[monodeldiablo]

Why is the redistribution of societal wealth "stealing" when it comes from rich people, but "earned" when it comes from poor people?

Poor people suffer far more theft on a daily basis -- they are forced to pay higher rates for credit, they spend vastly more time interacting with the bureaucracy while receiving substantially fewer benefits, and the terrible options available to them for healthy living robs them of quality twilight years -- but we rich folks kick up an almighty fuss any time it's suggested that we redress this balance by paying tiny bit more in taxes. So little, in fact, that it wouldn't likely impact our lifestyles in the slightest.

I live in a high-tax country now and, although I receive a smaller paycheck than I did back in the US, I'm richer in almost every other way. The crime rate is effectively zero. There's no homelessness. Substance abuse and its associated ill effects are exceedingly rare. My family and my neighbors' families are healthy -- owing to the free universal health care we all receive, regardless of income or status -- so the risk of communicable disease is extremely low.

So don't think of wealth redistribution as "stealing from the wealthy and giving to the poor". Think of it as "investing in a healthy and sizable middle class". Like the one our parents grew up in. The one that oversaw the most prosperous period in world history. The one now being systematically dismantled by we privileged few.

[jernfrost]

It is only stealing, when the premise is that there is no society, democracy or state, and everything you ever earned was earned completely independent of everything else.

At least that is what the neo-liberal fantasy world seems to be. They treat capitalism as if it some natural law of nature.

Every capitalist has to make their money within a society. That society is what enables them to become rich. Put Bill Gates in Somalia as a child, and there never would have been a Microsoft and he never would have been a billionaire.

Bill Gates and his fortune is a product of the society he grew up in which is shaped by democratic participation, deciding on what should and should not be taxed.

If a democracy says we can increase taxes on the wealthy, then that is just a choice, not stealing.

[AnimalMuppet]

> That society is what enables them to become rich.

Somewhat true. Where you go with it is false, though. You seem to think that the society is all that enabled them to become rich. But if that's true, why does Bill Gates have more money than me? I'm in the same society.

> If a democracy says we can increase taxes on the wealthy, then that is just a choice, not stealing.

That presumes that everything a democracy decides on is just a choice - that it can't be wrong. I disagree with that statement. More, I think history disagrees with that statement.

[Mz]

You seem to think that the society is all that enabled them to become rich. But if that's true, why does Bill Gates have more money than me? I'm in the same society.

Billionaires didn't really exist until there were billions of people. You can't amass that kind of wealth if there aren't people to generate it. Wealth is a means of capturing value and part of the value it captures is the value created by human intelligence and labor.

The fact that some people are both talented at capturing value created by society as a whole and well positioned to do so is a large factor in why some people have vast wealth and some do not. It doesn't mean someone like Bill Gates is "better"/smarter/whatever overall than other people. There is a combination of factors that lead to the concentration of wealth in the hands of one person like that.

This is why people argue so much about it. That wealth is created by the very existence of all of society, but inordinately benefits a small percentage of people.

I don't know how we do this better. I am not for Basic Income, nor am I for trying to manipulate things with a goal of creating "level" outcomes. I think both of those approaches are inherently problematic.

For one thing, society as a whole benefits when we actively reward certain behaviors. Being too punitive and too angry about some folks being rich hurts society as a whole. Bill Gates helped create real value for society by making the PC available to the masses, thereby revolutionizing life and business for pretty much everyone.

We need to not be discouraging things like that (things like people creating real value for society by being business people, etc). But I do think we need to do a better job of not shafting the masses.

[AnimalMuppet]

> Bill Gates helped create real value for society by making the PC available to the masses, thereby revolutionizing life and business for pretty much everyone.

Yes, exactly. Bill Gates created way more value than I did, therefore it is not totally unreasonable that he has way more money than I do.

> But I do think we need to do a better job of not shafting the masses.

Yeah, there's the real problem. We want to reward value creators enough that people try to create value. And yet, those who don't (or who try and fail) shouldn't be left completely behind.

[Mz]

We want to reward value creators enough that people try to create value. And yet, those who don't (or who try and fail) shouldn't be left completely behind.

One of the problems with this statement is the assumption that poor people are poor because they don't create value. One of the problems with that is the feminization of poverty. Women tend to be poorer than men. This is so not because we all simply laze around watching soap operas and eating bon bons. Instead, it is true because some portion of our time and energy goes into having and raising kids, taking care of relatives who are sick, and supporting the careers of our husbands in various ways.

One largely invisible way that women end up poorer is that families typically move to follow the husband's career. In other words, if they move to a new city as a family, it is because the husband sought employment elsewhere and got it.

For him, this is almost always a step up for his career. When his wife then quits her job to go with him, her next job is usually a step down for her. You do this enough and women end up going nowhere fast in their careers.

It is a complicated topic, but one of those complications is that an awful lot of poor people do create value for society, it just mostly doesn't result in them capturing value. If it is a woman who is poor, the odds are very high that she did plenty to benefit other people, but, no, it in no way resulted in financial security for her.

It would be really nice if people would stop implying that poor people are just lazy ass bums who do nothing at all of value. I was a military wife and homeschooling mom. I supported my husband's career and I took excellent care of two special needs sons. I just got off the street recently, after nearly 6 years of homelessness.

So, your framing implies ugly things about me and other people like me that are absolutely not true.

[AnimalMuppet]

From your comments, I actually was somewhat aware of your situation. (Though it was news to me that you had made it off the street. Very welcome news, too.) I tried to write my comment such that it didn't imply anything negative about you. I can now see how what I wrote can be taken that way; I didn't intend that.

I meant to be saying that people can, though no fault of their own, fail to create much economic value, at least as measured in dollars that people will pay for what they do. (Yeah, sometimes it's their fault. Sometimes it's not. Sometimes it's kind of a mix - they made a choice, and it worked out badly, but it wasn't a clear-cut bad choice. Sometimes it's hard to tell. The point is, these people are there, in very bad economic circumstances.) The question is, what do we do about it? What do we do that genuinely helps them, without taxing the rich so much that it dulls the incentive to create the stuff that will make all of us better off?

And since there's (I think) a lot of "help" that doesn't actually help, I'll specifically ask you: What would have helped you?

[tooltalk]

What does that say about Microsoft stashing away much of their profit in oversea tax heavens to avoid paying that? Is that also the will of the people? Much of Gates's wealth is also protected in his own private trust so as not to be taken away by the gov't force. So it seems like the only people getting screwed are the middle-class folks who pay much larger percentage of their income.