• Chriskmee@lemm.ee
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    1 year ago

    Most of their billions is ownership in companies they grew into what they are today. It’s not like they have billions to spend, it’s that their ownership is worth billions according to the market.

      • Chriskmee@lemm.ee
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        1 year ago

        So what? We should take away that ownership because they can leverage it? Also the same people suggesting we tax wealth like this want to also close those “loopholes” of low interest loans on shares.

            • Enma Ai@lemmy.world
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              1 year ago

              Taking away (extreme) wealth. There’s no reason one person should have that much. There’s countless better ways to use that money/wealth than for one persons extravagant lifestyle. And even if they don’t have an extravagant lifestyle, what are they gonna do with it? Doubt they will build infrastructure out of good will with it.

              • Chriskmee@lemm.ee
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                1 year ago

                So take away ownership of a company just because it’s too successful? That wealth is mostly in company ownership, so are you really suggesting we steal away legitimate ownership in successful companies?

                • someacnt@sopuli.xyz
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                  1 year ago

                  I mean, why do we have 'too big to fail" companies? Isn’t that counterproductive to having a robust society?

                  • Chriskmee@lemm.ee
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                    1 year ago

                    That’s how you compete in the world. Imagine for a second if the US didn’t bail out the automotive companies, I think Ford would have survived, but that’s about it, no more American competition for them. If they also failed, then we might not have any US car companies, how bad would that have been for our society?

                    Or the banks, could you imagine how screwed we would be if the whole baking system collapsed? Even the small banks were in trouble, it’s not a solution to just split them all up.

                • Enma Ai@lemmy.world
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                  1 year ago

                  Yes. Fuck Capitalism.

                  It’s not stealing their legitimate ownership. They don’t have legitimate ownership.

        • TurnItOff_OnAgain@lemmy.world
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          1 year ago

          No, they can keep them, but those loopholes need to be closed. Maybe don’t allow using ownership of a company as collateral for a loan? If you want to use your massive stored wealth as money you need to sell it. You want to get it back buy it. I’m not a finance or policy person, but there has to be a way to make these people pay the propert tax on their wealth.

          • Chriskmee@lemm.ee
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            1 year ago

            So they can keep their ownership, but we are going to remove their way to loan money against it, and still expect them to pay billions in taxes without giving away any ownership? How do you expect them to pay billions in taxes when the only billions they have in value is company ownership? You are forcing them to sell company ownership to pay this ridiculous tax.

            • Dark_Blade@lemmy.world
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              1 year ago

              To be fair, if billionaires could no longer use their stocks as collateral to borrow insane amounts, maybe they’d have to give themselves taxable salaries.

              • Chriskmee@lemm.ee
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                1 year ago

                I don’t think the government would ban the practice, since the middle class uses the same thing for stuff like reverse mortgages. I can see them limiting the amount though.

                If they did ban it though, billionaires would still be billionaires, they probably don’t need much of an actual salary when most of their stuff is paid for.