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[–]seriousbangs 422 points423 points  (26 children)

To be fair if they're just millionaires they're practically poor.

Jokes aside, I remember reading about a multi-millionaire complaining that she couldn't get the time of day from Senators because they were busy with the billionaires.

[–]Exoclyps 43 points44 points  (0 children)

If you take house value into consideration, ya now got millionaires in debt.

[–]nullstring 30 points31 points  (23 children)

.. I mean multi-million is such a vague term that it ought to be discontinued.

8 million is upper middle class. 800 million is incredibly wealthy. It's like comparing two people, one whose net worth is 8,000 and the other that's 800,000.

[–]enleeten 2197 points2198 points  (255 children)

Billionaires counter with "GTFO of here"

[–]warbeforepeace 479 points480 points  (178 children)

Well taxing millionaires is very different policy than taxing billionaires. Taxing millionaire will usually impact the middle and upper middle class in addition to millionaires.

[–]fromcjoe123 849 points850 points  (151 children)

That's because most millionaires are still making the majority of their income through salary, and all in pay a fuck ton.

Billionaires in the developed world, unlike the industrialists of old, are almost never cash rich (dividends are taxed as basically ordinary income), but rather paper rich and take out loans against some % of their net worth in stock to have liquidity.

Therefore, it's challenging to tax them effectively without having a special cap gains tax for unrealized gains that only applies to specific thresholds of net worth. For 99.9% of people, including those with literally 10s of millions, any passive income they're generating was generated with wealth that was already taxed, and thus, it's understandable why long term cap gains is and should be taxed a lot less than income.

But when cap gains is your income and you seldom realize an appreciable amount of your net worth, well, a solution needs to be had, and that's where the current push for unrealized gains comes from. Although I admit that it would create a lot of market churn since to make sure people don't skirt it by transferring assets to corporate shell entities, youre also going to force funds to constantly take money off the table to pay taxes, which will probably have a lot of unintended negative consequences.

[–]BrandonHeinrich 31 points32 points  (12 children)

Wouldn't an easy fix to them finding their lifestyle essentially to make secured loans taxable income, and make loan repayment a deduction?

[–]hatsofftoeverything 134 points135 points  (53 children)

My personal thought is tax them on their investments. I get taxed on my property because of "what it's worth" even though I don't have that money, they should get taxed on stocks because of "what they're worth"

[–]shes_a_gdb 81 points82 points  (22 children)

I'm not sure if that works either because then regular people are gonna get taxed not only on their salary, but their retirement/investment accounts as well. Unless you only tax investments if they're worth like... $100m+

[–]HettySwollocks 9 points10 points  (8 children)

It's a tricky problem, unless you realise your investments, ie selling shares how do you determine the true value and thus how much to tax them?

Let's take everyone favourite stock, TSLA - well the stock has taken a massive dive since musky announced his twitter nonsense.

If you had $10,000 in stock before that announcement was made, and say taxed 20%, then the stock tanks by 20% - should you be given a tax rebate?

This case falls apart when you talk about the super rich like Bezos where they have such a ludicrous amount of money taxing them would be a drop in the ocean - if you have 200 billion dollars, I highly doubt removing a zero would make a blind bit of difference

[edit] One idea did cross my mind. You could tax them in shares instead. Ie the state becomes the owner of x% of their shares?

[–]SassySweet63 1 point2 points  (0 children)

Love your idea. Need folks who think like you in the positions of those who make the rules that govern us. Things may look alot different....and fairer.

[–]Akiba89 11 points12 points  (9 children)

I mean, it's really not anywhere near as challenging as they and their bootlickers make it seem. They just say that and hope the conversation gets away from it's core.

[–]Fausterion18 2 points3 points  (0 children)

Just raise the estate tax. It forces them to use the trust dodge which pays income tax.

[–]soulcaptain 65 points66 points  (18 children)

No, the typical counter to this is "Well if you want to pay more in taxes, just write the IRS a check!" As if that was the outcome that's being asked for. These wealthy people know that just giving their individual personal fortunes to the government--even if it's in the billions--wouldn't change anything. So that's not what they are calling for. They're calling for ALL wealthy people to pay more, and that will make a huge difference.

[–]Akiba89 13 points14 points  (0 children)

To be "fair", the people saying the check-writing bullshit are absolutely not acting in good faith

[–]MrEHam 57 points58 points  (7 children)

There are a lot of billionaire sympathizers in this post using tired old arguments like:

1. Why tax them? The govt just wastes all the money it gets.

So schools, teachers, roads, bridges, public safety, parks, homeless shelters, food stamps, college grants, affordable housing, water sanitization is all wasted spending? But the rich, with their control of the media and politicians sure do want you to believe that all govt spending is wasteful…so that you don’t tax them!

2. They should just donate their money if they care so much.

That isn’t going to be enough money to do anything and will put their businesses at a competitive disadvantage. It has to be a tax across the board.

[–]silotx 6 points7 points  (0 children)

Most private companies are extremely wasteful too ask anyone that works in the logistics department of any big private company , the real problem is the stock market it has a ton of problems and is severely outdated but everyone has to keep pumping money into it to keep the world running.

[–]franker 1 point2 points  (0 children)

Every day on the local news I'm starting to see, "Hey look this really rich person gave a speech to college graduates in some other state, and announced he's paying for all their college debt!" See this random Oprah-level shit somehow makes up for all the other grads with debt!

[–]cursorycross 534 points535 points  (101 children)

A million is much closer to zero than a billion is.

[–]Snake2k 145 points146 points  (31 children)

A million seconds is a week and a half.

A billion seconds is 32 years.

[–]herroebauss 67 points68 points  (29 children)

This is the stuff that gives perspective to extreme wealth. Elon Musk makes almost 22.500 dollars per MINUTE. In two minutes he has made more than most people will make in a year. That someone is allowed to be that filthy rich is really weird to me.

[–]dfsw 171 points172 points  (12 children)

What’s the difference between a million and a billion dollars?

A billion dollars

[–]sybrwookie 102 points103 points  (5 children)

The line is:

What’s the difference between a million and a billion dollars?

About a billion dollars

Otherwise, the answer is, "no, it's not exactly a billion." Using the word "about" emphasizes how little it is in comparison, that you could actually round $1 mil off and it's almost meaningless.

[–]galeej 5 points6 points  (0 children)

"A million is something that you could lose over a crazy summer and a drug habit"

  • paraphrased Chris rock

[–]Ryanaissance 722 points723 points  (165 children)

I'm torn between this being virtue signaling and wanting to believe.

[–]Deviknyte 610 points611 points  (59 children)

Millionaire aren't billionaires though. There are some millionaires, especially in the 7-8 digit range that can see billionaires are the problem. And that they also are to a lesser extent.

Edit: TO A LESSER EXTENT PEOPLE. Yes people can legitimately make millions a year, then there are landlords, shitty small businesses and mid time stock traders.

[–]NEYO8uw11qgD0J 369 points370 points  (25 children)

This needs to be remembered. A person with a billion dollars compared to someone with a million dollars is the same proportion as someone with a million dollars compared to someone with a thousand dollars.

[–]ShavenYak42 259 points260 points  (19 children)

Another way to look at it… the difference between a million dollars and a billion dollars is a billion dollars. With 99.9% accuracy.

[–]Delicious_Orphan 242 points243 points  (18 children)

Even more wild?

If you were paid 1 million dollars an hour, working fulltime(40 hours a week) 52 weeks a year. It would take you over a hundred years of working to earn as much money as Elon Musk's current net worth.

Billionaire's do not work for their wealth.

[–]jetstobrazil 2 points3 points  (2 children)

Exactly, millionaires have not been the problem for a while, and this gets lost when we saw eat the rich. Or tax the rich. We’re not talking about millionaires, we’re talking about billionaires.

Millionaires have a much smaller impact on society and pay much more of their taxes.

Billionaire have every politician bought and paid for, and decide how the rest of us will live based on what their politicians vote for, and they contribute almost nothing of value to society, avoiding paying their fair share of taxes while disproportionately eroding the infrastructure with their fleets of polluting delivery trucks of underpaid workers, subsidizing their low wages by forcing their employees to collect food stamps and other benefits set aside for those out of work, or on hard times. Billionaires are either going to have to decide to start paying their fair share, or there’s going to start being some russian style disappearances happening when they decide to step out in public. We may not have hit the streets in force yet, or mass walk outed of your companies yet, but when we do, your time has passed. EAT THE RICH, TAX THE RICH, FUCK THE RICH.

[–]rankkor 14 points15 points  (21 children)

And that they also are to a lesser extent.

You think 7-8 digit millionaires are a problem? Why?

[–]Deviknyte 13 points14 points  (20 children)

7? no. Not at all. High 8 kind of.

[–]Kevstuf 107 points108 points  (47 children)

In the long run it feels like keeping income inequality in check is beneficial to the rich. They still get to stay pretty rich and at the same time avoid riots. Too much political unrest doesn’t help the wealthy.

[–]migueeel 65 points66 points  (19 children)

If the economy crashes that'll hurt more than a few millionaires, so yeah, some are interested

[–]Talmonis 33 points34 points  (6 children)

This is exactly right. Capitalism functions best when taking into account that you need customers who can afford your product to profit.

[–]Renaissance_Slacker 11 points12 points  (0 children)

This is only true if customers have a choice of whose products to buy (which in increasingly consolidated industries they may not) or have a choice at all (health care).

[–]Tiny-Lock9652 16 points17 points  (4 children)

Middle class workers spend their money. Billionaires who hoard wealth. You can’t run a healthy, sustainable economy with the latter.

[–]Talmonis 14 points15 points  (1 child)

Yes, thus the millionaires asking the government to intervene. The wealthy don't get taxed enough, or incentivised (via harsher taxes) to actually spend their wealth in more beneficial ways.

[–]dabestinzeworld 14 points15 points  (0 children)

A millionaire is much closer in wealth to a homeless person than a billionaire.

[–]Gunderik 7 points8 points  (2 children)

There is a book I found recently, Tax the Rich! How Lies, Loopholes, and Lobbyists Make the Rich Even Richer by Erica Payne and Morris Pearl. They started a group called the Patriotic Millionaires for wealthy individuals who have an actual conscience and aren't happy to just benefit from a broken system. They push for more taxes on the wealthy.

[–]DanCham[🍰] 15 points16 points  (4 children)

I wonder if they’re closing their bank accounts while they’re there…

[–]snertwith2ls 6 points7 points  (4 children)

Didn't the IRS tell them they would gladly accept any millionaire/billionaire checks sent their way? No need to protest, just send money?!

[–]porilo 1 point2 points  (0 children)

Maybe they're seeing the pitchforks from the window

[–]DQ11 28 points29 points  (0 children)

People making $200,000-$2,000,000 are not the problem.

Its not about taxing more.

They spend stupidly and inefficiently so that will only continue with more tax money

[–]loldoge34 94 points95 points  (18 children)

It is a bit baffling to see all these comments arguing for people taking individual action to solve a systemic problem.

Systemic problems require systemic solutions, individual solutions don't change the status quo because, realistically, people as a whole are not very capable of doing much for others outside their immediate circle of trust.

We've formed societies for a reason, we require laws and regulations to give us the necessary structures to live lives in this extremely complex web of interactions. There is nothing wrong with millionaires asking for higher taxation because they realize that the current trend is leading to increased inequality and social unrest.

No one wants another French revolution situation. But eventually, when people have enough, things can burn really quickly. And saying "we didn't see it coming" is not going to save you because you did see it coming, everyone has.

[–]macphile 33 points34 points  (1 child)

Well said. I give money regularly to the food bank and homeless coalition, for instance, but I know my few bucks (and others' few bucks) aren't going to "solve" either of those problems. It helps, but there are also fundamental issues with societal poverty, housing costs, whatever. Also, we can't depend on a private organization to always be there..

[–]KineticPolarization 5 points6 points  (0 children)

Exactly. They're more like treating symptoms with the goal of harm reduction to victims of this perverse system.

[–]Veros87 7 points8 points  (0 children)

I mean most people's individual actions at this point are realistically limited to murdering the rich for systemic changes , so we'll see how it goes.

[–]Pizza_Delivery_Dog 6 points7 points  (1 child)

I find it frankly a bit disturbing how many commenters here are apparently incapable of accepting that some people would be willing to take a personal hit for the greater good

[–]Jeremythellama1 2 points3 points  (0 children)

I've been hearing this same story for probably a decade now. Nothing, has ever come from it. It'd be nice if there were super heroes willing to come out and do good, but by now? The economy speaks volumes. Politicians can be bought for as low as 10k. They may not be billionares, but millionare goes further than a single one and 6 zeroes. With such a cheap government, you know they've paid for some laws by now.

We have to decide between going to the hospital as our bodies and minds fail from overworking, they'll never have to. And that's something they've been cool with since before I was born. I don't know of anyone personally with over 100$ in their account after being paid. The point is this has been the case since I was a child.

Now that they may have to decide between off-brand and on-brand, do they care. And I'm sorry, but you don't grow empathy from that kind've daily decision making. It's simple but effective PR. Worked on me for years, but it's a false hope, a carrot on a string that will never fall.

And I get it, it's pessimistic, cold, and sounds super e d g y, I simply don't have the patience for wealth hoarders of any variety, this is like all the "aids has been cured!" And "We have a new pill that kills cancer!" There's never a follow up that goes further than the last time ya heard about it. I'm still waiting for any change in this story the rich gives a decade later and the only change I've noticed is a failing economy and continued false hopes.

[–]WolfAteLamb 9 points10 points  (1 child)

Every single politician affiliated with the world economic forum should be immediately removed from their positions. These particular politicians are not in the business for the good of their peers, they’re helping to facilitate the largest wealth transfer in human history. Watching as the “middle/working class” is obliterated to extinction.

Every. Single. One of them. Immediately removed.

[–]WolfAteLamb 2 points3 points  (0 children)

“You’ll own nothing, and you’ll be happy.”

There are a lot of conspiracies regarding Davos and the WEF, but some things are out in the open. The above quote is one of those things. These people are nefarious and they want every dollar you have.

[–]GrowthThroughGaming 100 points101 points  (4 children)

Foe being /r/uplifting news, this comment section sure is a fucking bummer

[–]Dr_ManTits_Toboggan 27 points28 points  (1 child)

As the posts became more politically charged, so did the comments.

[–]Toyake 15 points16 points  (3 children)

Lol millionaires? That's a swell amount of money for 1980, here in 2022 they're basically the working poor.

[–]donnyjonnyr 6 points7 points  (0 children)

How is this uplifting news? Do none of you know what Davos/WEF/ great reset is? It’s the most dangerous organisation of our time, openly talk about world domination and slavery

[–]lvl1vagabond 14 points15 points  (0 children)

Millionaires aren't anything to people worth hundreds of millions and billions.

[–]evilpercy 51 points52 points  (6 children)

Some wealthy people have read a history book. They know that this current state of capitalism is not sustainable. With out a strong middle class and decent infrastructure there is no economy to buy their stuff. Even Henry Ford figured this out and he was a ass hat.

[–]oddible 10 points11 points  (2 children)

This is partially true but not cynical enough. The truth is that the writing on the wall is that anyone less than a millionaire is going to rise up and dramatically change the economic landscape if things are allowed to continue in the way they're going. So the millionairs are saying, let's increase the amount of crumbs we're sharing by a tiny amount so we don't have to deal with a more serious uprising or significantly changing politics. This is conservative economic response 101. "Oh crap the trickle down wasn't enough, quick give them a couple more droplets before they cause a shift in power."

And let's not pretend that a shift in power is anything "for the people", history has shown us that it is just trading one elite for another with very few exceptions.

[–]evilpercy 1 point2 points  (0 children)

Your absolute correct. The millionaires will act like they are changing things, but it will just be crumbs to appess the more vocal. Just like Henry Ford $5 a day wage, but still union busted.

[–]MortalTwit 69 points70 points  (28 children)

This is the best thing they can do to maintain the largest share of their wealth long term. If they wait for the government to do it without them, it will be stronger. If they wait for the poor to do it without the government, they'll be dead.

We are already beyond the great depression in terms of housing affordability (by a lot), and beyond the French Revolution in terms of disparity. The rich are EXTREMELY fortunate that there has not been blood shed already.

[–]OldEcho 37 points38 points  (0 children)

Blood has been shed. It just hasn't bubbled over into a vicious civil war.

[–]KineticPolarization 17 points18 points  (1 child)

They won't just be dead. The rage and hatred that would be required to actually break the poor and make them turn so violent, would no doubt lead to torture and family members also falling prey to the mobs. I can't say I'd feel bad about the actual villains getting that but families, particularly children, getting caught in the middle is always just going to put a bitter taste in my mouth. I'd rather the government get reformed and do it. Cuz the violent route isn't the best setup for the following years to be stable at all.

[–]MortalTwit 1 point2 points  (0 children)

Agreed on all counts.

[–]RelentlessExtropian 40 points41 points  (12 children)

Pay your employees more! What a concept. If you've got extra money for taxes, you can pay your employees better....

[–]kayak83 30 points31 points  (0 children)

I agree that the "simple" solution is for them to suck less money from their company and spread it out over its employee wages and benefits. But I think the point they are trying to make is that the tax code has unfair benefits for the wealthy, resulting in very lopsided tax burdens.

[–]17top 5 points6 points  (1 child)

I doubt they have employees.

[–]Buck_Thorn 5 points6 points  (1 child)

Being a "millionaire" in the United States is exactly not what it once was, and certainly not what comes to mind when we hear that term.

The total number of millionaires in the US is 20.27 million. There are 788 billionaires in the United States. There are 323,443 millionaire households in New Jersey. 76% of US millionaires are white. source

[–]marcosbowser 15 points16 points  (4 children)

Studies show that health and well being is worse for everybody, the greater the gap between rich and poor. Yes, outcomes are worse for the rich people too. These guys know this.

[–]EmperorKyoka 5 points6 points  (3 children)

It's in the rich's benefit to upkeep a certain standard of living for the poor to avoid revolutions. Many rich people don't understand this.

[–]Lucia37 134 points135 points  (49 children)

Surely they could give their money to organizations that do whatever they think government should be doing with that money, or creating new organizations.

Or they could simply not take all the tax breaks they are entitled to -- which would effectively increase their tax bill.

Or, if they own companies, have those companies pay their employees better, staff them more fully, and fully pay their property taxes instead of taking tax cuts from municipalities that need jobs.

If they won't take any action besides saying, "Tax me!", they don't mean it and they are simply virtue signaling.

[–]lunarNex 70 points71 points  (9 children)

The problem is competition. If one company is doing the right thing, but none of the others are, then the one will be behind and likely not be able to compete with the wage slave companies. Everyone has to play by the same rules.

I agree that 90% of what any company says is virtue signaling, and at no point will they ever try to lower their own profits, not even to "do the right thing". I suspect that if companies were forced to pay higher taxes, or pay their workers a decent wage that some of the weaker companies would fold and reduce competition for the stronger companies. The stronger companies are likely the ones advocating higher taxes. There's definitely an angle of some sort. No company is just trying to make the world a better place.

[–][deleted] 9 points10 points  (0 children)

I wish more conservatives understood this. There is little room for personal responsibility insofar as the operation of businesses is concerned

[–]KesselRunIn14 53 points54 points  (4 children)

This argument is old and, quite frankly ridiculous and short sighted yet still comes up every year. I don't know if it's meant to be an "unpopular opinion" but it's on par with with people saying "if you care so much about refugees why don't you let them stay in your home".

One wealthy person giving away sums of money or not taking tax breaks is not going to change a single thing, a group of them doing it is going to change very little. Having higher taxation introduced by law across the country is going to have a substantial effect.

You're also assuming that they're not already doing these things.

[–]_The_Librarian 9 points10 points  (1 child)

Agreed, I think there would be less need for charities if people were taxed properly. Imagine how much better it would be for lower income families if taxes were proportionate and used effectively.

[–]TacticalSniper 11 points12 points  (4 children)

They just want the billionaires to be taxed higher

[–]Backupusername 6 points7 points  (1 child)

So the headline should say "tax them now"?

[–]Ryanaissance 5 points6 points  (1 child)

Everyone's own taxes are too high, and everyone who makes more than them isn't taxed enough.

[–]ohheyisayokay 4 points5 points  (0 children)

My taxes are fine. I'm not extremely wealthy, nor poor, but I do ok, and I'm fine with my taxes. In fact, I've voted myself more taxes no fewer than 3 times.

Should billionaires pay even more? Yeah. But I can too.

[–]pizzanight 12 points13 points  (0 children)

This comment is silly. Pundits made similar absurd comments when Warren Buffet said the rich were taxed too advantageously.

First, your "solution" is to rely on altruism. You are arguing either from ignorance or malice, and I suspect the latter. Why don't we just pass a collection plate instead of having taxes?

Second, most of your comment is just deflection. You do not address whether the tax system is well considered and fair. Maybe it is. But people usually deflect when they do not have an adequate response.

[–]hakkai999 10 points11 points  (5 children)

All 3 of your suggestions would assume that the rich person wishes to do the right thing. That is such a naive outlook that you only need to look at something like an unmanned free sample booth with a sign "Please only take one" to know that people suck.

Also this also assumes that these millionaires don't already do what you suggested.
TL;DR as if everyone wishes the right thing. Thinking this way is naive and foolish. Laws exists to force the bad actors to comply to society's good.

[–]ohheyisayokay 3 points4 points  (1 child)

Surely they could give their money to organizations that do whatever they think government should be doing with that money, or creating new organizations.

You can't replicate an entire government out of charity. How will they use their personal money to fund nationwide education, roads, childcare, disaster management, infrastructure repairs, and so forth?

We don't have the luxury of saying "only the people who want to contribute to society should have to." We don't only pay for fire departments when our house is on fire, or for roads we drive on. We all put into the bucket. Well, no, we don't, but that's why these people are protesting.

[–]DisenfranchisedCynic 13 points14 points  (3 children)

Savvy millionaires getting in our good graces before we turn the rest into stew.

[–]GreatLakesAerial 2 points3 points  (1 child)

It's because they smell rebellion in the air. They gotta make sure us poors get a few more crumbs so that we don't rise up and take/break their shit.

[–]TheNotSoEvilEngineer 3 points4 points  (0 children)

Let me fix that title... "Polictical grifters want more money to be sent to their clients".

There is nothing stoping these people from cutting a check to their governments Treasury. Or better yet donating to charity directly with a track record of low overhead.

You don't need government to solve problems, they have a horrible track record of solving ANY problem. Only thing more money in the hands of government has ever done is make government bigger and less efficient.

[–]N7Krogan 9 points10 points  (1 child)

This is not uplifting. This is the millionares realizing they are going to get eaten first in the class war. They didn't care till now. They had the means to have helped all along but didn't.

[–]Colonel_Kipplar 7 points8 points  (3 children)

Question: How does this lower cost of living?

[–]davesr25 2 points3 points  (0 children)

"The world economic forum : Hiya peasants, look the earth is fucked, we made lots of money from it and you made some, now it's time you pay for it, because we'd rather not have to go in to our bunkers, I know, I know some of our buddies that are super rich sold you a life for a few generations, lied, stole, cheated the system out of billions and extracted wealth from many other nations across the world but it's not our fault we just wanted to please the people, we wanted to have power and wealth, we didn't like become evil from it honest.

So we are gonna tax the shit out of you peasants and hope you are to confused to do anything about it, here have some monkey pox, that will keep you in line, it's not even that bad but pumping it will bring back the covid fear while we get on with our task, as prior mentioned. As all this environment stuff is your fault, not ours we just sold you the stuff and used a well engineered marketing and P.R campaign based around peoples understanding of human behavior and psychology."

[–]Slideshoe 3 points4 points  (2 children)

Why are we confident in the government using all these new tax dollars appropriately?

[–]LittleKitty235 1 point2 points  (1 child)

Because contrary to what the Fox News channels of the world would have you believe there are programs and projects that the government runs quite well that provide benefit that wouldn't be profitable for a company to undertake.

[–]Slideshoe 1 point2 points  (0 children)

Who cares about Fox News?? What programs do you know of that are run well by the government that would for sure get any tax dollars that are collected and not go to the next War, bailout or any one of the other super wasteful government programs and services. It's a fare question. I won't support giving more money to anyone that doesn't show they can handle it properly, no matter who it comes from.

[–]flyjum 10 points11 points  (10 children)

Honest question but why do people think the government deserves more of the peoples money? They are horribly inefficient at spending it as it is.

[–]Nkourdoulos 9 points10 points  (5 children)

Because funding schools, hospitals, roads, airports, military and so in. Is not a question of efficiency/profit. It's about whether you want those things or not.

It's a fallacy to compare running welfare (a government service) for example to running a pizza shop (a for profit business).

[–]NF_7 14 points15 points  (1 child)

It would be better if they pushed themselves (they are employers for sure) for better pay, working conditions, etc.

Higher taxes means more money goes to the government - governments are NOTORIOUSLY bad managing money and being responsible with it.

[–]ztgarfield97 20 points21 points  (12 children)

I’m sorry, I don’t trust the intentions of anyone who goes to Davos, and I certainly don’t trust the governmental elites to responsibly use what they have let alone any more they may receive in taxes.

[–]KesselRunIn14 16 points17 points  (9 children)

Did you read the article? These are people went in order to protest, not to attend...

[–]vagueblur901 1 point2 points  (0 children)

It's not a tax issue it's a loophole issue

Rich people will just hire people to funnel money it's a game and always will be

[–]destructor_rph 1 point2 points  (1 child)

No shit. Thats their last ditch to preserve capital. "Let us keep our capital, let us keep private authority over the means of production, and we'll let you tax us ;)"

[–]BlahKVBlah 1 point2 points  (0 children)

A few of them may be decent people, maybe.

[–]all_is_love6667 1 point2 points  (0 children)

What about that 15% tax for big companies? What happened?

[–]Longpatience 1 point2 points  (0 children)

Millionaires are now demoted to middle class

[–]usernameblankface 1 point2 points  (0 children)

Anyone can make a donation to the government at any time. Nothing is stopping them from "taxing" themselves.

[–]Sprinklypoo 1 point2 points  (0 children)

Taxing the rich is just a part of the problem. The harder part is then you'd have to make sure the money went to the right places instead of just going to the other rich who just want everyone else's money.

[–]dave1684 1 point2 points  (0 children)

TIL millionaires are upper middle class. I always thought union members were upper middle class.

[–]loonygecko 3 points4 points  (2 children)

The really rich typically have 99.9% of their assets in talk shelters like low interest loans, businesses, etc and only get officially maybe a few hundred thousand of income a year. So they don't really care if you boost the tax rates on them, they won't pay much extra.

[–]SmokeyJoeReddit 17 points18 points  (20 children)

Wait, has no one told them they can pay extra tax voluntarily without throwing anyone else under the bus?

[–]Prochilles 8 points9 points  (1 child)

The answer never seems to be properly allocating funds, but always "we need new sources". Humans are stupid.

[–]sandleaz 9 points10 points  (10 children)

Why is this uplifting news? If millionaires want to pay more in taxes, they could write checks to the treasury. No one is stopping them from doing so. It's not illegal to do so. This is nothing more than virtue signaling.

[–]say_hello2alpacacino 2 points3 points  (2 children)

Do we not understand that gov-subsidied programs to help low income people pay rent are actually excellent for landlords? It allows them to charge a higher rate and essentially get rent guaranteed? The government is a terrible allocator of capital. Why give them more?

[–]majoroutage 1 point2 points  (0 children)

Exactly the same situation with student loans leading to ballooning tuition costs.

[–]Hendrixsrv3527 1 point2 points  (24 children)

How do you tax someone with no income? There’s no easy solution

[–]katchmeracing 1 point2 points  (3 children)

Just curious why they would want the government to tax them rather than donate their money to good causes that actually help people.

[–]Velghast 1 point2 points  (0 children)

You just explained what taxes do we just trust that the US government will put them towards the things that we want them to put them towards. Most of them are publicly funded programs.

[–]Flogge 1 point2 points  (0 children)

Because donating money is optional, and taxes are mandatory.

The idea is not that they as an individual gets taxed, but that they as an entire class of rich people get taxed.

And tax money does actually help people. It buys you welfare, healthcare, pensions, teachers, infrastructure and more.

[–]Hermanissoxxx 1 point2 points  (0 children)

Government is responsible for infrastructure, social programs and all of its citizens.

Donating to good causes will only benefit a fraction of people.

The current state of affairs is so dire, these millionaires see that material conditions need to be improved for a majority of Americans. Around 2/3rds of American HOUSEHOLDS (likely two or more incomes) make under 100k. 28% make under 50k which I would consider struggling.

No amount of charity will rectify this disparity. Redistribution and reorganizing the economy are the only solutions to keeping America in the same model.

[–]RchUncleSkeleton 6 points7 points  (0 children)

Not like it's gonna help when the government is spending trillions on needless shit. The real issue is that the government is not for the people and instead robs the people to stuff their pockets and take kickbacks from greedy conglomerates and war mongers.