5 Rational Reasons We Shouldn’t Raise Taxes on the Rich Any Higher
5 Rational Reasons We Shouldn’t Raise Taxes on the Rich Any Higher
It should be a hard "no" every time from now on
It seems like every Democrat in America has some ludicrously expensive new program they want to allegedly “pay for” with a tax on the rich. They’ve called for raising the Capital Gains tax on the rich, the death tax, adding a wealth tax and even taxing the “unrealized” capital gains of wealthy people, which is an unworkable and insane idea. There’s no responsible governance, no prioritization of what we need, and no thought whatsoever about giving these rich Americans any kind of value for their money. Instead, they’re acting like kids who stole money from mom’s purse and plan to buy and eat everything they see in the candy store until they get sick.
Whenever someone points out that Democrats get way too excited about taxing wealthy people, the Left accuses you of being in the pocket of the rich. Of course, that’s not true at all. It’s just that if you’re not looking for any excuse to sock it to the rich, you realize that taxing them more than they’re already being taxed doesn’t make any sense. Why? Well…
1) Our tax code is already far too progressive: If your goal was to maximize economic growth and keep government spending low (and that is exactly what your goal should be if you run a country), you’d want a tax system that was as flat as possible. The more progressive a tax system is, the more likely it is to retard economic growth and produce out-of-control spending. Of course, America has one of the most progressive tax systems in the Western world:
If everyone was really paying their “fair share,” you can be sure that it wouldn’t be the rich whose taxes were going up.
2) If the middle class isn’t willing to pay for a program, it shouldn’t exist: Since the poor don’t have much money, it makes sense that they wouldn’t pay a lot in taxes, but the whole idea that the “rich” should be paying for programs all by their lonesome is ludicrous.
If the middle class in America isn’t willing to fork over tax dollars for a program as well, it shouldn’t exist – and that’s just the problem. You don’t hear a lot of middle-class Americans complaining about paying for street signs and roads. However, if the middle class was told they were going to have to pay significantly more taxes for some pie-in-the-sky global warming program, the war in Ukraine, or a new welfare program, their response would be, “the hell we will” and they’d vote the people raising their taxes out of office.
So, Democrats get around that problem by promising that “the rich” will pay for everything. It doesn’t work out that way in practice (see our 31.6 trillion dollar deficit). It’s also just bad governance to try to force a small group of your citizens to pay for programs that wouldn’t exist if everyone had to chip in for them.
3) It will slow the economy: The more money the government takes from the wealthy, the less money they have to spend, invest, and use for productive purposes. On top of that, the more money the government takes out of what they earn, the less incentive they have to make it in the first place. When you take your most productive citizens, chain increasingly heavy weights to their legs, and then expect them to carry your whole economy on their shoulders, you’re going to get disappointing results. If it all comes down to whether people like Elon Musk, Bill Gates, and Jeff Bezos will produce more for society with their own money than the government will with pork barrel projects, welfare programs, and bureaucrats, you want the rich guys keeping the money.
4) Rich people and corporations can move: This is already happening in places like New York and California that have gone overboard on taxing the wealthy:
Around 300,000 of New York City’s wealthiest residents who fled during the early days of the coronavirus pandemic two years ago collectively earned $21 billion in total income in 2019, according to new data released by the Internal Revenue Service.
The sum, which was gleaned from IRS tax filings that were received in 2020 and 2021 represents the largest flight of capital from the Big Apple ever recorded.
According to the New York Times, which first reported on the $21 billion sum, it is double the average of those who had left New York over the previous decade. According to the IRS, 21,000 New Yorkers relocated to Florida in 2020 — nearly double the average annual net loss from before the pandemic.
This trend is only going to continue and accelerate in our country, but keep in mind if taxes get too high, wealthy people and corporations can also move to other nations. Even if you love living in America, there is a point where you will move to Europe rather than be looted by greedy Democrats. Rich people are good for a country. They create jobs, invest money, and pay a lot of taxes. They’re like a Golden Goose for a nation. Remember what happens if you have a Golden Goose and you get too greedy:
5) The government doesn’t need more money: Ronald Reagan once correctly said:
In 1962, the federal government took in 99.7 billion dollars in taxes. In 2023, it’s estimated that they will rake in 4.71 trillion dollars. As was mentioned earlier, the government has also managed to accumulate a 31.6 trillion-dollar deficit. How is it possible that the government has racked up that much debt despite having revenue today that’s 47 times higher than it was in 1962? Well, not only have we added countless new spending programs, but the government gets bigger automatically every year via baseline budgeting. Despite the fact that this is obviously unsustainable and that Social Security/Medicare recipients are going to be hardest hit when it implodes sometime in the next decade or two, there is no serious talk about getting our spending under control from either party in DC. Until BOTH PARTIES come to the table and make big cuts to spending, the only thing we’d be doing by giving the federal government more tax revenue would be throwing good money after bad.
This greedy, grasping government will not curtail, stop or slow spending. As long as "we the people" continue electing these thieves over and over and over again, or allow the democrat party to continue cheating to win elections, while republicans stand around flapping their hands and complaining, the debt they intentionally and with malice impose upon the populace will eventually crush this country while everyone but them will suffer the consequences.