Free Republic

Politicians are renowned for their shortsightedness. During the post-war period, for example, Republicans have very publicly opposed most tax increases. I like small government, so I'm good with that. Where I part ways with the Grand Old Party is with its failure to oppose big spending that's funded with debt, meaning future tax hikes. Their lack of spending restraint, also encouraged by Democrats, is inconsistent and means that a new source of government revenue is likely in our future. And, if that is the case, it may very well be a wealth tax. Support for taxing wealth (as distinct from...

A pack of Democratic lawmakers in California are proposing a wealth tax for the state's richest citizens, forcing them to pay more essentially just for owning a lot of stuff. They also, amazingly, want the tax to follow Californians who flee the state in response, attempting to make them continue paying taxes on wealth that's not even in the state. Assemblymember Rob Bonta (D–Oakland) is blunt about his reasons for introducing the California Wealth Tax (A.B. 2088). Rich people have money. He wants more of it to pay for and expand state services. And that's it. "The California Wealth Tax...

A group of state lawmakers on Thursday proposed a first-in-the-nation state wealth tax that would hit about 30,400 California residents and raise an estimated $7.5 billion for the general fund. The tax rate would be 0.4% of net worth, excluding directly held real estate, that exceeds $30 million for single and joint filers and $15 million for married filing separately. California is facing a big budget deficit because of the health and economic crisis brought on by the coronavirus, and “we can’t simply rely on austerity measures,” to close it, said Rob Bonta, D-Oakland, lead author of AB2088. “We must...

Fox Business Network anchor Neil Cavuto questioned California State Assemblyman Rob Bonta on "Cavuto: Coast to Coast" Friday over his proposal to institute a 0.4% wealth tax on Golden State residents worth more than $30 million. The Alameda Democrat told Cavuto the proposed tax "affects about 0.15% of the California population -- not the top 10%, not the top 1%, the top .15%, about 30,000 people" and would generate $7.5 billion in revenue for the state. The host asked Bonta what will prevent the ultra-wealthy from continuing to "bolt" from California as taxes continue to rise. Bonta disagreed with the...

Former Barack Obama adviser Rahm Emanuel, during a recent interview, reminded us of his 2008 financial crisis quotation, "Never allow a crisis to go to waste." The COVID-19 pandemic has presented a wonderful opportunity for those of us who want greater control over our lives. Sadly, too many Americans have already taken the bait. We've allowed politicians and bureaucrats to dictate to us what's an essential business and what isn't, who has access to hospitals and who hasn't, and a host of minor and major dictates. Leftist politicians who want to get into our pocketbooks are beginning to argue that...

Presidential hopeful Sen. Bernie Sanders, I-Vt., unveiled a new plan for universal child care if he is elected in November, saying in an interview airing Sunday that a wealth tax would pay for it. The proposal would offer free child care from infancy to pre-kindergarten up to the age of four, Sanders told Anderson Cooper on CBS News' "60 Minutes." The idea was yet another in a slew of progressive plans laid out by the self-proclaimed democratic-socialist, plans that he said would be funded by increased taxation on America's wealthy. Sanders expressed his disdain for opponents -- even some within...

[A]ccording to a recent study by former Congressional Budget Office director Douglas Holtz-Eakin and Gordon Gray, both of whom are now affiliated with the conservative policy organization American Action Forum (AAF), the effects of a wealth tax would extend throughout the economy, reducing the supply of capital and decreasing investment, which would negatively impact worker pay. Sanders' wealth tax would cost workers about $1.6 trillion over a decade, they estimate. Over time, as the impact of the tax grew, workers would end up implicitly shouldering about 63 percent of the burden. The wealthy would indeed have less wealth, but workers...

Tax proposals from two leading 2020 Democratic presidential candidates, former Vice President Joe Biden and Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.), would raise less revenue than the campaigns say they would, according to analyses released Thursday by the nonpartisan Penn Wharton Budget Model (PWBM). The analyses were released less than two weeks before the first-in-the-nation Iowa caucuses. PWBM released three analyses Thursday. One looked at Sanders’s wealth-tax proposal, and a second looked at Sanders’s proposal to expand the estate tax. The third examined nine tax changes proposed by Biden. Sanders’s wealth tax proposal would create a progressive tax that starts with a...

So what is the question to which measuring wealth distributions and a wealth tax are the answer? To briefly review, in Part I we met the fact that "wealth is measured as "capitalized income," Y/r. But only some kinds of income and with r choices that blew up measured wealth inequality. In Part II we learned that a big reason wealth inequality widened is that interest rates fell. If r falls, Y/r rises, but it's the same Y. In Part III we noted the distinction between consumption, income and wealth inequality. Wealth is beyond badly measured as a measure of...

A majority of millionaires support a wealth tax on those worth $50 million or more, but their support declines for a tax on those worth $10 million, according to a new poll. Fifty-nine percent of millionaires said they would support a new federal tax on wealth over $50 million, according to the Q4 CNBC Millionaire Survey. Democratic presidential candidate Elizabeth Warren’s tax plan includes a wealth tax of 2% on wealth over $50 million and 6% over $1 billion. Forty-eight percent opposed a wealth tax on those worth over $10 million. Attitudes toward the wealth tax are also strongly dependent...

A rather shocking Fox News poll released Sunday found far greater support for Sen. Elizabeth Warren’s proposed wealth tax than for President Donald Trump’s southern border wall.The poll notes that 1,000 randomly selected voters were surveyed between Dec. 8-11 and 68% of them supported Warren’s wealth tax, which is the highest for any Democratic proposals, while just 26% said they were against it.The fact that a strong majority of people would like to see the wealthy taxed more isn’t a big surprise.The surprising part of the poll was how the general public as a whole feels about Trump’s long-promised...

Elizabeth Warren has been justly criticized for the magical math in her Medicare for All proposal. That health plan would cost perhaps $34 trillion, according to outside estimates. But Ms. Warren says the true figure is only—alakazam!—$20.5 trillion. Her wealth tax is the same way, as a fiscal fact check this week demonstrates. Ms. Warren wants to tax the net worth of affluent Americans 2% a year on assets above $50 million, and 6% on billionaires. She says it would raise $3.75 trillion over 10 years. Her campaign cites a letter from two economists at UC Berkeley, Emmanuel Saez and...

Elizabeth Warren’s proposed wealth tax—an annual levy on the total value of one’s assets, not income—has drawn a lot of attention. The senator’s claim that her proposal would cost “ultramillionaires” only an annual 2% and billionaires an annual 6% wildly understates the truth. Wealthy people don’t maintain bank accounts with millions or billions of dollars of liquid cash; they invest their assets. Those hit with the wealth tax would have to sell assets each year to pay it, subjecting them to income tax as well. The actual cost would often be several times greater than 2% or 6%. Ms. Warren...

WASHINGTON— Elizabeth Warren’s wealth tax would raise $2.7 trillion over a decade, $1.1 trillion short of her presidential campaign’s estimates, according to a new analysis from the Penn-Wharton Budget Model. The difference stems in part from disagreement over the pervasiveness of tax avoidance. Still, the new study projects that the wealth tax would raise more money than critics such as former Treasury Secretary Larry Summers have argued, and the analysis suggests it could be a significant new revenue source targeted at very few people. “This is not nickels and dimes, even in our estimate,” said Kent Smetters, who runs the...

No excerpt from Bloomberg allowed, story here. He makes the point that if the tax code becomes a tool to punish people, it loses its legitimacy.

... Name a tax and there’s a way to reduce it, delay it or not ever really pay it, if you have the right adviser. Upset that the 2017 tax act took away your deduction for state and local taxes in New York? Change your residence to Florida, as President Trump recently did, and those taxes are gone. Don’t want to pay capital gains tax? Well, you can decide when to sell those investments. If you need the money, you could borrow against the account and leave the capital gains taxes for another day. And if you die still holding...

WASHINGTON — Senator Elizabeth Warren’s proposed wealth tax would slow the United States economy, reducing growth by nearly 0.2 percentage points a year over the course of a decade, an outside analysis of the plan estimates. The preliminary projection from the Penn Wharton Budget Model, which will be unveiled on Thursday in Philadelphia, is the first attempt by an independent budget group to forecast the economic effects of the tax that has become a centerpiece of Ms. Warren’s campaign for the Democratic presidential nomination. The assessment found that if the tax raised as much new federal revenue as Ms. Warren...

Sen. Elizabeth Warren is campaigning for a 2% surtax on anyone’s net worth over $50 million and 6% on more than $1 billion. Most discussion of the wealth tax has focused on whether it could generate sufficient revenue to fund Ms. Warren’s various spending plans, and the revenue likely would be far less than she projects. But that focus overlooks the ways the massive new tax would harm all Americans. If you take comfort in Ms. Warren’s claim that her tax would apply only to the wealthiest Americans, think again. In 1913 the progressives of that era sold a federal...

... The constitutional objection to wealth taxation is based on two clauses that require any “direct tax” to be apportioned among the states based on population. So, since 12 percent of the population lives in California, Californians must pay 12 percent of any direct tax. For the Warren and Sanders wealth taxes, that would be a deal breaker. To match revenue fractions to population percentages, as the Constitution’s direct tax clauses demand, we estimate that the wealth tax rate in West Virginia — the poorest state per capita — would need to be roughly 10 times the rate in more...

Warren says she'd talk to Bill Gates about what he'd pay under wealth tax: 'I promise it's not $100 billion' Democratic presidential candidate Sen. Elizabeth Warren (Mass.) responded to former Microsoft CEO Bill Gates’ reported concerns over what he would have to pay under the senator’s proposed tax on the wealthy. “I'm always happy to meet with people, even if we have different views. @BillGates, if we get the chance, I'd love to explain exactly how much you'd pay under my wealth tax. (I promise it's not $100 billion.)” Warren tweeted Wednesday. Gates spoke with The New York Times writer...