Shopify CEO Tobias Lütke, whose company commands a market capitalization near $154 billion, told his social media followers this week that a tax-tiered voting system—one that would strip voting rights from anyone who pays no income tax—would be a “good system.”
That two-word endorsement, dropped into a viral thread, has reignited a debate over wealth, power, and democracy that most Americans thought was settled more than a century ago.
The proposal would invert the founding American principle of “no taxation without representation” into something closer to “no representation without taxation”—and specifically, high taxation. Reactions online split sharply: Some framed it as a provocative thought experiment about aligning fiscal responsibility with political voice, while others called it a naked attempt to legitimize plutocracy by giving billionaires and multimillionaires a formal, multiplied vote over the laws that govern everyone else.
But it also revealed that America is grappling with a political economy debate, as a frozen housing market and an entrenched wealthy baby boomer demographic have many, not just Lütke, arguing that something big needs to change
At this point, their necks practically beg for the guillotine’s blade. They keep reminding us:
The tree of liberty must be refreshed from time to time with the blood of . . . tyrants.
-Thomas Jefferson in November 13, 1787, letter to William Stephens Smith.
Yes, the old people do. You see the issue coming back up? If you piss off Gen Z, it doesn’t matter if they are 25% of the population (made up numbers) if only 20% of them vote. Boomers being 15% but voting 70% of the time has more numbers.
They don’t need to. Republicans can kick the can down the road and say “we’ll think of something” and that’s good enough for a campaign. They try to cut healthcare, and even this abomination of an administration gets flak.
But yes, I get what you’re saying. Campaign trails are rarely about the most eloquently explained policy plans. It’s much more superficial and that’s how we get Trump. There’s unfortunately this weird cognitive dissonance between what someone talks about and what someone in office does. And thars why approval ratings almost always start highest and slowly declines.
I suppose my most charitable interpretation here is that Boomers still think we live in a time where congress isn’t constantly in gridlock, and a time where politicians would occasionally try to run bills that help the people. But newer generations only see broken promises and compromised bribe holders.
Because it was watered down by conservatives and lobbied further by Healthcare. Yes. It’s not a great plan, but it’s the most that could get passed in 30 years.
This goes beyond my point because I’m not talking about how well executed plans are. I’m talking about who those people got into the position to begin with. You’re complaining about policy makers and I’m saying “who put them there”
Do you honestly believe that if every millennial voted in the 2010s that no results (local, state, national) would have changed? And thus it would have changed the effectiveness of policy?