• This is a political forum that is non-biased/non-partisan and treats every person's position on topics equally. This debate forum is not aligned to any political party. In today's politics, many ideas are split between and even within all the political parties. Often we find ourselves agreeing on one platform but some topics break our mold. We are here to discuss them in a civil political debate. If this is your first visit to our political forums, be sure to check out the RULES. Registering for debate politics is necessary before posting. Register today to participate - it's free!

Bernie Sanders: "top 1% owns more wealth than the bottom 95%"

I ran a thread suggesting something similar recently, though I put it at $200K.


Oddly, the left didn't support it.

A 40% FIT rate, coupled with a state income tax rate of over 10%, would result in a few paying over 50% in total taxes, with most paying little or nothing.
 
I ran a thread suggesting something similar recently, though I put it at $200K.


Oddly, the left didn't support it.

See post #145.
 
Nope, Bernie wants to create tax laws which apply higher rates to those with more income/wealth than he has.



Yep, the reason why he switched the narrative from millionaire to Billionaire.
 
A 40% FIT rate, coupled with a state income tax rate of over 10%, would result in a few paying over 50% in total taxes, with most paying little or nothing.
Well if the overlords want to keep paying people so little that they can't afford to pay taxes, that's how it's gonna be.
 
Bernie used to rail against millionaires until he became a millionaire. Now he just rails against billionaires.

So here’s my counterproposal: We’ll tax billionaires AND millionaires out of existence. That way, we’ll eradicate all the shitty crony Capitalists on the Right and Left in addition to all those Leftist Elitist millionaires like Sanders and Elizabeth Warren so that they, too, can enjoy the fruits of the Socialist ideology that they seek to impose on everyone else.

Mark

Bernie is your typical leftoid when it comes to "helping" people. He wants people helped, but he doesn't want to do the actual helping.
 
Nope, Bernie wants to create tax laws which apply higher rates to those with more income/wealth than he has.


Dude, I did not write any of above things that you responding to in this post. Please go back and see who actually wrote them and correct that.
 
No, I meant wealth. I am an advocate of the work of Berkeley economist Gabriel Zucman. Look up some his writings.
To see me the research on this nice sunny day can you just explain how you would tax unrealized capital gains?
 
Why do you begin a post by putting words into my mouth?

I accept rational proposals with realistic outcomes. I don't accept hyper-partisan mindless emotion in politics. I was clear.
You were certainly clear that you think it's acceptable for billionaires to exist. I'm sure that on a 'gut level' you disagreed with my characterization that their wealth has been extracted from their societies and environment, but seemingly don't have much of an intellectual response to my explanation of that fact :unsure:
 
Flat tax rate is not a fair tax rate. Those at the lower income end of it are being subject to regressive taxation. Flat tax rates only have the appearance of fairness, not the reality of it. Progressive income tax works the best.
A flat tax is regressive in what context?
 
Dude, I did not write any of above things that you responding to in this post. Please go back and see who actually wrote them and correct that.

I supplied links to Bernie’s FICA ‘payroll’ tax reform plan, showing that it wouldn’t raise taxes on Bernie.
 
I supplied links to Bernie’s FICA ‘payroll’ tax reform plan, showing that it wouldn’t raise taxes on Bernie.
That's fine but I never said anything about that or about Bernie. It was some other poster. Respond to them please.
 
Another thing to consider is that the best way to reduce our outlays for social safety net programs is to raise the wealth of people who have the least. If people have more they will need less help from the government.
 
It's time to tax billionaires into extinction. Redistribute all their wealth to the people. Enough is enough!!

Bernie Sanders....one of the last heroes left in American politics.

I wish he could live until 120. He should be the next President.
 
It's time to tax billionaires into extinction. Redistribute all their wealth to the people. Enough is enough!!

I admire Bernie Sanders, but to be precise, the wealth concentration figures are, well, Sanders does exaggerate. According to the Federal Reserve’s Distributional Financial Accounts, the top 1% of Americans control roughly 35% of the nation’s wealth. The top 50% collectively hold over 97% of it. These figures are verifiable through the Fed’s wealth distribution tables.

Notably, this same top 50% is also responsible for paying approximately 97% of all federal income taxes. While some might argue that this demonstrates fairness, the reality is that such extreme wealth concentration--especially among the top 10%, who own about 70% of all wealth--reflects deep structural imbalances. The top 1%, in particular, hold nearly half of what the entire top 10% owns.

There is, therefore, considerable room for progressive wealth taxation--not just income taxation--to address this disparity. Wealth is increasingly being accumulated passively, through ownership of appreciating assets, not through productive labor or innovation. The founders were simply unable to foresee 200 years into the future of how this would manifest and become a serious issue. This entrenches economic dynasties and undermines meritocratic access to opportunity. If we’re serious about upward mobility and social cohesion, then some degree of wealth redistribution--through taxation or structural reform--is not only economically justifiable, but necessary.
 
No, you were taught propaganda and you still believe it.



You’re cherry-picking a stat from a narrow sliver of history and presenting it like it tells the whole story--like it somehow undermines modern critiques of corporate greed or economic inequality. But here’s the part you’re either missing or deliberately ignoring that wage growth you’re talking about came during an era of brutal working conditions, child labor, zero worker protections, and no social safety net. People worked 12-hour days, six days a week, often in dangerous factories, and died young. That so-called wage gain wasn’t driven by benevolent free-market forces--it was extracted through suffering, and the moment workers began organizing to demand better conditions, the same industrialists you’re defending hired Pinkertons to beat them into submission.

And even with that modest wage growth, wealth was still massively concentrated at the top--robber barons like Carnegie, Rockefeller, and Morgan were consolidating power and buying off politicians. Sound familiar? Because what you’re praising is the prototype for today’s corporate kleptocracy: the rich getting richer not by innovation or competition, but by rigging the system--through monopolies, deregulation, tax loopholes, and the erosion of labor power.

You're also conveniently ignoring that productivity and GDP have skyrocketed since the 1970s, while wages for the bottom 90% have stagnated. So no, quoting some selectively framed stat from 1890 doesn’t refute the fact that the modern economy is tilted--rigged, really--to funnel more and more wealth to the top while the rest tread water.

You're not defending capitalism. You're defending oligarchy wrapped in nostalgia.

I got your 'gilded age' right here:
 
I admire Bernie Sanders, but to be precise, the wealth concentration figures are, well, Sanders does exaggerate. According to the Federal Reserve’s Distributional Financial Accounts, the top 1% of Americans control roughly 35% of the nation’s wealth. The top 50% collectively hold over 97% of it. These figures are verifiable through the Fed’s wealth distribution tables.

Notably, this same top 50% is also responsible for paying approximately 97% of all federal income taxes. While some might argue that this demonstrates fairness, the reality is that such extreme wealth concentration--especially among the top 10%, who own about 70% of all wealth--reflects deep structural imbalances. The top 1%, in particular, hold nearly half of what the entire top 10% owns.

There is, therefore, considerable room for progressive wealth taxation--not just income taxation--to address this disparity. Wealth is increasingly being accumulated passively, through ownership of appreciating assets, not through productive labor or innovation. The founders were simply unable to foresee 200 years into the future of how this would manifest and become a serious issue. This entrenches economic dynasties and undermines meritocratic access to opportunity. If we’re serious about upward mobility and social cohesion, then some degree of wealth redistribution--through taxation or structural reform--is not only economically justifiable, but necessary.

How, exactly, would you redistribute their wealth?
 
A flat tax is regressive in what context?
It's the opposite of progressive.

A progressive tax exponentially taxes more the more one makes, starting at a high point, people who earn above, say, $300k per year, (or whatever they decide on) the middle pay taxes, but it's not supposed to be burdensome. The burden, the pain, should be shouldered by those who can easily afford it. Taht's progressivism, in a nutshell. Why? Because that's where the money is. Increasing taxes on poor and middle will destroy the economy because they do the bulk of purchasing, which is the engine of jobs.

A regressive tax lowers taxes on the top and increases it on the bottom.

Compared to the status quo, that's what a flat tax does. Takes more from the poor, and less from the rich. That's why it is 'regressive'. It's terrible for the economy.
 
It's the opposite of progressive.

A progressive tax exponentially taxes more the more one makes, starting at a high point, people who earn above, say, $300k per year, (or whatever they decide on) the middle pay taxes, but it's not supposed to be burdensome. The burden, the pain, should be shouldered by those who can easily afford it. Taht's progressivism, in a nutshell. Why? Because that's where the money is. Increasing taxes on poor and middle will destroy the economy because they do the bulk of purchasing, which is the engine of jobs.

A regressive tax lowers taxes on the top and increases it on the bottom.

Compared to the status quo, that's what a flat tax does. Takes more from the poor, and less from the rich. That's why it is 'regressive'. It's terrible for the economy.

A standard deduction of $40K with a single (flat) tax rate of 25% would effectively be quite progressive. That ‘two number’ FIT system would only tax ‘excess’ (personal) annual income. See post #145.
 
To see me the research on this nice sunny day can you just explain how you would tax unrealized capital gains?
If you've got a thousand dollars and are being taxed 20%, you transfer 20% of those dollars to the government. If you've got a thousand shares and are being taxed 20%, a fairly obvious possibility would be to transfer 20% of those shares to the government. Probably too cumbersome to work for normal taxpayers, but in the case of billionaires it would work just fine.

I suppose one 'criticism' is that it would potentially result in a de facto form of socialism with the government owning large or majority stakes in most industries; but a trusteeship system could help avoid the pitfalls of straying too far towards a centrally-planned economy and, perhaps more to the point, it seems to me that should be viewed as an even more damning criticism of the state we've reached in the present system: Why would it be better for a handful unelected individuals to hold those stakes rather than a democratic government?
 
You’re cherry-picking a stat from a narrow sliver of history and presenting it like it tells the whole story--

Another poster brought up the gilded age, not me, therefore I did not cherry-pick it.

like it somehow undermines modern critiques of corporate greed or economic inequality.

Businesses exist to maximize profits. Calling that greed is like calling a tiger predatory. You spend 99% of your time and money on yourself and your family. Why don't you consider yourself "greedy"?

Furthermore, I don't give a shit about economic inequality, because it's all based on envy. You want to earn more money? Get some skills.

But here’s the part you’re either missing or deliberately ignoring that wage growth you’re talking about came during an era of brutal working conditions, child labor, zero worker protections,

Yes, but it was still much better than the alternative, which is subsistence farming. How do we know? We know because whenever they have had the chance, people walked off the land and into the factories as fast as the factories could take them.

and no social safety net.

Good. The state is not your mommy. Stop thinking of yourself as a child who needs to be nurtured and cared for by some dirtbag politician.

People worked 12-hour days, six days a week, often in dangerous factories, and died young. That so-called wage gain wasn’t driven by benevolent free-market forces--it was extracted through suffering, and the moment workers began organizing to demand better conditions, the same industrialists you’re defending hired Pinkertons to beat them into submission.

If you don't like the job or the wages, then quit. There is no "right" to monopolize the labor supply, which is what unions do. The Pinkertons were needed because the violent union thugs wouldn't simply go home after they were fired. Instead, they physically attacked other workers.

And even with that modest wage growth,

It wasn't modest, it was a large increase.

wealth was still massively concentrated at the top--robber barons like Carnegie, Rockefeller, and Morgan were consolidating power and buying off politicians. Sound familiar?

It sure does. Leftists here remind me of them all the time. Why don't you blame the nurturing, caring politicians who are auctioning off favors to the highest bidder?

Because what you’re praising is the prototype for today’s corporate kleptocracy: the rich getting richer not by innovation or competition, but by rigging the system--through monopolies, deregulation, tax loopholes, and the erosion of labor power.

Government regulation, which is written by lobbyists, is how the system ended up rigged.
 
Last edited:
It's amazing how inequality in the US is just accepted as just fine.
 
Back
Top Bottom