[criticaljudge]

The notion that children don't deserve the spoils of their parents is really crazy to me. Parents work so that they can give their children a better life. Heck, they even choose their partners to maximize odds for a better life for their offspring (wealth, good genes, and so on - it does not even depend on capitalism).

To take that away from people is truly dehumanizing, but sounds like a typical socialist scheme (destroy the family, destroy individualism, everything has to be the same).

[overlords]

1 rich person saving his money so his 3 children never have to work is bad for the economy.

It's better the 1 rich person is forced to consume that in his lifetime. By doing so that money is redistributed back to the economy, and his 3 kids are also productive.

In scenario 1 only 1 out 4 people work. In scenario 2, 4 out of 4 people work.

Also - it's hypocritical for 'pull yourself by your bootstraps' for children born poor, and 'guaranteed basic income' for children born rich. That is more dehumanizing than not being allowed to pass off inheritance.

[dahfizz]

Its hard for me to imagine being so full of envy that you would like to see the children of rich people stripped of everything they have. Equality means nothing if you achieve it by pulling everyone down to the lowest level.

> 1 rich person saving his money so his 3 children never have to work is bad for the economy.

"Your rights are bad for the economy, we are taking everything from you. Back to work, pleb".

[AnIdiotOnTheNet]

> Its hard for me to imagine being so full of envy that you would like to see the children of rich people stripped of everything they have.

I think you misread the sentiment. What a lot of us would like to see is a more meritocratic system, where children start off on more equal footing and either earn their wealth or not. But inherited works against that. It is difficult to listen to arguments against taxing the wealthy heavily "because they earned it" while at the same time hearing support for what amounts to aristocracy.

[dahfizz]

Right, but you're trying to achieve your meritocracy by pulling people down instead of helping people up. This isn't a footrace, and it's not a zero sum game. When you say something like "we need to take money away from rich kids so they have to work like everyone else", you're doing nothing but harm. You may feel the people you're harming have it coming, but that's still what you're doing.

The idea that we have to come up with a good reason _not_ to heavily tax people is backwards. The only reason you need is that people have rights. A man owns what is his and you have absolutely no right to it.

This is all beside the pont anyway. Increasing tax revenue will not solve any of the problems you are trying to solve. As I said elsewhere, you could tax 100% of every billionaire in this country, leaving them homeless, and you would not have collected enough money to fund the federal government for even one year. You could sell off your entire "aristocracy" and it wouldn't make a dent. The strategy of "just spend more money" does not work.

[AnIdiotOnTheNet]

> Right, but you're trying to achieve your meritocracy by pulling people down instead of helping people up.

And how are we to do that without taking money from somewhere and using it to help people up?

> The idea that we have to come up with a good reason _not_ to heavily tax people is backwards. The only reason you need is that people have rights. A man owns what is his and you have absolutely no right to it.

Case in point. You can't take money away from rich kids via inheritance tax (nevermind that they'd still have innumerable advantages from growing up in a wealthy household), you can't tax the wealthy, but you're somehow supposed to help poor children up anyway. Who's paying for that?

Furthermore, I disagree with the statement on the grounds that national infrastructure and protections are doubtless large contributors to anyone being able to amass that kind of wealth in the first place, therefore it is not unreasonable to expect that a portion of that wealth be contributed back.

[criticaljudge]

Children already start of pretty well in most parts of the world. Every child gets an education, for example.

I think you would find that to make everything equal, you would have to take children away from their parents at an early age. Because having caring, loving parents is also an advantage. At least so far not all kids in a school turn out the same, even thought they all have the same teachers and lessons. Must be the parents that make the difference.

I don't think that would be desirable. I don't want my children to be raised in a government institution to make them exactly the same as everybody else, just for the sake of an arbitrary metric ("equality" measured in some arbitrarily chosen terms).

In fact why not get rid of parents altogether, and create children in labs? I bet that is the socialist dream fulfilled.

[gota]

"Back"?

(Sorry about the cheap comment - I couldn't resist)

[criticaljudge]

You misunderstand the nature of money. Money means society owns something to the holder of the money. By not spending money, society is temporarily richer.

Also, sorry, but I don't care how productive other people's kids are, or "the economy". I care about the well-being of my kids. yes, I want everybody to be happy if possible, but my kids have priority to me.

And what exactly is "hypocritical"? What are you referring to? You assume everybody should have the same starting position in life, and I reject that notion.

Children of course are not at fault for the actions of their parents (like if they are drug addicts and have an unwanted child they can't afford, the child is not to blame - but neither are other people's children or parents). But that doesn't mean every child should automatically get the same "starting money". This is not a game of monopoly.

As I said - people compete to give their children the best odds. That is not even unique to humans, it is true for all of nature.

If you take that away, why bother with anything? Why should you bother to get a good job to be able to support your family? Just fuck and live the good life, and dump your children on society to be taken care of.

Already in the west everybody gets a pretty good deal in the form of an education.

[gizmondo]

When rich person pays others to, let's say, build a luxurious castle, the money is both redistributed back to the economy AND the castle is there to use, for a few centuries at least. That's how investing* makes the society wealthier over time, and promoting consumption instead is nuts.

* There is a caveat that it should be a new investment rather than a purchase of the existing one, the latter is zero-sum.

[criticaljudge]

In the latter case, the person who sold the castle can use the money to build a new castle.

[gizmondo]

Sure, but they can also choose not to do that, so the purchase doesn't necessarily increase overall wealth.

[whimsicalism]

So you are only deserving of a life free of poverty (even if you're lazy) if your parents happened to be rich?

Yeah, I disagree. We're talking about on the order of tens of millions of dollars or more being passed from one parent to one child.

[dahfizz]

You're right. We should kick that kid out on the street, sell all his belongings, and write a check to ever american for a fat 10 cents. Problem solved.

> So you are only deserving of a life free of poverty (even if you're lazy) if your parents happened to be rich?

This is such a twisting of my words I am not even sure how to respond. Are you saying the only way out of poverty is to steal everything you want from the rich?

[criticaljudge]

Why don't parents who work hard to give their children a good live deserve to do so? It is not their fault if other people have children while they are poor.

Everybody should have a fair chance, but people who worked harder should also be allowed to benefit. Why should anybody be entitled to the fruits of their labor?