Why don't we force wealthy people to give us more of their money?

[Moonlight Graham]

I'm talking very wealthy people by the way. IE: let's say people who have over 50 to 100 million in assets.

It seems to me ridiculous that the vast majority of all people, aka those who are not insanely wealthy, do not force the wealthy to be taxed much more and have the extra wealth transferred to them. The non-wealthy majority (whom i assume includes virtually everyone on these forums) have the power to do it, so why don't we? Are we stupid? Does the average joe feel that somebody who is worth over a billion dollars legitimately deserves their riches due to their smarts and hard work? If anyone does believe this...WHY??? Who gives a crap about the rich? Give me most of your money, i'll let you keep about 100 million and you will still be laughing inside your 10 yachts and 5 mansions, and now maybe i can afford a mansion of my own and we'll all be laughing.

So WHY? Why in the world do we let them keep their money? Do you think they deserve it? If people are ultimately self-regarding (which i believe), why do the masses deny themselves more money they can readily have?

Personally, i'm inclined to say F the billionaires. Distribute most of these billions to the worker bees, many of whom work just as hard if not harder than the queen bees to keep the honey flowing.

I'm not a communist, i'm simply asking questions & thinking aloud. Certainly Marx was a brilliant thinker, but had many flawed ideas as well. The revolution of the proletariat he predicted obviously never happened. Marx may not have underestimated the intelligence, greed, and manipulativeness of the elite, but rather overestimated the intelligence of the proletariat. Are we so apathetic, naive, and sedate to put up with getting rammed in the buttocks?

Money is power. It controls the economic & political systems. I am absolutely tired of watching the little people, the many, get screwed by the wealthy/elites in infinite ways. Maybe if the elites had less money, and we had more, the power systems of the world would become a little more equal & "democratic".

[Guest TrueMetis]

This thread will be highly entertaining.

[bush_cheney2004]

So WHY? Why in the world do we let them keep their money?

Because it's their money....it is taxed when earned, inherited, spent, or invested. Do you propose just taking it outright?

Money is power. It controls the economic & political systems. I am absolutely tired of watching the little people, the many, get screwed by the wealthy/elites in infinite ways. Maybe if the elites had less money, and we had more, the power systems of the world would become a little more equal & "democratic".

So you are a communist...wishing to plummet all to the lowest level of mediocrity for the sake of fairness. Good luck with that.

Edited August 2, 2010 by bush_cheney2004

[Remiel]

Well, one of the main reason, I imagine, is that people like to wishfully think that they too could be one of the wealthy. So they permit themselves to be hoodwinked to a greater degree than if they laboured under fewer such delusions (because it is a delusion for the vast majority).

Another reason, perhaps ironic, is the Christian morality many of us have been brought up with. Taking from the rich, to a point, looks like stealing on the surface. It is only with a deeper understanding of the system that we realize that it is infact everyone else who enables the rich to become rich. Good ideas only take you so far without a horde of underlings to do the dirty work.

Another is the fear that the rich can just go elsewhere at will, though we could in fact alter laws about the movement of money if we wished. This is actually, I think, related to Trotsky's belief that communism could only work if everyone was doing it. You need cooperation among nations if you are going to truly reinvent the relationship between the rich and the poor.

Lastly, I think your question is a bit of a mistake. I think a better question would be, " Why do we not force wealthy people to take less of our money? " The battle is as much in defining who is taking from who right now as in who should take more from who. Or, another way to look at it would be, " Why do we not force wealthy people to pay more for the system that allows them to accumulte far more than they could possibly handle without our cooperation? " At close to the most basic level, private property is what you can protect with your own two hands. The wealthy are vastly favoured by a state which affords them such ample protection of all the lay claim to without demanding a ransom in return.

[Sir Bandelot]

So you are a communist...wishing to plummet all to the lowest level of mediocrity for the sake of fairness. Good luck with that.

And you are a capitalist, wishing to plummet all to the lowest level of mediocrity (except yourself), fairness be damned.

[bush_cheney2004]

And you are a capitalist, wishing to plummet all to the lowest level of mediocrity (except yourself), fairness be damned.

Correct.....if you don't wish to compete.....then don't covet the things competition can provide.

[Shady]

And you are a capitalist, wishing to plummet all to the lowest level of mediocrity (except yourself), fairness be damned.

Your statement makes no sense. No one forces you to buy specific goods or services. If you don't wish to participate in the greatest economic engine ever known to man, then don't. Just don't think you're entitled to the results of anyone else's hard work and labour.

As for fairness, there is no such thing as equality of outcomes. People have different talents, desires, interests, work habits, etc. What anyone does with those, through legal means to earn money and private property, which is a manifestation of their labour is non of your G-D business.

Edited August 2, 2010 by Shady

[Shady]

Why don't we force wealthy people to give us more of their money?

A comparable statement would be, why don't we kill all of the poor people, so there isn't any poor people any more?

[eyeball]

Money is power. It controls the economic & political systems. I am absolutely tired of watching the little people, the many, get screwed by the wealthy/elites in infinite ways. Maybe if the elites had less money, and we had more, the power systems of the world would become a little more equal & "democratic".

I'd like to get to the place you're going but I think you've got it backwards, the redistribution of power is far more important and necessary than the redistribution of money.

If the elites had less power the income gap would be nowhere near the issue it is. It seems fairly obvious that in those systems where power is concentrated into fewer hands that income gaps grow bigger and faster than in systems where power is distributed more evenly. It stands to reason the more that power is distributed amongst the people the less extreme that income gaps will be.

Somehow I get this sneaking suspicion the usual suspects that rail against the redistribution of wealth will be just as uncomfortable at the prospect of spreading the power around too. They're kinda funny that way.

[Bonam]

This thread will be highly entertaining.

I dunno, I kind of expect that most people who could put together a cogent rebuttal would honestly not bother replying to the original post. It is too hopeless to try to reply to something like that.

Just take all the money from the rich! Marx had a good idea but the workers just weren't smart enough to properly annihilate the capitalists! Seriously? People can still say stuff like this with a straight face?

[Smallc]

A comparable statement would be, why don't we kill all of the poor people, so there isn't any poor people any more?

Yes, because murder and theft are morally equivalent.

[Moonlight Graham]

I must go to bed, but i will try to respond to most of these replies tomorrow. But Shady's is a short post and the easiest rebuttal, so i'll answer it:

A comparable statement would be, why don't we kill all of the poor people, so there isn't any poor people any more?

Not comparable at all. Also, if you kill all the poor people, they will be replaced with other poor people. If we killed all rich people, will rich people go away? No.

[bush_cheney2004]

I must go to bed, but i will try to respond to most of these replies tomorrow....

Rich people can stay up as late as they want!

[TimG]

The non-wealthy majority (whom i assume includes virtually everyone on these forums) have the power to do it, so why don't we?

Our society is built on a social contract where people who play by the rules are entitled to the wealth they earn. We do expect these super-rich to contribute back to society but via taxes but a punative level of taxation would violate this contract.

You also should to remember that the majority of the super rich in North America are people who built successful companies that delievered something that benefited everyone (Gates, Jobs, Waltons (Walmart), the Google guys etc.)

[Wild Bill]

Not comparable at all. Also, if you kill all the poor people, they will be replaced with other poor people. If we killed all rich people, will rich people go away? No.

Ten Years After sang it way back in the mid 1960's: "Tax the rich, feed the poor. Till there are no rich no more!"

[DogOnPorch]

Why don't we force wealthy people to give us more of their money?

Because...

Edited August 2, 2010 by DogOnPorch

[Sir Bandelot]

Hang the Rich.

[DogOnPorch]

Hang the Rich.

Genocide for those with wealth? What's the $$$ cut-off for the noose?

Edited August 2, 2010 by DogOnPorch

[eyeball]

So redistributing more power to the people is still a non-starter huh?

I suppose forcing the wealthy to bow down before the guillotines is still a lot easier in the end. It takes a lot less thought.

[August1991]

Another is the fear that the rich can just go elsewhere at will, though we could in fact alter laws about the movement of money if we wished.

IMV, Remiel has the right point here.

If we tried to raise taxes on rich people, they would merely move their wealth (or at least their accounting books) elsewhere so the tax authorities could not examine them.

Take Bill Gates. He has put most of his wealth into a tax-free foundation. He can then control how the income generated by this investment is spent. This idea sort of answers eyeball's point:

I'd like to get to the place you're going but I think you've got it backwards, the redistribution of power is far more important and necessary than the redistribution of money.

Gates understands that he could never spend the money for himself but rather than let politicians in Washington spend it, he has created a foundation so he has the power to spend it.

----

To return to the OP, there's another reason we don't impose, say, a 98% tax on the very rich that I haven't seen mentioned in this thread.

Consider Bill Gates again. Or Steve Jobs. Or even James Cameron. Why would anyone bother going to the trouble of trying to create something if the government was going to take 98% of any winnings? Would you buy a lottery ticket if you knew in advance that a 98% tax applied to all winnings?

IOW, our taxes affect incentives and if we set incentives right, creative people will create far more wealth, and more tax revenues, than if governments were to impose high taxes now. With luck, and correct incentives, the future will be a richer place than the present.

Colbert said famously that the art of taxation involves plucking the goose, but not too much.

[Shady]

Also, if you kill all the poor people, they will be replaced with other poor people.

Not at all. If you eliminate everyone below the poverty line, all that we'd have left is people above. People with at the very least, decent jobs. This would have two positive effects. Crime would drop significantly. And government expenditures on welfare and similar type programs would slow almost to a halt. My modest proposal is a win-win situation for everybody. Other than the poor of course.

Why would anyone bother going to the trouble of trying to create something if the government was going to take 98% of any winnings?

Well said. Not only would it discourage present ideas, technology, and business. But it would also depress the creation and implementation of new ideas, technology, and business in the future. You'd actually cause more economic hardship with this silly wealth confiscation proposal.

[Topaz]

I think there's more respect for someone who started out with nothing and became very rich, rather than inherited it. Those who came from nothing usually do give to charities. I also think its depends when you were born, ie, I have a friend whose father went into the stock market business after the WW2, during the 50's 60's 70's 80's he became a self-made millionaire and he said he was easy to do that than it was in the 90's to now. Most rich people don't spend, they save and save. The question I have now, is how much IS enough for a person to have? You can't take it with you, so why do people save to the amount of millions or billions?

[Remiel]

In any case, while 98% is too high, I think I could manage just fine on 2% of Bill Gates net worth, .

[bloodyminded]

A comparable statement would be, why don't we kill all of the poor people, so there isn't any poor people any more?

That you think taking from the rich is "comparable" to killing the poor perhaps says more than you think it does.

[Smallc]

I'm not sure he'd realize it though. He's wrapped up so tight inside his talking points that I don't believe he knows what he really thinks anymore.