Comment by tforcram | Hacker News Reader

Comment by tforcram | Hacker News Reader

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`the sweat of thousands other people's brows`.

This is a great point, and I think lends itself to a better solution than taxes. Why give all the excess to the government, who will do who knows what with it? (actually it's pretty clear where the majority of it goes, and I'm pretty sure most people wouldn't spend it the same way as the government).

If someone attained their wealth with the help of others, why can't we enact regulations saying that the wealth must be divided amongst all of them? Sure you can have some differences for those at the top, but it shouldn't be orders of magnitude difference.

Then each of those individuals would be both better off individually as well as spreading that wealth farther across the economy instead of concentrated to a few individuals.

I'm probably too naive in my thinking here though.

If you're someone who feels that government will do "who knows what" with the money they get, I feel like there's a very strong obligation to look at & observe that fact, & see what might be done about it.

If we just say that the extremely well off have some burden, but maybe it's not entirely up to them & maybe people under them should have some day where that money goes: that creates perverse incentives where the rich person might shape who stays employed and who falls inline. Or even if not explicit pressure, maybe the rich person sets up various programs which obviously clearly benefit employees more so than others. It creates endless hard to read quid-pro-quo and other self dealing situations.

Rather than give the mega wealthy control over some societal obligation, it seems like governments can and should be in charge. If you disbelieve in government, I think there's a strong and high obligation to state how and where you think things are going astray, and I think there's a strong obligation to seek reform and improvement. Tearing down the United States & state governments or supplanting them with exterior powers is an act that, to me, seems blankety awful, with little clear advisement for it.

I like the state and don't think we should undermine it and I think should expect the ultra-richer to carry some burden, which they have so far escaped. I don't think we need to revamp the structure of government when we decide rich people should pay some burden too, which for the last ~4 decades they hasnt been the case.

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