Comment by ALittleLight | Hacker News Reader

Comment by ALittleLight | Hacker News Reader

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I can't speak for the other person, but I think I have a similar perspective. I don't like big corporations, I think many smaller businesses are better. For one, if only a couple companies exist then you don't have many choices. For another, working as, what previous generations might've called a wage slave, feels very soul crushing. I think society would be freer and people would be happier working for smaller companies that they owned and had bigger impacts in. On top of all that, a few big companies means concentrated power and that means a few rich folks can leverage their power to political ends to get more riches and more power etc.

"Tax the rich" sounds kind of like a good idea at first but then you take into account the point about how the rich have lawyers, lobbyists, and accountants. Rich people and companies already figure out how to subvert tax laws. Why wouldn't they figure out how to subvert the new laws they are clamoring for too?

Put another way, is Bezos supporting this law because he wants to be worth less?

I'd prefer we solve things more directly. Break up big business via anti-trust. Stop businesses from buying one another. Rather than raising taxes let's just simplify the tax code so it's automatic and there is minimal ambiguity or flexibility for creative tax accounting. Let's bring legal cases on all the questionable tax strategies big companies are engaging in. Raising taxes to hope we catch the big guys doesn't seem like a smart plan to me. It seems more likely they'll dodge the increase and smaller companies will get hit with it.

> I'd prefer we solve things more directly. Break up big business via anti-trust. Stop businesses from buying one another. Rather than raising taxes let's just simplify the tax code so it's automatic and there is minimal ambiguity or flexibility for creative tax accounting.

Well, I don't see how it's feasible or desirable to do things more directly. You're saying BigCos are a problem, and you want to disincentivize their formation, then picking them on one-by-one basis will actually require more expertise and more effort, compared to having laws (e.g. tax laws) that apply broadly, and then enforce these laws.

We have laws precisely so that we wouldn't have to decide every case individually, and that the rules are clear to everyone, so they can avoid possible (and arbitrary) punishment.

I also think that as long as you want to tax all corporations the same, there will always be an inherent advantage in being big. That's why many people suggest progressive taxation in various forms to disincentivize such empire-building.

> Raising taxes to hope we catch the big guys doesn't seem like a smart plan to me.

This is a straw man - nobody is arguing just for raising taxes and then not enforcing those laws, we would love to enforce these laws of course. But having them is the first step to enforcement, I don't think your approach (enforce something without support from laws) is more viable, even legally. It requires more regulatory expertise, which you argue we are lacking compared to corporations.

Also nobody is really arguing against tax code simplification, but it only can get you so far.

A couple big companies versus hundreds of small companies in a given industry is a strong feature of leftist driven governance, whether it comes from republicans or democrats. For the little guy they are definitely not.

Big governments love a couple big businesses because it’s much easier to infiltrate, influence, control and ultimately procur wealth with that small group of businesses rather than attempting to influence 100’s or even 1000’s of smaller and independent companies.

So the next time you see 3 domestic car companies, and 3 airplane makers, and 4 toilet paper makers, 3 oil companies, etc. Understand they want it that way because of control and $$$$.

Don't equate big state with left. It's really two independent things, and not how most leftists think, in my experience.

>"I'd prefer we solve things more directly. Break up big business via anti-trust."

In theory I am all for it but on the other hand what would be the allowed size? I can hardly imagine mom and pop shop producing Lithium Ion cells, starting foundry etc, etc. This measure could put country to severe disadvantage against any other that does not implement same measures.

To be more practical and keep competitive edge internationally I'd just milk big companies by way of taxes and make sure there are no loopholes and perks like foreign earning exceptions etc. And outlaw political corporate lobbying.

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