| Just some counterpoints: 1. While there might be attempts to "juke" 409a valuations, a tax on capital appreciation still makes founders wealthier if their stock holdings appreciates in value. They might get 75 cents for every dollar of appreciation due to taxes, but it's irrational to think there isn't an incentive to continue growing their companies and wealth. 2. In order to maintain control of their companies, and avoid taxation, it's possible for companies to create separate classes of voting, non-voting, and sometimes super-voting shares. Even though only one of GOOG and GOOGL holds voting power, they still trade relatively closely in value. 3. Founders of privately held companies can choose who they want to sell their shares to. It's possible they might sell them to closely-tied venture capital firms or pension funds. I don't know why you're so concerned about foreign purchasers, when they already have the ability to purchase public and private companies. It's not like anything is changing in that regard. 4. The amount of currency in circulation might seem relatively small, but pales in comparison to the $29 trillion held in savings accounts and Money Market Funds. The NASDAQ had $300 billion in transactions on Tuesday October 26th, so dollar liquidity is hardly an issue. https://fred.stlouisfed.org/series/M2SL
https://www.nasdaqtrader.com/Trader.aspx?id=DailyMarketSumma... 5. It's possible that some existing billionaires will attempt to avoid these taxes, but it's hard to expect that future founders will have the foresight to prematurely sacrifice founding their business in a country that attracts investment and talent. It's certainly possible, but if founding a business in the USA is a common characteristic among billionaire founders, it's hard to imagine entrepreneurs who aren't yet billionaires will take their business somewhere else due to the potential future tax consequences of becoming a billionaire. |