November 7th, 2020 at 5:09 PM
Yea that's the problem they don't realize. By taxing humungous rates on the wealthy, they just... don't pay. We've seen it over and over and over again. We can trade blame or we can demonize them as we wish, but in the end, it's still less money going into the government. And it always ends up defeating the very purpose of raising the rates to begin with.
There are people suggesting 80% tax rates for the wealthy, and that's insane. It almost feels like it's being suggested out of resentment rather than about actual utility. That "they shouldn't be rich, they don't deserve it" - when in reality perhaps they started a business young, took brave risks, failed 10 times, and got finally succeeded. And by them succeeding, in all liklihood, they're employing others and giving back to the economy.
These past few years, many, many companies took initiative (on their own) to dramatically raise pay rates. Walmart is paying $12 and $13/hr in my city. Target pays $15 (on their own). I worked three different jobs that raised everyones rates from around 9 to around 12 on average. Companies started raising rates without any governmental mandates or regulations, and I was quite impressed by that. I don't think I worked a single job where the average raises didn't increase by about 25% (at minimum) under the past few years.
That being said, some degree of corporate regulation is still absolutely necessary and serves a vital purpose. When we've got massive corporations that aren't paying any tax at all, we need to ask why. Is it because the tax rates are too high? (Unlikely, because Trump cut them to 21% this year). There are certain things we just shouldn't tolerate, such as Wells-Fargo's fake accounts, or Amazon not paying any taxes, or medical companies price-gouging life-saving drugs. It ends up costing everyone, and it makes the playing field unlevel for other companies when some aren't playing by the same rules. And it's a hard line to draw, because we can't risk over-regulating corporations in the wrong way either. They'd simply leave the country. More regulation is not always the answer.
I truthfully believe the stock market is responsible for a lot of that, where Apple and Amazon both (each) produce more than 5% of the nation's entire GDP alone. They end up being owned by their shareholders, which, by definition, expect them to outperform their expectations and projections.
It's the nature of the free market economy in motion. The problem with reining it in and having the government manage everything is that the government, too, will become corrupt. The free market (to an extent) regulates itself. It decentralizes the flow of money and power, which prevents any one governmental institution from becoming too powerful or corrupt against the will of its people.
The problem in America is that somewhere along the line, we lost our drive to create creative solutions to problems. We just threw uninformed leglislation, or let corporate lobbyists take over, and stopped creating fine-tuned legislation to solve actual problems directly. And we're paying the price for that now.
There are people suggesting 80% tax rates for the wealthy, and that's insane. It almost feels like it's being suggested out of resentment rather than about actual utility. That "they shouldn't be rich, they don't deserve it" - when in reality perhaps they started a business young, took brave risks, failed 10 times, and got finally succeeded. And by them succeeding, in all liklihood, they're employing others and giving back to the economy.
These past few years, many, many companies took initiative (on their own) to dramatically raise pay rates. Walmart is paying $12 and $13/hr in my city. Target pays $15 (on their own). I worked three different jobs that raised everyones rates from around 9 to around 12 on average. Companies started raising rates without any governmental mandates or regulations, and I was quite impressed by that. I don't think I worked a single job where the average raises didn't increase by about 25% (at minimum) under the past few years.
That being said, some degree of corporate regulation is still absolutely necessary and serves a vital purpose. When we've got massive corporations that aren't paying any tax at all, we need to ask why. Is it because the tax rates are too high? (Unlikely, because Trump cut them to 21% this year). There are certain things we just shouldn't tolerate, such as Wells-Fargo's fake accounts, or Amazon not paying any taxes, or medical companies price-gouging life-saving drugs. It ends up costing everyone, and it makes the playing field unlevel for other companies when some aren't playing by the same rules. And it's a hard line to draw, because we can't risk over-regulating corporations in the wrong way either. They'd simply leave the country. More regulation is not always the answer.
I truthfully believe the stock market is responsible for a lot of that, where Apple and Amazon both (each) produce more than 5% of the nation's entire GDP alone. They end up being owned by their shareholders, which, by definition, expect them to outperform their expectations and projections.
It's the nature of the free market economy in motion. The problem with reining it in and having the government manage everything is that the government, too, will become corrupt. The free market (to an extent) regulates itself. It decentralizes the flow of money and power, which prevents any one governmental institution from becoming too powerful or corrupt against the will of its people.
The problem in America is that somewhere along the line, we lost our drive to create creative solutions to problems. We just threw uninformed leglislation, or let corporate lobbyists take over, and stopped creating fine-tuned legislation to solve actual problems directly. And we're paying the price for that now.
