
Gates says billionaires should pay 'significantly' more taxes - sharkweek
https://phys.org/news/2018-02-gates-billionaires-significantly-taxes.html
======
forapurpose
People talk about a 'flat tax', where everyone pays the same rate, as being
fair. But is mathematical equality really fair?

* If we want a truly flat tax, everyone would pay the exact same amount. In the U.S., that would be roughly $14,000 from each adult to cover all funding. Obviously, that's absurd.

* Or we could use the 'flat tax' (or 'equal rate') described above, where everyone pays the same rate. In the U.S., that would be very roughly a 17% tax on all income, corporate or individual.

But I don't think the 'equal rate' tax above is really equal. If you make
$10,000 in a year, $1,700 is a much larger blow than $1.7 million is if you
make $10 million.

* What is fair, IMHO, is equal sacrifice. It's harder to quantify, but the taxes paid by people making $10 million, or $100,000 or $10,000 should cause roughly equivalent pain. It depends on the individual's situation and we'd never do it perfectly, but maybe there is an economic theory of utility or quality of life that could be used as a proxy; maybe we should subtract necessities and calculate it based on discretionary income.

~~~
Latty
I'd be stronger and say flat taxes are nonsense.

All the people that go on about incentive and the open market amaze me when
they claim that it's a disincentive for people to work when you lose say, 50%
over some high amount.

Once you have a ton of wealth, it just becomes relatively worthless to you.
People with a ton of wealth don't add (significant) value except by providing
that wealth to others, which then nets them even more.

We should be trying to limit the ability to just continually accrue wealth. At
some point it stops serving society for an individual to have more. The
incentive is gone - no one is not going to try because if they are so
successful they earn over $10m say, they will not get any more.

~~~
CryptoPunk
>>People with a ton of wealth don't add (significant) value except by
providing that wealth to others, which then nets them even more.

Investments that produce positive returns are the primary mechanism by which
productivity increases. Productivity gains explain almost all of the rise in
standard of living experienced throughout human existence.

~~~
Can_Not
But we don't need a rich person to hold onto the money, decide where to
invest, or spend lavishly on enormous mansions/yachts, we can build
institutions to focus on benefiting humanity as a whole first or even automate
rich people out of their jobs.

~~~
CryptoPunk
Letting good investors keep their returns is how we encourage the volume of
good investments to increase. It both provides better investors with more
capital to invest with, and incentivizes them to invest.

Centrally planned economies don't make these considerations and languish in
productivity as a result.

The wealth generated should go to the investor who earned it.

>>or even automate rich people out of their jobs.

Go right ahead. Any automated tool you create that can effectively identify
investment opportunities would be a enormous boon to humanity.

What you'll find as you grow more familiar with how an economy works is that
investment is a dynamic, ever-changing process, and individual initiative and
enterprise is always necessary to make it happen.

Many people make the mistake you're making now, of taking for granted the
process of managing and allocating capital, because they don't understand how
enormously complex the task is.

~~~
Can_Not
I think you've overstating the efficiency in this investments economy, along
with overlooking the negative externalities. How much was thrown away? 6 empty
houses per homeless person. Why instead of updating AIM/ICQ for Android/iOS
and business usage, they were abandoned and new investors replaced them with
several Electron based permanent MVPs? There's entire industries dedicated to
creating fake demand for high margin items, then there is also people buying
things just on speculation that it could be worth more later. Its incredibly
inefficient and wasteful. Who pays for the smog from coal? Our lungs do.

~~~
CryptoPunk
First of all, pollution has nothing to do with what I'm talking about. It is
an act of public property damage that ought to be punished. If it's not
punished, we get negative externalities.

As for efficiency, you're overestimating how efficient political
establishments can be in comparison. Just because a plan calls for the
government to act efficiently, in the interest of the public, doesn't mean
that this is what actually happens.

All of the tendencies toward waste and corruption seen in the market are
manifested in politically appointed institutions as well. Private sector
investment has been demonstrated to be the best way to increase productivity,
and to be far more effective than politically directed management of economic
assets.

------
telesilla
I'd like to see a change in society* where we talk about remuneration in terms
of buying power and fair comparisons rather than focusing on what we now
perceive as being _taken_. If I earn minimum wage at say $10 an hour, that's
$500 a week ($26k salary) at 40 hours a week. If I pay 10% tax, I get $450 a
week in the hand. If I earn $50 an hour ($100k salary) and am taxed at 30% I
get $1400 a week in the hand.

So the minimum wage worker as 70% less buying power than me: making it fair
that I contribute more. We look at taxes of our salary like "you can't take
30% of my pay! I work hard!" instead of "I'm going to make a contribution to
the society I live in by a fair percentage". If we saw our tax bills and
payslips this way, and talked about it to our kids and in the media like this,
we'd all feel a lot kinder towards what we would consider as giving.

Maybe technology will allow future transparent societies to be governed with
full transparency and this will come to pass.

* (This presumes a fair society without corruption, which I'm aware many of us do not live in)

~~~
ric2b
> So the minimum wage worker as 70% less buying power than me: making it fair
> that I contribute more.

I don't think you can assume that it's fair based only on the income. Maybe
their job is useless or even harmful to society while yours is useful and
helpful.

> we'd all feel a lot kinder towards what we would consider as giving.

Giving implies that it's voluntary. It's not.

~~~
telesilla
>Maybe their job is useless or even harmful to society while yours is useful
and helpful.

I think it's completely correct that income reflects this.

>Giving implies that it's voluntary. It's not.

A transparent society can show that sharing a fair portion of your income has
a greater benefit to you than keeping it to yourself.

The point of my original comment is that it would be something I hope to see,
where society moves in the direction of seeing sharing a portion of income
with your community/country as giving, rather than as a tax to be taken. Your
statement confirms that taxes are currently completely unwanted.

~~~
ric2b
> I think it's completely correct that income reflects this.

Not at all. Many (non-criminal) scammers probably make more than the two of us
combined, and their value to society is most likely negative. It's actually
pretty easy to come up with examples of professions that are harmful to
society but still have very good incomes due to one or more of the following:

\- Their societal costs are externalities \- They abuse political power to get
unfairly rewarded \- They make their income by taking money in small slices
from other people in a way that people don't care much (lots of payment
providers/intermediaries do this) or by scamming people.

> Your statement confirms that taxes are currently completely unwanted.

I didn't comment on whether it is wanted, only on whether it is voluntary.

------
monkeypizza
Not distinguishing between additive and multiplicative "more" makes this an
unclear message. People constantly mix up rates (*) with absolutes (+), and
reinterpret statements made referring to one as referring to the other.

"More people use the internet in China than in the US" \- whether that's true
depends on the interpretation of "more". This is intolerable and everyone with
a mathematical background should strive to be clear on which "more" they are
using.

~~~
gt_
If you’re not joking, this one: >

He is arguing for a relative _more_ , the starting point at which is specified
as the current state.

~~~
monkeypizza
I don't feel that he has guaranteed that all readers of the article will come
to the conclusion you have reached. Here is how I could interpret his brief
quote:

1\. more in absolute terms (which they already pay due to higher income) 2\.
more in relative terms (progressive taxes) 3\. more than now (what you claim).

I don't that it's clear what he means in in the story, though. It could easily
be taken to mean "yes, we pay more, and we should pay more (than others) so I
don't support the republican plan!". Your interpretation is also valid - "the
rich should pay more (than we do now)".

~~~
maxerickson
Here's the original:

[https://www.cnn.com/2018/02/18/politics/bill-gates-taxes-
cnn...](https://www.cnn.com/2018/02/18/politics/bill-gates-taxes-
cnntv/index.html)

 _" I need to pay higher taxes," Gates, who is worth over $90 billion, said in
an interview with CNN's Fareed Zakaria on Sunday. "I've paid more taxes, over
$10 billion, than anyone else, but the government should require the people in
my position to pay significantly higher taxes," he said._

That first sentence sort of simplifies the interpretation.

------
dlwdlw
This would pretty much be disastrous in the US because so much if the
identities are based around a heroes journey. Unlike many Asian countries that
more easily accept socialist narratives, the fundamental driving force in the
US is that we are NOT equal and NOT the same.

It is about equal opportunity and a certain type of freedom yes. But all this
is to serve the purpose of individuals proving to the world, others, and
themselves that they are better and so deserve more.

The pursuit of happiness is the freedom to be better. And better cannot exist
when all is equal. Heroes require villains. Light creates dark.

The self actualization narrative then is too tightly bound to the domination
narrative. And domination always requires domination of humans. Attempts to
humanize it by dominating instead some aspect of the world fail because we can
do easily dehumanize others.

It's not that this narrative is good or bad, it just is. And it is also losing
resonance with the wider world. It only works when the self-actualized has
some sort of moral high ground or other advantage.

The taxes described here attack the resulting pattern of a run amock narrative
but don't actually weaken it. It may actually strengthen it as it provokes a
reflex response.

------
pvaldes
I wonder the opposite question; why there is not a legal limit to the number
of "milk" that the government can suck from one human. Is a mystery to me.
Maybe people that had paid many billions in taxes, supposedly in benefit of
the entire country, should be thanked, granted an "untaxable status" from now
on, and left alone to live the rest of their lives. If somebody could pay in
advance the taxes for the next ten years in just one take, this could help the
government to attract extra money in scarce times, when they need it most. And
of course the first country doing such bold movement would attract lots of
rich people.

~~~
DoveBrown
I'd personally prefer if we ameliorated your paid tax so that the rate applied
over your entire lifetime earnings. That way you could use the same
progressive rate but windfall years aren't a special case and lean years are
an example of failing to optimise your taxes. You could even have the
government refund tax if the windfall event was a once off.

Extra bonus you can get rid of many loophole taxes (like Capital Gains and
Inheritance taxes) since these feel unfair to take on a single year basis.

------
mathiasben
Income in excess of 5 million a year taxed at 90%.

------
tensor_rank_0
that way it is harder for anyone to catch up to him

~~~
forapurpose
> that way it is harder for anyone to catch up to him

It's the opposite; it would be easier for people to catch up. By providing
more funding for health, housing, and education, more people would have the
opportunity to become wealthy themselves, and to do great things for society.
How many potentially great developers are lost in awful educational systems,
for example? The U.S. is supposed to be land of opportunity, where the belief
is that anyone can thrive given liberty and opportunity, and that talent does
not depend on the wealth of your parents. Right now, college education is
determined, more than anything else, by parental wealth or income.

If you mean that it's harder for other billionaires to catch him, it's kind to
consider their welfare. But as Gates would pay more tax than the other
billionaires, they would catch up to him.

~~~
KhanMahGretsch
>The U.S. is supposed to be land of opportunity, where the belief is that
anyone can thrive given liberty and opportunity, and that talent does not
depend on the wealth of your parent

To offer an alternative interpretation, I’ve always seen the “American Dream”
as opportunity to improve your position in life, rather than creating an
entirely-level playing field for all. The latter experiment has been attempted
many times in the 20th century in many nations, and the results have not been
encouraging, to say the least.

Besides wealth-of-money, many kids benefit from parents with wealth of
character, intelligence, wisdom, and even love; the importance of these cannot
be understated.

I agree, of course, that wealth has never been more important in determining
one’s ability to receive a good education, and that is a major problem. One
solution could be to increase funding for public schools... but I am rapidly
losing faith in the results they deliver. The most disadvantaged people are
priced-out of the market for private schools, and the same can be said for
many in the middle-class.

There is also a fundamental problem at play: those not suited for academia,
but have much value to offer society, are always going to slip through the
cracks under the “must-be-college-educated” paradigm. I want plenty of low-
skilled jobs with a reasonable wage available for those who just want an
income, while they tinker away at their genius invention in the evening, for
example.

~~~
gremlinsinc
Something like 60% of Americans have less than $1000 in the bank. 69% live
paycheck to paycheck.

I don't see how not having at least a modicum of financial safety net could
possibly be considered 'living the American dream'..

The American dream is just that - for most people it's just a dream, something
to hope for but never achieve.

~~~
KhanMahGretsch
>a modicum of financial safety net

This is why I'm generally in favour of policies that create jobs, as the
welfare system has utterly failed in creating upward-mobility for those in
need and their progeny. (Edit: it's worth nothing that many charitable
organisations do incredible work, with more cents of the dollars donated
reaching those in need that gov. programs).

This is based on my presupposition that those people could, and would, thrive
in an environment with more opportunities for work.

Edit: the downvote heat for non-socialist perspectives on HN is unreal. Simply
unreal.

~~~
yesenadam
hahaha. 'non-socialist perspectives'. So..you have the impression the norm
here is 'socialist perspectives'. Maybe you're right. That's just amazing to
me though. My impression is Rand-type/libertarian/free market perspectives are
the norm. (Or even more, not caring about politics, just wanting to get rich,
which maybe comes to the same thing. Rand is certainly by far the most
frequently-mentioned writer on here with any political..dimension, I think)
I've never read anything I considered more than very slightly to the left on
here, let alone 'socialist', which just makes me laugh when people from the US
(which I presume you are, sorry if wrong) use. In the US 'socialism' seems
nowadays to usually be used to mean both 'I don't like it' and 'anywhere to
the left of far-right'.

Well, I was just reading the wise words of chairman dang yesterday, that
_everyone_ on here feels they're in a minority in every way. It's always
surprising to read comments such as yours are for me; they reveal similar
feelings in everyone.

Maybe the downvoting wasn't, as you assumed, for the 'non-socialist
perspective'-ness of what you said, but the way you said it, or something
else? I've noticed people are often wrong, or seem to be, about what caused
the downvoting, when they reveal what they assume the reason is. Well, maybe
they're not 2 separate things - the veiled assumptions coming out in the
prose, and the assumptions coming out in the voting complaints.

~~~
KhanMahGretsch
My observation is that polite, decently-articulated comments are generally
well-received at HN, and snarky, mocking comments are not tolerated. Stating
an incorrect opinion as fact is not tolerated, but opinions are generally
welcome.

This rule does not apply to political discussion, however.

If someone is incorrect, or there is a disagreement, the community will
usually offer a correction, or open the topic for discussion. They will
directly offer a rebuttal to what has been said in a manner that it
beneficial. This, I believe, is what makes HN the great place that it is.

Again, this rule does not appear apply to political discussion.

I agree that the HN community runs the gamut of political views. I made no
claim to the contrary. My observation is that I consistently see comments that
meet the "HN Standard" of reasonable discourse being down-voted, and this
practice appears to apply overwhelmingly to criticism of central-planning by
the federal government.

I find your comment to be needlessly mocking, and I cannot make sense of your
attempt to fudge the definition of "socialism" as "things I don't like".

~~~
yesenadam
Ok thanks very much.

I guess one example of what I was talking about is your phrase: "your attempt
to fudge the definition of "socialism"".

That's a rather inaccurate, poisonous misrepresentation of what I said and was
doing, it seems to me. Yet you say it like it's the plainest fact, and maybe
you believe it is. It's snarky. It's not assuming good faith. It's pure
downvote material.

I was describing how it seems to me the word is used in the US nowadays. Or as
I said, even more carefully, how it "seems nowadays to usually be used". I
don't hear much news at all, less from the US, but a fair bit of that (before
Trump anyway) has been hysteria about purported socialism, and e.g. any policy
or intention Obama had that the far-right didn't like, described as such. It's
laughable—at best, The Worst Argument In The World[0].

I likewise can't make any sense of how you thought I was trying to 'fudge the
definition' of a word, if I understand what you meant by that. And I can't see
which part of what I wrote was 'mocking', at all. The 'hahaha' at the
beginning, if you were referring to that, was me laughing - I actually
physically laughed like that, it was a record of that.

But I really appreciate the effort put into the rest of what you wrote,
thanks.

[0][http://squid314.livejournal.com/323694.html](http://squid314.livejournal.com/323694.html)

------
KhanMahGretsch
At the risk of sounding glib, I can offer Mr. Gates >220 trillion reasons why
increased taxes won’t necessarily improve the fiscal solvency of the United
States, in and of itself.

Debt and un-funded liabilities are staggering, and it’s politically unviable
to implement plans to reduce that (although lip-service is paid), IMO.

I’d like to hear more about how those taxes would be spent.

~~~
RobLach
I personally feel that taxation shouldn't even be that debatable in the
legislature.

How it should be is just covering the cost of a moving-average window for the
previous x amount of years of spending mapping according to a integration
across income.

It's nonsensically inefficient to debate on taxation without consideration of
spending, and vice versa.

~~~
dragonwriter
> How it should be is just covering the cost of a moving-average window for
> the previous x amount of years of spending mapping according to a
> integration across income.

No, it shouldn't. If you wanted to target a balanced budget that wouldn't
work, and I don't know why you would want to target perpetual deficits as a
locked-in rule.

> It's nonsensically inefficient to debate on taxation without consideration
> of spending, and vice versa.

Whether or not a bill included mandates on both sides, IME, it's very rare for
either spending it taxed to be debated without consideration (even if the
quality is poor) of the other.

~~~
RobLach
You can explicitly budget in a surplus target.

