this post was submitted on 05 Jun 2024
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What you're describing would amount to either eminent domain or civil asset forfeiture, both things that you really shouldn't be resorting to for money unless you've run out of all other options to cover a budget and have a spectacular plan to get the country back onto regular revenue with that money already in place, because that window can only be broken into once.
This is a silly thought experiment to point out that billionaires do not earn their own wealth, and you treat it like it's proposed as an actual economic plan for the whole country?
... rofl
Why not? What about it being a silly thought experiment invalidates wanting to look closer at it?
Because it is specifically NOT an economic plan. At all. It's a basic concept that would have to be fleshed out in order to even have an actual mechanism to test. Eminent domain is silly, because very, very few people want billionaires' wealth going to the government.
Billionaires do not earn their wealth. That's the through line.
The purpose is wealth redistribution, not financing the State. Ideally, that money would go to a one time expenditure like a tax rebate for lower earners or a stimulus or something. Revenue neutral for the State.
I feel like that almost makes it worse
Even assuming we could just get all the money with no complications, every billion seized this way would redistribute something like 3 dollars to the average american, because there's a fokkin' lot of us.
What'd be better would be to turn that money into a sovereign wealth fund that can be tapped for crisis moments or unexpected budget deficits. Basically as a "fuck you we don't need austerity" piggy bank whenever economic downturn prompts the right wing nutcases to start complaining how things like a functioning government are a waste of money.
Why piggy bank it when there are things right now that could, and would, use the money?
Crumbling road infrastructure, social programs, implementation of better public transit, EV rebates, homelessness programs, library attorney's fees, replacing lead pipes for water delivery systems, forest fire management, employment insurance, boosting food and cash aid for the needy, etc.
Because we currently have money for those things and just aren't spending it on them.
Building up an actual lean time fund for actual lean times instead of engineered poverty that can and should be addressed with what's already there is just good policy, growth is not infinite, and having an emergency fund available to make up differences can significantly smooth over bust times for the working class.
Not necessarily. If you want to do a new thing, make a new rule
For example, send them a tax bill for 99% their net worth. Offer to accept assets at the calculated market price and the government can sell it slowly, or let them sell it off for pennies on the dollar and submit their new net worth for an adjusted amount
Obviously that's super heavy handed, but you can slice it a million different ways