[joelhoffman]

If you're working for a firm that isn't actively tanking, then the primary beneficiaries of your excess productivity are always your employers. As many other people here have said the floor of any wealth tax is far higher than anything you could ever accumulate on a salary income.

[leetcrew]

note that I am replying to a comment asking whether I would accept an unconditional 100% inheritance tax in exchange for paying no other taxes while I'm alive.

regarding the wealth tax in general, I see no reason to prefer it over a capital gains tax. if it's not possible to eliminate the loopholes that allow very rich people to avoid paying capital gains, I don't see why the same wouldn't be true for a wealth tax. with the possible exception of LVT, I would greatly prefer to see the existing tax structures get fixed than to add an entirely new tax into the mix.

[joelhoffman]

Fair point, I misread that. But even so, the inheritance tax is still a delayed wealth tax and a 100% tax would generally be easily avoided with gifts -- still taxable, but presumably not at 100%.

(Edit: if we had a combination of capital gains + personal income tax that effectively achieved the same goal as a wealth tax, wouldn't that be basically a maximum wage? Seems even harder to sell. It seems to me the main difference would be that a capital gains tax still encourages holding on to assets and a wealth tax encourages spending.)