Appearing on The Verge podcast this week, Bill Gates slammed “extreme” tax proposals like one freshman congresswoman’s 70 percent marginal tax rate proposal, adding that they miss the big picture.
He correctly told the podcast:
“You wouldn’t want to just focus on the ordinary income rate. People who are wealthy have a rounding error of ordinary income. It has nothing to do with the 39.6% marginal ordinary income rate. So it’s a misfocus. If you focus on that, you’re missing the picture.”
This is why you see millionaires and billionaires gain favor in the press when they say they want higher income tax rates on the wealthy. That’s because they don’t earn an income.
If a wealthy tycoon demands a 90 percent capital gains tax rate, then they would gain a bit more credibility. For instance, JPMorgan Chase CEO Jamie Dimon claimed he’s for higher taxes on the rich, but fell short of saying he’d endorse tax hikes on wealth and capital gains (SEE: Two questions for Jamie Dimon on higher taxes on the wealthy).
Gates also got it right on the latest leftist monetary policy scheme known as the modern monetary theory (MMT) (SEE: MMT: What is this monetary policy AOC, other leftists are advocating?).
He just said: “That is some crazy talk. It will come back and bite you.”
That said, Gates gets it wrong when he advocates for a more progressive tax code. But how much more progressive can it get?
“We can be more progressive, the estate tax and the tax on capital, the way the FICA and Social Security taxes work. We can be more progressive without really threatening income generation.”
That’s the last thing the government should do. An estate tax is morally wrong, a tax on capital would hurt the economy, and Social Security is bankrupt.
Americans are whistling down to the concentration camps.