zlacker

>>southe+(OP)
I wonder if this is coming up just before the election because of the Harris campaign’s suggested policy of capital gains tax on unrealised gains for people who have over $100m in assets? I think this is a great idea personally given what these people are doing to avoid paying tax including taking out loans against their own share portfolios. Worth thinking about what people are willing to do to not pay billions of dollars worth of taxes.

>>andy_p+ex
Unrealized gains taxes is an extractive and totalitarian tax. Someone is always risking 100% loss until they realize those gains. It's an affront to entrepreneurial risk-taking and it's capricious. It would be just as ridiculous to allow someone to write-off unrealized losses.

>>chrisc+fX
Well when you have over 100m in assets in your pile of gold in the dragon lair, its time to be extractive.

>>kjkjad+5Y
Nobody with assets over 100m has a "pile of gold", as you put it. Those assets are always productively invested in some form or another. But you would prefer that those investments be pulled, because the government are clearly much better at employing those assets productively?

>>this_u+i41
What's productive? Measured in purely financial terms selling cigarettes, junk food, and fentanyl is productive. Figuring out how to get teenagers to scroll TikTok all day is productive.

... What people are suggesting is to take money from some productive enterprises and put it towards other productive enterprises such as education, medicine, public infrastructure, etc. Enterprises which have more benefits beyond simply increasing the bank account of entrepreneurs and fund managers.

>>alxmng+wN1
Increased spending is the simplistic solution. Government spending as percentage of GDP is 35%, compared to about 25% in the 50s/60s. Since then inflation-adjusted spending per student has increased by roughly 3X with no measurable increase in test scores. Baltimore spends 21k/yr per student, with abysmal results. College tuition prices have increased far more than inflation, in large part due to federal student loans. The USA spends more on healthcare as a percentage of GDP than any other country, with insane markups on routine procedures. The California High Speed Rail project has taken 15 years to do environmental reviews and lay a few miles of track in the middle of nowhere, all while costs have grown to more than 128B from its initial estimates of 10B.

Giving money to ineffective organizations is throwing good money after bad. I'd love to see competent government that can effectively use funds, but I'm not seeing a lot of evidence for it these days. There needs to be deep reform and anti-corruption efforts. Good luck doing that without the status quo powers pulling out all their dirty tricks.