This is why we need a billionaire income tax," Americans for Tax Fairness said.

This is why we need a billionaire income tax," Americans for Tax Fairness said.

  • @givesomefucksEnglish
    16•11 months ago

    Nothing will fundamentally change

    Joe Biden when telling these people they shouldn’t listen to his lies to voters. That no matter how progressive he has to pretend to be during a campaign, he would make sure their wealth kept increasing.

    It’s one of the few campaign promises ole Joe has kept.

    And the only one I expect him to keep after I’m forced to vote for him a second time solely because the only other option is trump.

    It’s really starting to look like the problems with wealth inequality in America aren’t going to be solved at the ballot box.

    • Zorque
      10•11 months ago

      Well, if the only thing you care about is the presidential election, yeah. There is an insane amount if power in legislative races, not even on a federal level but state and local positions as well, that it is ridiculous to me that people think the president is the only person in the country that matters.

      • @givesomefucksEnglish
        6•11 months ago

        Your right, it’s not just Biden, it’s all the party leadership.

        Especially when House/Senate leadership refuse to hold votes because 1 or 2 Dems will bite the bullet and say that won’t vote for it.

        That allows the rest to tell voters they would have supported it, while telling donors they never would vote for it.

        The result is the party hides how conservative lots of Democrats are, so most voters have no idea they’re represented by people who if it ever came down to it, would never help them.

        If votes were held on this stuff in Congress, we’d know who needs primaried.

        Biden might be the largest symptom, but he’s still just a symptom

        • @Mr_Blott
          2•11 months ago

          Your right

          My favourite ironic phrase of the 21st century, brought to you by the American de-education system 😂

          • @Cruxifux
            -1•11 months ago

            People make mistakes, sometimes autocorrect does it for them. I can’t believe people are still nit picking about this shit in 2024.

            Making a mistake on the internet about spelling/conjugation once in a while has nothing to do with the education system, grow up dude.

            • @Mr_Blott
              2•11 months ago

              Yeah I shouldn’t of said anything. For all intensive purposes, I could care less 🤮

              • @Cruxifux
                1•11 months ago

                Hah, I see what you did there. Imma upvote or whatever lemmy has for that one.

      • @alvvayson
        3•11 months ago

        Indeed. In the US, as most democracies, Congress is much more powerful than the presidency, even though it may not seem so.

        But just look at Ukraine right now. Or look at any government shutdown. The slimmest majority in just the house or Senate can totally block any meaningful action by the president.

        FDR was only as successful as he was because he had a big Congressional majority.

        When voters get their act together, they can achieve whatever they want.

        The real problem though, is polarization. It’s the old divide and conquer.

        To obtain a big majority, the working class must unite to select the right candidates. Polarisation makes that unity impossible.

        The poverty of the great depression was the catalyst that made working class voters come to their senses and unite behind a progressive candidate. Political rhetoric quickly loses its appeal when your kids are hungry.

        So politicians have learned from that and they won’t be allowing it to get that bad again.

        So the challenge to our generation is to figure out how to unite, even when most people are pretty comfortable, all things considered.

    • BraveSirZaphod
      3•11 months ago

      controlled more than one in every six dollars of the country’s “unrealized gains,” profits that aren’t taxable until the underlying asset, such as a stock position, is sold.

      Given that what the article is referring to is all unrealized gains, this would be a government seizure of all property that might rise in value, including essentially the entire housing market.

      I’m not entirely against a government monopoly on housing and land ownership, but I think that’s probably a few steps past what’s politically viable right now. The key thing is that these gains are unrealized, so a stock market dip could easily decimate them. You can still use those assets as collateral for loans, but if the market does dip, you’re gonna be in for a hard time.

      More seriously, there probably is an argument to get made about taxing loans for the ultra-wealthy that are secured against their assets, but that’s a different matter.