> For real estate, yes, but it's a quite different type of asset with a stable value that (mostly) only goes up.

It's still a tax on wealth. So you just can't use this argument (the argument that we dont tax anything based on wealth and therefore is justification not to do it now).

> is it fair to ask people to cough up some 300-500k of real cash in tax?

I actually disagree that we should tax anything on asset value. Yes, RE is illiquid and thus has "stable" values. What's worse is that the value is tied to appraised values (and potentially government imposed caps) which you have no (or limited) control over.

Maybe? You can deduct losses. If you have to sell a little of your crypto while the price is high to pay your taxes, then what have you lost after it goes to zero? At least the tax office get something out of it in tat case.

Yes, and we absolutely should.

Huh? You're talking about budgeted values for the payee, not the rate that an individual payer. I'm talking about the rate established for the payer, which is based on the value of your property. In absolute value terms I may pay more than my next door neighbor if my property is deemed to have a higher asset value. This would be no different if both my neighbor and I owned AAPL stock, but if I held more stock than him, I would owe more (theoretically) in taxes on that stock.