A wealth tax. All assets and cash need to be properly valued and then that value taxed. I agree with the sibling comment and also with past discussions where a wealth tax is the only non-regressive (not-keep the poor down) tax code.
Also, quality of living is determined by income, not wealth. Fresh retirees are generally wealthier than other age-groups because they've saved for retirement. But that doesn't mean they consume more. Also, consider the citizens of the Netherlands. They enjoy a comfortable existence while servicing an enormous amount of debt. If wealth were the primary determinant of quality of life, you'd think the Netherlands were as as destitute as Somalia.
The American capital, legal, and tax structure collude to reduce wages, whereas the Dutch system incentivises responsible 'market based solutions'
The only people who want to live with a somali gov are gop
(Genuine question) how would one determine the value of something for taxation purposes if there's no market involved?
Or startups - is your loss making one a 0 or a $1bn? You could have work arounds for tax but it complicates things.
Another way of thinking about this: A wealth tax is like inflation, except assets are also devalued alongside your savings. Which means the wisest strategy is to consume now, save nothing, invest nothing.
What's the value of a painting? You could use the price I bought it for, but what if we just swap paintings instead? You know, I give you this fancy painting, you give me some Goodwill shit and you pay me a $100k "finders fee".
What's a yacht worth? What are super fancy houses worth? One of Mike Tyson's old mansions is still abandoned, so I assume it was worth nothing since they couldn't sell it.
Properly valuing things is hard. Wealth taxes are also regressive, in a way, because poor people are much less likely to have access to financial instruments that will return greater than the wealth tax rate. The poor and the middle class are far more likely to have their money in functional investments (homes, cars, etc) than they are to have them in something that generates profit.
So you'd still have to just not assess the tax on assets under the value of a reasonable home and car, at which point we're basically just back to what we have now, which is carving out a loophole for the poor.
1. own the largest market 2. Own the world reserve currency 3. Have a means of charging exit taxes