Fact. 1000% increase in CEO pay from 1978 to 2018. If that’s not “grown out of hand” for you then thats your opinion, which you are entitled to. And that isn’t coming from more productivity either. the avg worker not so lucky. 12% during same period.
Where did he wrote about wealth cap ? 2 more names, should be in Walton List. It's not about socialism or capitalism. It's all about inheritance. Like, this morning by accident, i heard on the radio, ,, 7500 people, won't get medicine, to fight the cancer, which could potentially save their life's, because budget is 200 mils short '' Then government comes up with a genius idea. Let's put a new-additional tax on every business, that makes above 2 mils in revenue every month. Seriously ? (btw the new tax came prior 200 mils short) Who will suffer first - clients & workers. How much of that will have an effect of those who own a majority of the company , not that much i guess. And those in the top of those companies (no envy), will leave that fortune to their children , and their children to their children, and cycle goes on.
If a company has shareholders, public or private, shareholders can vote on pay. Otherwise, so long as a company operates legally, ethically, safely, and in context, responsibly and in compliance, the company can do whatever it wants with its revenue and profits. As for your figures, The highest 5th of "workers" in 1978 earned an average of 26K. Today the average worker earns I believe near 60K, more than double (at least.) Not sure where/how you landed at 12%. I do agree CEO pay has grown faster (and higher) than "workers".
By default... What is the point of accumulating more than 4-5 million if most or all of excess will be taxed away?
Doesn't matter how much of wealth your grandfather or father or aun't had, one should be left with only 10% or 5% of it, and the max number for that should be 2 millions. Maybe 5. Inheritance taxes should go up to 90% - 95%. If a person, can't have a kick off in life with 2 or 5 millions, than nothing else is going to help for such individual. Pairs Hilton ,,Paris Hilton's net worth is estimated to be $300 million, and she's one of the richest models in the world.'' By the way, wiki states that she made 6 or 7 mils in the best year or so, so maybe i got the math wrong, but to earn 300 mils on that pace, she would be the oldest model as well.
I think it's a little like broken phone effect, some confusion going on, by sequence from the first comments : 1 - i think you got his perspective (gaussians) incorrect from the beginning 2 - taxed should be only the receiving side (children,grandchildren), not the ones , that are making the fortune for themselves, while they're alive, and has over 4 - 5 mils ( they already got decent taxes - don't they ? ) 3 - i understood your latest question - in a wrong way. With the right politicians, and some mix of jealousy from masses, and honest rationality, such law could be pushed through... Unless nation want's to keep going that wealth disparity road. Example, a surreal one, E.Musk, lets say, in his life, he becomes the first ever trillionaire, im fine with that, over - achiever. But once his dead, 90% - 95% of that goes to taxes, and only 5% is left to share among his wife/kids. Or there would be cap, on how much one could receive, like already stated, 2 - 5 mils.
The point of an inheritance tax is to promote fairness and equality of opportunity. Gross generational wealth creates further imbalances in the structure of an economy (note: most revolutions are started by the abject poor). Over half of Europe's billionaires, for example, inherited the vast majority of their wealth. Perhaps the original owner of the billions produced significant value, but you can easily argue from first principles anyone down the line produced an exponentially decaying amount of value relative to their worth. Taxing the estate is questionable because you do not want to encourage forcing the sale of ancestral homes, but taxing the billionaire a significant amount on willed money is fair game. This money, arguably unusable by the dead person, can be used to fund public goods such as schools, universities, and hospitals. These create more, not less, successful people who have a better chance of creating more value for our country. You can argue even as far as a person who is willing many millions or billions to their family had the capacity to create success for these people prior to their death - furthering the utility of a "reclamation tax". Moreover, it is well known as you make more, more money comes from capital gains. Capital gains tax is significantly easier on billionaires relative to any other progressive tax, so a tax on willed money is approximately reclaiming money owed. Perhaps with a significant tax of this kind we will see more billionaires donating significant money to charity to avoid the tax. This is the kind of effect we want and its decidedly not socialist even by the loosest definition. No one would complain if billionaires gave their kids 10 million each and then donated the rest to a basket of charities, hospitals, and universities. These taxes do not effect your aunt willing you a house and $100,000. They specifically target gross generational wealth. The kind almost no one on the planet will ever be able to realize.
Why? Dropping the stepped up cost basis means original purchase date to date of death would be used to collect taxes on the asset upon death... everything gets marked to market on death, and gains are taxed. The asset if passed to a survivor has cost basis of date of death, not the original purchase! IOW, every generation pays taxes on asset gains! Just as if the asset was actually sold BEFORE death, taxes on gain or loss were already paid. Why should there be a cap on how much can be inherited? And that leads right back to a wealth cap... Why be an over achiever at all? Let's have government decide who and what projects are truly altruistic. No thanks.