One thing that would help is far more progressive taxation. No one in modern society should have the kind of wealth that enables leveraging politicians and public opinion.
In reality, that doesn't do a thing. The rich simply make up for you not paying taxes by paying you less. Finally, the rich pay capital gains rates and then only occasionally.
If you want to fix the problem, abolish income tax and add a universal sales tax on everything. Rich people then pay the same amount of taxes as everyone else (or their money just sits there). You can then reduce taxes on things like food staples which disproportionately benefit the poor. In the process, taxing the sale of stocks would immediately reign in the biggest issues in the stock market too.
Poor people spend MOST of their income on their primary residence, food, utilities, and a couple other staples. You could simply eliminate taxes associated withe residences under X amount, taxes on staple foods, residential utility bills under a certain amount, etc. At that point, poor people would be paying few taxes while rich people would be forced to pay for all the things that make it worth being rich.
Basic food items (e.g. bread, eggs, flour, milk) are already exempt from sales tax, at least in Texas, which is not exactly known for being progressive about anything.
You think that a flat capital gains tax lower than the top income tax brackets is progressive?
That's... different.
Even in Communism there is class division (if not more). Powerful people find ways.
Not saying that's a successful model, but there are a lot of shades of grey between and surrounding our current system and the classic bogeyman "communism".
What do you mean by this?
We've never had a completely Capitalist system, AFAIAA, because the logical ends to that are slavery and selling body parts just to survive. Which means rebellion by the proles and it's easier to get people to work endlessly for your ends if you give them a measure of hope.
Similarly, we've never had a completely Communist system because the logical ends to that are redistribution of power from those in control to the people. This means those currently in control lose most of their power; if you empower people to force a change towards communist principles ... well let's just say that has never gone well.
We can squash the wealth gap, and we can redistribute political power back to the demos ... but it's a very long road and means structuring society to combat individual greed, ultimately giving up the "American dream" of having others work at your minions to give you a millionaire life-style. Honestly, the greed we humans have for that is so powerful it acts as an almost insurmountable barrier to a fairer society/World.
It's entirely possible to increase taxes on the wealthy without increasing government tax revenue by giving everyone else a (probably very modest) tax cut.
Perhaps we conscript our leaders via some random process?
I think that ship has sailed.
> Only the wealthy can afford to just take a 4-6 year break from their career.
Many elected political offices get paid a reasonably good salary, higher than median wages. Many people change careers after 5 or 10 years too. Even the commoners. So I'm don't buy this assertion.
The "revolving door" seems problematic. The politician -> industry bribery pathway seems like it would be strengthened by policy such as this.
The root problem is corruption, not experience. Corruption is a force that is happy to work on any system and I see no reason to believe that term limits would do anything to reduce corruption, only modulate it.
If the positions themselves are limited, it just pushes power and seniority into supporting positions such as staffers or the party apparatus itself, potentially even the think tanks/lobbyist groups that are often the entities that write the laws anyway.
The greater issue is that you are describing an idea of how to reduce corruption in terms of what politicians need to do. An iron law of reality is that you cannot control other people, at best you can influence them.
If you want to solve political problems you must ask "what can I do?" because talking about what politicians should do is glorified masturbation.
The answers are at least:
Get directly involved and run for a position of power and don't be corrupt when provided the opportunity to be
Never choose loyalty to a person over loyalty to ideas. Loyalty is the unit of corruption.
Get directly involved in the bureaucracy and use your position to do good and stifle bad
Use your position at work to practice professional ethics
Get involved with a union to provide consequences via striking, show solidarity
Get involved with investigative journalism to uncover corruption and speak truth to power
Get involved with campaigns to get candidates you don't believe are corrupt into positions of power
Get a good grasp on what fighting authoritarianism with force requires and meditate deeply on the use of guillotines or analogues
When someone else puts themselves at risk or sacrifices themselves to fight power, venerate them
Understand that "If none of us is prepared to die for freedom, then all of us will die under tyranny."
Educate yourself on the history of revolutionary movements and try to make complex ideas simple and viral
Understand that cynicism is coerced consent and that cynicism does not change anything