Here is some data that solidly debunks your disguised claim of "trickle down":
https://www.epi.org/publication/ceo-pay-has-grown-90-times-f...
http://www.ibew.org/media-center/Articles/19Daily/1908/19082...
Sure. I said:
> It's a boon to anyone whose job was created by it as well
You then say:
> If you mean people got to keep their jobs = boon
No, I said the job in the first place is funded by investment. I couldn't have made it clearer.
If investors don't invest in your startup/scaleup then there is no job in the first place. Nothing about being grateful for keeping your job.
> The problem is, wealth was transferred upstream, en masse, and not taxed anywhere near labor.
You're thinking in terms of groups instead of individuals, and that the groups are static. You shouldn't (as it will lead to so many broken ways of thinking) and they aren't.
> Here is some data that solidly debunks your disguised claim of "trickle down"
It's not trickle down - I only go for nonpolitical theories, and the US left wing's labels to oversimplify and demonise some fairly standard economics doesn't hold up by that measure.
I'd rather you replied to what I said than straw man it. You will mislead casual readers by doing so.
Your entire post is misleading.
It contains the ASSUMPTION that the favorable capital tax rate (vs labor tax rate) is NECESSARY for the investment to happen.
This is obviously not the case. People with capital will want to deploy it so that it grows, as long as the tax rate on the profits is <100%.
What we do not have is the curve - how high can the tax rate be set relative to the tax on labor income before investment is ACTUALLY discouraged?
Only an assumption, based on the obviously self-serving assertions of people who own capital, that higher tax rates will make them just sit on their money and not deploy it profitably.
As you can see above, I'm happy to debunk oversimplification & demonization from the LW or RW, but "trickly down" is pretty much what the RW called it when it was flogged as a concept in the '80s, that "freeing up capital" for the rich would trickle down to everyone in the economy. The ACTUAL result was the opposite. Ratios of executive vs worker pay only increased from ~70x to over 300x, and the share of the total GDP going to labor declined to the lowest point ever.
The actual fact of the matter is that with lowering tax rates on capital, the "boon" you speak of is actually available to fewer people than ever.
It... doesn't seem like we do? I mean, it's not like pre-1990 we had skyrocketing unemployment and underinvestment in business, and lowering capital gains taxes fixed it.
The fact of the matter is that people with capital want to invest and grow that capital. It is absolutely false that if that activity is taxed, it will disappear. Just as obviously, if all capital gains are taxed at 100%, it will disappear. The question is the balance - how much to tax it so that the wealthy don't merely get wealthier at everyone elses' expense.
It may also be a good idea to tax underutilized capital, as land is taxed.
