than just "TAX THE RICH!!".

I'm for a wealth tax of the super wealthy. As I tried to show in post #23, I think it is unfair that a relatively high wealth tax already exists and it is borne by everyone but the very wealthy.

But there are significant side effects to every policy. My political pet peeve is candidates putting up apparently simple solutions to complex issues. But maybe OKP isn't the best place to talk about nuance.




>This was cute, but it in no way represents real world
>investing. Especially at the level we are talking about.
>
>You think guys like Bill Gates are investing in 50/50
>situations?
>
>
>I get it, you tried to make it simple. But you can't come up
>with a simple exercise to put any of us in the shoes of how
>Bill Gates will decide to invest.
>
>A more realistic exercise/question would be "Do you think an
>ultra-billionare would walk away from investment that
>previously would return 80 million per year, but now only
>returns 40?"...or something.
>


Investments are never certainties like you are portraying here. They are risky. And increasing the tax rate increases the number scenarios in which an investment is unprofitable. So it decreases the likelihood of taking on an investment project.


>I hope you're just being devils advocate here.

I kind of am. But also kind of not. Again, trying to get into the nuance instead of campaign slogans.


>
>
>But at the end of the day, even if we accept the idea that
>investment would go down...the argument would be 1) the
>increased government spending would lead to other
>benefits/growth and 2) the societal gains are more important
>and 3) your argument sort of assumes that Bill is investing
>all of his wealth into booming businesses today AND that a
>different investor wouldn't step up etc etc.
>
>

All this is true. These are possibilities. Especially #2


>And again, the natural progression of the stance you are
>taking are things like privatize social security, continuing
>to worship investors, etc.
>

Not really. Sometimes social welfare can improve at the expense of economics. I.e. Everyone gets healthcare, but as a result everyone has to pay a little more.

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