" when you tax the rich old farts too much, they stop making money, because they DON'T NEED MONEY! They will not take the risks of investing, if the reward is going to be sucked up by Uncle Sam! Why the fuck should they?
in a word, because making some return on equity is better for anyone than making NO return on equity.
But for those with no equity in life, and no clue what to do with it if they ever got it, that sort of truism is beyond comprehension....obviously.
I would say this is not always accurate or true. It's not always best to make some return on equity, and any equity is going to always gain some return, unless it's in a mattress. The amount your return on your equity is taxed, has to be considered. I can take virtually no risk with a secure municipal bond, pay a minimum tax, if any, and get a reasonable return on my equity... this may be better for me financially, than investing in a more risky venture, where any profits would be taxed at top marginal rates. Yeah, I might make more money, but would it be worth the cost of paying higher taxes on my return?
Again, go back to the point of my argument, rich people don't
need to make money! You are advocating a policy that presumes all rich people will just have to keep making the millions they have been making, and that just isn't the case. I know that it's stuck in your little simplistic pinheads, that if we could just squeeze the rich old fart a little more... all the problems could be solved. The fact is, any increase in taxation on rich people making money, or their businesses, will result in less revenue to the government in taxes. It will also be detrimental to the economy, in lack of new jobs and commerce.
The primary reason for this, revolves around the fact that nothing is static, things constantly change along with the flow of the economy. Rich people are not stupid, they didn't get to be rich like that, and you can never expect them to produce tax revenue for you on demand, that is not their purpose in life, they have no need to be generous, and there is no motivation for them to have to make any more money in their lifetimes, therefore, they won't be paying taxes on their income.
"Tax the Rich!" has been around a long time. It's a popular theme because it appeals to our jealous natures, and sense of nobility in standing up for the "little guy". When you look at the US Tax code, and how it unfairly shifts the overwhelming and vast majority of tax burden to the upper 20%, while leaving the lower 20% without any financial responsibility whatsoever, to speak of, it is clear that most people just think it is fair to tax the rich man more. The problem is, the economics of doing this, and how this "mantra" from the left is continuing to be resonated by people who don't understand economics.
IF we allow wealthy people to spend their wealth, make more money, and continue to spend their wealth, the economy can do nothing but grow. They will create the new jobs, the new plant or factory, the new stadium, the new IT system that revolutionizes working at the office to a thing of the past. We grow economically, we grow technologically, we grow financially, we grow in prosperity and strength, we just GROW.
When you start trying to add restriction, sock a tax on it, try to regulate or control it, you introduce an aspect to the capitalist equation, which naturally creates stagnation and zero growth. You may think it can work, you might be fooled into believing that millionaires are just going to fork over their fortune to the liberals and suck it up, but I'm telling you, history doesn't bear this out... it doesn't happen like that! The more you tax them, the more they will find ways to avoid the taxation, this is just common sense a brain-dead moron can get, it's not that difficult. If you agree, then doesn't it stand to logical reason, if you are taxing their income, they will find ways to make less income to tax?
