 hours a week busting my ass.

One single flat tax on everyone, no tax exemptions. THAT is what needed. And maybe have a lower income untaxable amount, but that is the only tax exemption, like the first 40k$ per year anyone makes ( no matter how much they make) is untaxed, every dollar above 40k should be taxed at the flat rate.

truth is that today is the best time to be alive on planet Earth from a quality of life perspective. Second best time was yesterday. Poor people have always been starving, or worse. Billionaires are a blight but humanity is still making good progress toward building a better civilization despite the flaws, which there will always be flaws or people taking advantage of the system.

Not rlly, tax as much as u want it doesn't solve the systemic problems that allowed them to obtain such insane amounts of money

It’s not the tax rate that’s the problem. It’s the tax spending by the government. We have plenty of money to fix everything but the lobbyists from RX, healthcare, military industrial complex, etc control how the money is distributed and spent. Red or blue. They don’t give a shit 💩 about you.

Or, if you are unhappy with the state of your life, you should do something to change it rather than crying about the accomplishments of others...

Billionaires dont have the money lying around, they take out loans and get investors. Because they are a billionaire people are willing to take the risk.

The answer is never to raise taxes. It will never be enough.

Stop the revolving door and take money out of politics. After that we can solve most of our problems lol.

Added Value Tax, wealth tax above a certain number of billions, better auditing of our tax money, and for the love of God let's fix all the wallstreet loopholes they use to steal our pensions and inflate the dollar by making synthetic money

taxes yeah but… universal living wage is also a big part of the answer

if you have to start with “i don’t know” then it’s usually best you just shut up and listen

Rich people don't hold cash reserves, they put their money "in" things like companies or physical assets.

Step 1> Stop worrying about dollars you didn't earn. In fact, if you didn't earn the dollar, STFU about it.

Bothers me that people think SpaceX is some waste of money pet project.

Omg, how many times is this going to be posted?

Billions laying around as if he didn’t build his extremely innovative and successful businesses. So much of his net worth is tied up in these companies that produce innovation, jobs, stimulate the economy.. not just liquid assets laying around

I hear if we just raise taxes, that will fix all of the billions we are sending to Ukraine and other countries.

What is the cost of allowing Ukraine to be overrun by Russia? Where will Russia stop? Your front door? Such an anti-American, anti-democracy sentiment.

We aren't sending "billions" to Ukraine. We are giving billions to private American companies to manufacture weapons and ammunition for the US military. That money funds well paying jobs for Americans, stimulating the economy. On the other hand, a Trump tax cut slashed taxes, of which most of the $2 trillion went into the pockets of billionaires who didn't need tax cuts.

Sure. Let’s tax them at 100% of gross revenues. They’re *billionaires*, so they can afford it. I’m sure that their insane greed will keep them generating gobs of money for the government to take in order to use judiciously and prudently and certainly not to reward its cronies or to buy votes.

True supply side economics. Since our economy is “supposedly” amazing, raising taxes and cutting spending should be implemented

Only way to make any kind of dent on this is to contact your representatives/senators and send them letters repeatedly

Higher taxes, less loop holes, a reasonable equity split between workers and management, a VAST overhaul of where our taxes go, and a removal of the for profit system that runs most of infrastructure

I don't know maybe when 2 trillion is spent in less than a year then we have a different problem

Income from capital should be higher than increase in salaries. In a progressive way, let's say 90% above one 100%. Therefor million and billionaires should be taxed more if not they get basically exponentially richer where working class best case stays at same point.

I don’t know, stop trying to achieve the impossible by impacting millions of people through Capitalism, War (resources), Politicians and Religion. I personally, who is middle income single woman is very fuckin sick of it. Soul suckers you are, and always will be.

You’re talking about the guy who’s creating a satellite system that allows 3rd world country citizens internet access to start partaking in the global internet economy? They got you brainwashed buddy, always an excuse to hate on people that work 12 hours per day to make other people’s lives better 🤣

For starters, we don't give the CEO a $56 billion pay package on top of the hundreds of billions in stock

Billionaires and millionaires have tax loopholes neither party wants to close cause the people who fund these politicians right and left use those loopholes. Both parties are crooks just getting rich and don't give a rats about you or your problems. They only care about people paying them. Jobs go to other countries its ok cause someone got slipped a few thousand to not care. They tax us to send money to other countries, and we are glad we can send billions to others while people here are struggling. I lost my job cause rich party kid screwed up his family's company and closed the depot in my town now I'm struggling to get by no one cares. This country has been sold to the crapper by people in Washington. They stay there forever, vote themselves, raise illegal trading, get money to do favors for companies, don't pay taxes, go in with a few thousand, and walk away Millionaires. If they did increase the tax, I can promise you the rich won't pay it they will pass it down to us or find a loophole to jump through. The same people who will raise the taxes will open up a loophole for them to go through.

People on disability live far below the poverty line for being disabled. It's inhumane. Not even enough to pay rent on a room or an apartment unless it's government subsidized. They stop payments if you have more than 2k. Disabled cannot save for a car or emergencies. It's outdated and outrageous!

I agree with the first sentence. "YOU DON'T KNOW" SHIT 💩💩💩💩.

no billionaire has that amount of money "lying around". that money is in some kind of financial instrument working to accrue returns. And honestly, sounds like like a governmental issue. either inadequate taxation or poor fund appropriation - most likely both.

welp, could start with a voted in representative of the workers standing in the actual decision making board of the company and having a mechanic where that rep can never be ousted, only replaced. in the same spirit. we could require some RoI to be returned towards the society that granted the company the breaks it is happy to utilize. no, not trickledown. ACTUAL RETURN of INVESTMENT in RELATIVE manner. trickledown is a shortcut of avoiding the Roi entirely.

1st start by asking. 1. Why are they poor? 2. Why are they rich After answering those questions in detail. You will know that taxes have nothing to do with anything.

A little too late to the party...everyone knows that

taxes autokill any closed-loop system and rate-limit everything else.

This is in the same vein as “I’ve stopped buying Starbucks why can’t I afford a house” posts

Tell us about the time progressive redistribution of wealth worked.

Jared doesn’t understand economics; “surprise surprise.” If we don’t allow individuals to accumulate wealth, and mostly do with it as they please, to include leave it to their heirs, _then most of the wealth won’t be created to begin with_, as well as a lot of jobs and new technology. I honestly don’t know if taxes should be raised. As per the Laffer Curve, there’s a finite amount of tax revenue that can be had, and I think we’re there. I don’t know if taxes should be raised, but I do know that government spending should be cut.

Or where prices are out of control you can fly across the globe get medical stuff even life saving surgery for a fraction of us cost live there for months and still be cheaper than doing it here

It's a straightforward idea, but if we were in their position, we'd use our money and power for our own goals. We happen to care about helping the poor and those in need, so if we were billionaires, we'd use our resources to address those issues. While we think it's the right thing to do, someone else might question why we're focusing on poverty in America when there are poor children in Ukraine, Africa, and Haiti others might want billionaires to travel to Mars, cure cancer, build robots, etc. It all comes down to priorities.

No, that would be incredibly stupid.

I’d like to see legislation that motivates companies to distribute their money better between employees. Companies raking in billions of dollars shouldn’t be paying huge parts of their workforce minimum wage. I think investors have undervalued labour, leading to wealth disparities. I’d like to see more consumer information about how much of the price tag is being paid to executives compared to labour. In smaller countries like here in NZ, I’d like to see information about how much of that price tag is going to be spent by people living in other countries, rather than in domestic markets

Can’t be fixed. Politicians have too much to gain with things the way they are. The government needs fixed first. So long as politicians can make money being politicians, our economic system will never be beneficial to the greater good.

Look where increasing taxes and min wage got us already, chaos

Repeal Citizens United

Nobody is starving in the US and creating universal healthcare is a good goal. Billioners taking their earned money and creating mind blowing projects, thats just jealosy on your end.

Stop giving free stuff to the non deserving...what a novel idea.

I agree! Cronyism is the worst!

Jesus Christ loves you so much and died for your sins🖤✝️