Guest Post by Bill Bonner
DELRAY BEACH, FLORIDA – Americans seem to be getting on board the “tax the rich” train faster than they can sell tickets for it.
We thought it would take at least a couple of years… and a recession… to bring them around.
But no.
Rich Pariahs
Envy is readily disguised as “virtue signaling,” and larceny is easily confused with reducing “inequality.”
And now, rich people are the new pariahs. Behind every one of them is a crime, the liberals say; and if it’s not a crime now, they’ll make it one.
The Hill reports:
Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-N.Y.) and her Republican critics have both called her proposal to dramatically increase America’s highest tax rate “radical,” but a new poll released Tuesday indicates that a majority of Americans agrees with the idea.
In the latest The Hill-HarrisX survey – conducted Jan. 12 and 13 after the newly elected congresswoman called for the U.S. to raise its highest tax rate to 70 percent – a sizable majority of registered voters, 59 percent, supports the concept.
And polling shows that Americans are warming up not just to tax hikes, but to the rest of Ms. Ocasio-Cortez’s programs, too.
Gallup adds:
47% of Democrats view capitalism positively, down from 56% in 2016.
57% of Democrats now view socialism positively, little changed from 2010.
For the first time in Gallup’s measurement over the past decade, Democrats have a more positive image of socialism than they do of capitalism.
Trotsky in Drag
As for ourselves, we have mixed feelings. A war between the haves and the have-nots seems to be coming. Our guess is that both sides will lose.
Which is okay with us; we don’t like either of them.
But claptrap annoys us. And we prefer an honest stick-up man to a slick embezzler. Give us a tax increase over deficit financing; at least we’ll know what’s going on.
And now, there’s no doubt. The rich are on the table. And all leading Democrats are getting out their knives and forks.
Here’s Bloomberg:
As U.S. Democrats lay the foundation of their bid to unseat President Donald Trump in 2020, raising taxes on the rich is emerging as a central theme for a party being pulled to the left by its invigorated progressive wing. Spurred on by the social media-fueled phenomenon of Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, the youngest woman ever elected to the U.S. House of Representatives (and so young she can’t seek the presidency herself), other Democrats planning or considering a run are producing a bevy of proposals for how to draw more money from the most affluent. Ideas include a “wealth tax” on assets, much higher marginal rates on big annual incomes and a new tax on financial trades, all in the name of raising more money for new government programs while making a dent in rising inequality.
When we first mentioned the proposal from AOC to raise the top tax rate to 70%… many of our dear readers gasped in horror: Socialism!
Trotsky in drag, disguised as a young woman from Queens! Doom must be right around the corner. They were right, of course.
Doom is around the corner. But not because of Ms. Ocasio-Cortez and her tax hike.
Soak the Rich
When the insiders get finished with it, the new tax will raise pitifully small amounts of money. And most rich people will dodge around it. That’s what they pay the lobbyists for.
The new tax will not alleviate inequality, either. The rich will still be rich. And the fake money system that magnified their wealth so remarkably will still be intact.
But American politics is always more showbiz than public policy management.
The serious decisions are made by the insiders. It doesn’t matter what “the people” think… as long as they don’t threaten the Deep Staters who run the system.
Ultimately, the feds spend, directly, about 22% of GDP. They control, manipulate, or heavily distort another 20% (when you pay a tax preparer, for example, it is counted as a private sector expense; but it’s actually a cost of government).
The money has to come from somewhere. Traditionally, the liberals want to “soak the rich.” The “conservatives” want to soak the middle classes (no point in bothering with the poor; they don’t have any money).
And the Deep State – insiders, cronies, and the elite who actually run the show – don’t care who gets soaked as long as the honey keeps oozing in their direction.
And there’s the doom. Over time, more and more real output is twisted, bent, and corrupted to pay off the elite. Worse, the old leashes – common sense, fair dealing, limited time and resources – are slipped; claptrap runs wild.
Then, people think they can live at each other’s expense… and get rich by spending money none of them ever earned.
Tax increases, like tax cuts, are just part of the scam. The December 2017 tax cut pretended to boost the economy; the next tax hike will pretend to sock it to the rich.
Who wins? Who loses?
Who cares?
The beat goes on… the parasites grow bolder… and the real economy weakens.
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This is how Trump can fund the Wall. Propose a “temporary” income tax surcharge on incomes over $1 mil. Half goes to the wall, the other half goes to some liberal wet dream: windmills or solar panels or some shit. Make the libs come out against taxing the rich for green energy. Or, Trump gets his Wall money. It’s a win/win.
Diabolical!
Diabolical because although this would be a superficial win-win on the surface, it’s actually just a ploy to FURTHER DIVIDE AMERICANS and have them at each others throats instead of elite’s throats.
Bill, AOC wants to tax the oligarchy. Not the ordinary rich. Just like the estate tax, she has set the number too low (10 million annual income) but her ideas are liable to gain traction if our side doesn’t do something first. We don’t need an oligarchy, especially a crooked oligarchy. Something has to be done
The idle rich have got to go. They’re as bad as the free shit army.
Speaking of the idle rich…
https://genius.com/X-american-punk-band-los-angeles-lyrics
Hmmmm…. rich idleness, dirt poor idleness, and a shrinking, yet grossly overworked productive class of folks in the middle.
That’ll end well.
“A war between the haves and the have-nots seems to be coming. Our guess is that both sides will lose. Which is okay with us; we don’t like either of them.”
Well, Mr. Boner, I’m surely in the “have-nots” category.
So, why don’t go suck a pus-filled black cock ya faggotfuk shit-for-brains writer.
Hard to care. The upper middle class loves the migrants for their labor and their virtue signaling. These same migrants will vote for taxes that soak the upper middle class to death. Such is the life cycle of any society with too much prosperity and not enough in-group preference.
AOC is irrelevant today as anything but a media lightning rod, but in a decade or two she will be the new normal. As Steve King rightly declared, “you can’t rebuild your nation with other nations kids.” Everyone who gets a flutter from the term “nation of immigrants,” deserves this socialism and the misery it will cause. Their short sighted virtue signaling made it impossible to avoid.
The main issue with any liberal plan to tax the rich results in more tax loopholes protecting the rich and fuck over the disappearing middle class.
At the end of the day, Ocrazio-Cortez and her ilk will turn out to be Trump’s lil’ helpers…
IMO we’re so fucked there’s no way in hell any of the “natl debt” will ever be repaid. It was a charade before, now add $22 Trillion to the number due to the amount the DOD and HUD have no accounting records for. That’s $44 Trillion or so, and we’re borrowing another $1 Trillion just for “known” debt. That $22 Trillion MIA is probably growing too, we just don’t/can’t know it.
The circle jerk of Wall Street to K-Street to Capitol Street that created funded bailed out each other and handed the debt load amassed on the backs of what was a thriving middle class with the crony capitalist move of privatized profit and public debt mess is why socialist ideas are raising its ugly head . The oligarchy Of wealthy insiders that created economic stagnation for 100 MILLON working Americans have done well for themselves by engineering the greatest transfer of wealth from the many to the few with government and court systems bought and paid for assisting along the way . To the top 10% of those holding the bulk of economic power and wealth when you wonder why the shit is hitting the fan look in the mirror . You kindled the socialist agenda coming about in this country by your greed and narcissistic belief that you actually are worth what you were able to work and massage a system of willing government reps as they scurry about like cats covering up shit . The jig is up , your armed badge wearing minions will cover for you but only so long , the financial promises made to them are nothing but unfunded bull shit too ! Like pensions assured by contract but never properly funded and then washed out as unfunded liabilities , a legal bankruptcy term for lawyers and accountants assure profit for the few and fuck everybody else among the great unwashed . Good Luck you will need it !
TBP regulars should give MUCH more respect.
…should give you much more…
“Tax the rich, feed the poor,’til there are no rich no more” Heard that back in the 70’s
When the wealthy have been able to purchase favor in what was a free republic squeezing out the middle income Americans leaving only the very wealthy the very poor and 100 MILLON unemployed or grossly underemployed that are basicly indentured servants to the state sanctioned olagarchy socialism looks great when you have been taxed out of your earned wealth to the benefit of either the extreme poor or extreme wealthy paracites . It’s a bad road to go but it’s a typical boom bust wash rinse repeat by the big club ! Average working Americans no longer truly have a voice about anything of substance . This will end badly ! Tax the rich or finish off the middle class in America thru taxation of what the middle still want to believe they own !
the 1970s and 1980s was a heyday of COOL BUMPERSTICKERS.
Work harder! Millions on welfare depend on it!
First of all, where’d they dig up that whackadoodle skank? Secondly, what makes other whackadoodles embrace such a witless caricature? Kinda reminds me of the cartoonish public figures in that movie where the girl shoots down military jets with a bow and arrow (haha).
Piano wire on an arrow and a few lucky shots really fuck up a Huey . I bet it could get a jet intake to rattle apart PDQ
As soon as you enact wealth taxes the oligarchs are all going to do a reverse diaspora to that other country they have citizenship in.
I keep wondering when folks will realize that the top 1% isn’t their problem, it’s the top 0.001% that are the real problem. Moreover, the problem is more about how they got that way and stay that way.
Indeed, the exploitation of government power and violence on THEIR behalf. Anyone getting rich by selling great products or services to private citizens in a competitive marketplace, free of government “support,” deserves NOTHING but praise and admiration.
Hey Bill. The real problem with ALL of these stupid discussions of “rich” vs. “poor” is that the one thing that would equalize all of this – you know, that pesky Federal Reserve money printing is NEVER discussed. I forget who said that to find out who really runs the show, find out who you are forbidden to talk about?
All of these stupid tax discussions always are people just shifting deck chairs on the Titanic. Ho hum, wake me when someone is actually talking about solving the problem.
AOC is just the latest in a long line of monkeys crapping over everyone to get to the top of the shit heap. There is no “there” there. Its all BS.
I can solve this in a heartbeat – hear me out.
Each year the richest 20 people in the USA are forced to draw straws and the person that draws that short straw is murdered for our amusement and the entire estate of the now dead person is used for some grand public works project. First, the more cowardly of the rich would give away their wealth or pay their employees more to avoid being in the top 20 which is good for everybody. Second, those in the top 20 know exactly what they are getting themselves into and have accepted the risk in exchange for all that wealth. Third, no exclusions for Politicians, Royalty or the Pope.