Microblog Memes

What would be REALLY new is if people understood how little the top income tax rates matter because almost nobody pays them. Income tax rates only apply to salaries. Wealthy people get almost all their income from capital gains - i.e. buying and selling stocks and other investment items. Capital gains tax has always been much lower than income tax, currently I think 10-15% depending on how long the item is held before being sold. Raising top income tax rates back above 90% would not "tax the rich" or provide enough tax money to take any burden off the rest of us. It's a silly PR slogan.

To ACTUALLY tax the rich we need to increase capital gains taxes. Or create new wealth taxes. Or even a ceiling on individual wealth. That last one would have the greatest effect, by limiting how much money any one person has available to influence politics - which really seems like the root of the whole problem. Secondly, abolish Citizens United, the congressional act that made corporations "people", to stop corporate wealth from buying politicians.

The difficulty is how to get anything like this past the people whose power it would eliminate. A good first step tho would be whenever you feel like you understand something because of some meme you saw, remind yourself that you don't, and then stop scrolling and do some real reading on the subject.