Hacker News Reader

Comment by bboylen | Hacker News Reader

What would this policy look like?

Government seizing shares of companies from people if their valuation rises too much?

I had a half baked idea of the government seizing shares, and those become non-voting shares. Those shares are then rolled into a huge fund whose shares are distributed along with tax returns. It would probably amount to essentially free $SPY shares.

Didn't think through it much, aiming for a national product that elevates everyone in the country. Kinda like a Norway oil fund.

We have that already and it's called taxation. What would change would be that it would include a wealth tax that goes to 100% after that threshold.

Oh, but don't worry. Greed is such an amazing motivator that it wouldn't take a decade before we accomplished meeting those basic needs.

So if you have a private valuation that exceeds $25M you’re forced to somehow pay, even when all your wealth is locked up in illiquid company share?

Share ownership can be transferred.

A progressive tax.

Taxes usually only apply to income, not assets.

Income taxes are the ones that apply to income. Other taxes apply to other things, e.g. property taxes apply to property and sales taxes apply to sales.

So wealth tax then! It’s really just a question of finding metrics and then sending people bills to force them to liquidate or whatever

And what if the stock valuation crashes before they can pay the bill? On hook for money they don't have?

Seems almost impossible to implement

There are already things in tax law for this kind of stuff. You can write off the losses. If you're rich enough to be hit by this stuff, you're rich enough for an accountant and lawyer to help out with this kind of thing.

Reply on news.ycombinator.com