# Tax the rich! **URL:** \ **Category:** In My Humble Opinion\ **Created:** [October 16, 2019, 8:32pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tax-the-rich/841867 "2019-10-16T20:32:41Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 1\ **Showing post:** 38
**Author:** ![septimus](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/septimus/32/410_2.png) [@septimus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/septimus)\ **Post date:** [October 17, 2019, 9:29am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tax-the-rich/841867/38 "2019-10-17T09:29:14Z")
These days the mainstream magazines are full of stories that lament the economic and social flaws of income inequality. But perhaps the real ‘income inequality problem’ is that incomes aren’t unequal enough! Some say that the present U.S. GINI is unprecedented. Wrong! It was higher at the height of the Roaring Twenties boom — those years were called ‘Roaring’ for a reason. 14th-century Paris, just before the bubonic plague struck, had a GINI estimated at 0.7. The great New Spain Empire during the 18th century also had a GINI much higher than today’s U.S. Like “P/E ratio” — which needs a 2nd parameter to be meaningful — GINI is misleading without a 2nd parameter. See, for example, [this graph](https://ourworldindata.org/uploads/2013/12/Pre-Industrial-Inequality.png). > [@neutro](#): > > A fair tax system would be dividing up the budget by the number of people and sending everyone a bill. Even a flat tax, as you’ve defined it, might be unfair to the rich. I explained this in an earlier thread: > [@The 2017/2018 Trump/GOP tax plan](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-2017-2018-trump-gop-tax-plan/797442/91): > > **Why not a truly Fair Tax?** > > At present Americans pay an average of $4600 in individual income taxes. It would be fair to jack up the taxes for SocSec and Medicare, which are underfunded, and borrow a few more 100’s of Million annually from China. Do both and we can cut the average income tax in half. > > Some would say that $2300 per each person, young or old, rich or poor, would be the fairest tax. But if you think about it this discriminates against the rich. > > **The rich use _private_ schools — is it really fair to make them also fund _public_ schools? They often have their own private security — why should they have to pay as much for police as the people in crime-ridden ghettos? The rich shouldn’t be forced to subsidize national parks — they vacation in the Caribbean or on the Riviera. And what sense does it make for the rich to help fund the Dept. of Labor??** > > A fair tax would be progressive; something like this: > > - Earning less than $75,000 per year — pay $3000 > - Earning $75,000 to $150,000 — pay $2500 > - Earning $150,000 to $350,000 — pay $2000 > - Earning $350,000 to $550,000 — pay $1500 > - Earning $550,000 to $750,000 — pay $1000 > Anyone earning more than $1,000,000 is probably a Job Creator. _ **The government should be subsidizing them, not taxing them.** _ I know the Trump plan won’t accomplish all this, but it will be a big step in the right direction. > > Yes, the $3000 tax would be burdensome on many freeloaders. I think the tax would motivate them to find work! And the prohibitions against cash for kidneys and other organs should be repealed of course — Win, win! --- _[View the full topic](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tax-the-rich/841867)._