Cortez marginal tax rate hike

[Draco Dracul]

No matter how high the top income tax, without enforcement, it's completely irrevelant. And I am fairly well convinced, that you do not have to increase the tax rates in the first place, but that the true problem and the best way to increase tax income is, to enforce the taxes that are already in place and remove ways to hide income. "Calculating yourself to be poor", so that someone with $1,000,000 a year of income effectively pays less taxes than someone who earns $20,000 a year, should not be an option.

Conversely, any tax rate that is higher than 50% of your income is unjustifiable outside of special, time-limited circumstances.

To pay more than 50÷ of their income they would need to make close to 20 million dollars annually.

[CmdrKing]

FWiW, the outrage I hear seems to be mostly about other things in AOC's proposal, with "economic security for those who choose not to work" being the big one, and the one AOC seems to want to backtrack on (to the extent of calling it fake, something that seems unlikely unless hacking was involved), but also including equity proposals (i.e., equality of outcome rather than equality of opportunity).

This is a good window into the heart of the matter really.

Equal opportunity is something we’ve achieved less than we’d think (I mean, if I wanted to come out at work, but they refused to update my employee data... welp, tough shit), but certainly equality under the law and legal recourse for discrimination are closer to reality than not.

But what we think of as equal opportunity is not actually equal opportunities.

If I have to pay my way through college and another girl’s being covered by her parents, she has more opportunities than me.
She’s got fewer time sinks, giving her more study time and less stress.
If a high-profile unpaid internship comes up, she can jump on it while I weigh my ability to also do paid work.
If we graduate with similar grades and honors, she has more resources to attend interviews, be coached on the interview process, afford better interview clothes.
I have most likely racked up significantly more debt, meaning that once I am employed I have far higher risks if opportunities arise for new jobs, so she’ll have greater job mobility.

These things snowball, and it’s visible from just one hypothetical.
And that’s not accounting for the deliberate prevention of accumulated wealth from times pasts (redlining for an easy example).

Equity as a rhetorical device is designed to highlight this, that success is often not from ability, but from being spared obstacles due to generational wealth. The goal is to create a lower ‘floor’ of wealth, and to do more so those added costs for this starting from the bottom are less burdensome.

[Mickey_Rat15]

I wasn't contesting that it was the amount of the increase. I apologize for the lack of clarity.

70% isn't a huge deal. We had that much before and it wasn't a problem, but now everyone's acting like it's the most radical proposal ever.

When we had those kind of rates we also had massive tax shelters. Very few people actually paid that kind of rate if they had an accountant worth their salt. But those tax shelters created perverse economic incentives that distorted the economy and lessened its efficiency.

Part of the deal in getting rid of those rates was also removing the shelters. Bringing back the rates without the shelters has no hstorical precedent to say that there was "no problem".

[Mickey_Rat15]

FWiW, the outrage I hear seems to be mostly about other things in AOC's proposal, with "economic security for those who choose not to work" being the big one, and the one AOC seems to want to backtrack on (to the extent of calling it fake, something that seems unlikely unless hacking was involved), but also including equity proposals (i.e., equality of outcome rather than equality of opportunity).

This is a good window into the heart of the matter really.

Equal opportunity is something we’ve achieved less than we’d think (I mean, if I wanted to come out at work, but they refused to update my employee data... welp, tough shit), but certainly equality under the law and legal recourse for discrimination are closer to reality than not.

But what we think of as equal opportunity is not actually equal opportunities.

If I have to pay my way through college and another girl’s being covered by her parents, she has more opportunities than me.
She’s got fewer time sinks, giving her more study time and less stress.
If a high-profile unpaid internship comes up, she can jump on it while I weigh my ability to also do paid work.
If we graduate with similar grades and honors, she has more resources to attend interviews, be coached on the interview process, afford better interview clothes.
I have most likely racked up significantly more debt, meaning that once I am employed I have far higher risks if opportunities arise for new jobs, so she’ll have greater job mobility.

These things snowball, and it’s visible from just one hypothetical.
And that’s not accounting for the deliberate prevention of accumulated wealth from times pasts (redlining for an easy example).

Equity as a rhetorical device is designed to highlight this, that success is often not from ability, but from being spared obstacles due to generational wealth. The goal is to create a lower ‘floor’ of wealth, and to do more so those added costs for this starting from the bottom are less burdensome.

Equality of opportunity refers to there being legal equality. People do not have equal talent or ambition and will never have equal results in a free society. Because of that, the members of each upcoming generation are going to coming from unequal circumstances. The extent to which you make circumstances more equal, is the extent you will remove liberty. Liberty is the greater value over equality of circumstances.

"Harrison Bergeron" does not describe a eutopia.

[Draco Dracul]

FWiW, the outrage I hear seems to be mostly about other things in AOC's proposal, with "economic security for those who choose not to work" being the big one, and the one AOC seems to want to backtrack on (to the extent of calling it fake, something that seems unlikely unless hacking was involved), but also including equity proposals (i.e., equality of outcome rather than equality of opportunity).

This is a good window into the heart of the matter really.

Equal opportunity is something we’ve achieved less than we’d think (I mean, if I wanted to come out at work, but they refused to update my employee data... welp, tough shit), but certainly equality under the law and legal recourse for discrimination are closer to reality than not.

But what we think of as equal opportunity is not actually equal opportunities.

If I have to pay my way through college and another girl’s being covered by her parents, she has more opportunities than me.
She’s got fewer time sinks, giving her more study time and less stress.
If a high-profile unpaid internship comes up, she can jump on it while I weigh my ability to also do paid work.
If we graduate with similar grades and honors, she has more resources to attend interviews, be coached on the interview process, afford better interview clothes.
I have most likely racked up significantly more debt, meaning that once I am employed I have far higher risks if opportunities arise for new jobs, so she’ll have greater job mobility.

These things snowball, and it’s visible from just one hypothetical.
And that’s not accounting for the deliberate prevention of accumulated wealth from times pasts (redlining for an easy example).

Equity as a rhetorical device is designed to highlight this, that success is often not from ability, but from being spared obstacles due to generational wealth. The goal is to create a lower ‘floor’ of wealth, and to do more so those added costs for this starting from the bottom are less burdensome.

Equality of opportunity refers to there being legal equality. People do not have equal talent or ambition and will never have equal results in a free society. Because of that, the members of each upcoming generation are going to coming from unequal circumstances. The extent to which you make circumstances more equal, is the extent you will remove liberty. Liberty is the greater value over equality of circumstances.

"Harrison Bergeron" does not describe a eutopia.

Of course that's dancing around the fact that one of the biggest reasons why people succeed or fail is the opportunities that a parents money can buy. What could be a once in a lifetime opportunity for a motivated middle class kid could be one of ten thousand chances for an unmotivated stoner with rich parents.

[CmdrKing]

Equality of opportunity refers to there being legal equality. People do not have equal talent or ambition and will never have equal results in a free society. Because of that, the members of each upcoming generation are going to coming from unequal circumstances.

1. Inequity as a concept is meant to address precisely this disparity: to foster conditions in which equality of effort and talent will yield more equal results.

2. Under capitalism, one's ability to take advantage of legal equality is wholly dependent on their access to capital. So in a sufficiently unequal distribution of capital, equality under the law becomes untrue.
Which... I also said.
And therefore...

The extent to which you make circumstances more equal, is the extent you will remove liberty. Liberty is the greater value over equality of circumstances.

"Harrison Bergeron" does not describe a eutopia.

False. Liberty under capitalism is determined solely by access to capital. Maximizing the liberty of a single person at expense of liberty for millions is a lower sum liberty than a less unequal society.

[Darth Wedgius]

Equality of opportunity refers to there being legal equality. People do not have equal talent or ambition and will never have equal results in a free society. Because of that, the members of each upcoming generation are going to coming from unequal circumstances.

1. Inequity as a concept is meant to address precisely this disparity: to foster conditions in which equality of effort and talent will yield more equal results.

2. Under capitalism, one's ability to take advantage of legal equality is wholly dependent on their access to capital. So in a sufficiently unequal distribution of capital, equality under the law becomes untrue.
Which... I also said.
And therefore...

The extent to which you make circumstances more equal, is the extent you will remove liberty. Liberty is the greater value over equality of circumstances.

"Harrison Bergeron" does not describe a eutopia.

False. Liberty under capitalism is determined solely by access to capital. Maximizing the liberty of a single person at expense of liberty for millions is a lower sum liberty than a less unequal society.

But that's not the kind of equity AOC is talking about. The Green New Deal mentioned that women earn 80% of what men do. No 80% for the same work and experience, just 80%. This is forced equality of outcome regardless of individual choices.

Also, liberty under capitalism is not soley determined by access to capital. That's ridiculous. Free speech? How much does it cost to get a web site? You much does it cost to make a YouTube video? I think there are homeless people making YouTube videos. Freedom of movement? How much does a bus ticket cost? Second amendment rights? Guns aren't that expensive.

[Fuzzy Necromancer]

I wasn't contesting that it was the amount of the increase. I apologize for the lack of clarity.

70% isn't a huge deal. We had that much before and it wasn't a problem, but now everyone's acting like it's the most radical proposal ever.

When we had those kind of rates we also had massive tax shelters. Very few people actually paid that kind of rate if they had an accountant worth their salt. But those tax shelters created perverse economic incentives that distorted the economy and lessened its efficiency.

Part of the deal in getting rid of those rates was also removing the shelters. Bringing back the rates without the shelters has no hstorical precedent to say that there was "no problem".

We have a metric assload of tax shelters now. Ever read a little thing called the Panama Papers?

[Fuzzy Necromancer]

Progressive Taxation in a Nutshell
https://thenib.com/progressive-taxation ... es-it-work