• Carighan Maconar@lemmy.world
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    1 year ago

    I wish one of the bigger industrial countries had the balls to curb the state-like influence of billionaires, by flat out capping the amount of wealth they get to wield. It’s not even that people should not be allowed to be “rich”. But “rich” should mean owning 1-50 millions or so. Not billions.

    • Amilo159@lemmy.world
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      1 year ago

      You should try visiting Scandinavian countries. While being ultra rich isn’t disallowed, it’s so heavily taxed that ultra rich end up providing more for the welfare than any other group.

      … that is until they move out to Switzerland.

      • Amaltheamannen@lemmy.ml
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        1 year ago

        Not true at all. Sweden has worse wealth equality than the US. Sure we have high income taxes, but basically no wealth or inheritance taxes. The only reason social democracy ever took off in Scandinavia was due to the fear of the nearby Soviet Union. The moment the Soviet Union collapsed all the countries of Scandinavia started dismantling the welfare and privatising.

        • Cruxifux@lemmy.world
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          1 year ago

          An inconvenient truth is that life was a lot better for the working class in a lot of countries before the Soviet Union fell.

      • Maeve@kbin.social
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        1 year ago

        My buddy is in Switzerland doing his phD. He says col there is hella expensive. Do they have a tiny tax rate?

    • RegularGoose@sh.itjust.works
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      1 year ago

      If we’re not going to abolish money, it should really be entirely illegal for the highest paid person in a company to make more than, say, 15-20 times more than the lowest paid person.

      • kool_newt@lemm.ee
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        1 year ago

        Reliance on the state to make things right is the fatal flaw. The purpose of the state is not to make our life better, it is to protect the powerful from us.

        • RegularGoose@sh.itjust.works
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          1 year ago

          You’re assuming I’m in favor of keeping our existing government intact. I don’t. It was shit from the start, and now it’s entirely unsalvageable.

          Even if the government itself was salvageable, the US is far too ideologically divided into sides that cannot and should not be reconciled with each other.

          This country cannot and will not hold itself together much longer, and the only potentially viable course of action is to mitigate the harm that is going to happen no matter what by breaking it up in as controlled and peaceful a manner as possible.

    • MyNameIsIgglePiggle@sh.itjust.works
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      1 year ago

      Rather than worrying about trying to tax 1 person heaps (they will dodge it anyway)

      Why not put in place improved worker protection and pay laws.

      Higher minimum wage - say equal to the bottom quartile median house price in the area, mandatory health care even for the lowest paid employees, absolutely no overtime.

      They can dodge this by moving manufacturing overseas… But they already did this.