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Comment by tetris11 | Hacker News Reader

I hope there comes a day when the rich and influential look for the next money-making venture in which to invest in, see only a sea of machine-generated uncertainty on the stock market, and decide "actually, the most profitable thing I can do to protect my wealth is to invest it in the public"

One day maybe.

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Ugh.

I hope there comes a day when using the money hoarded by the rich and influential to invest in the public, does not depend on the rich and influential choosing to do so out of a desire for maximal profits, or even benevolence.

One day maybe.

> One day maybe

TBH, I doubt it. Don't get me wrong, I sympathize with your values. Heck, I'm even called 'woke' by most people around me. Yet I understand that in this day in age, thanks to cryptocurrency, money is and will be a private matter. No government will be able to confiscate your wealth, at least to the extent that your wealth doesn't depend on assets related with the government (e.g. real estate is related given that you need to pay taxes to maintain it).

All assets depend on the governemt. You own land, that’s because the government allows it, you own a company, not if the government doesn’t let it exist.

What part of my comment did you miss? I already mentioned government-related stuff. Cryptocurrency is not government related.

Sorry to say the government can take away your cryptocurrency

It’s also a worthless number until exchanged for something real.

you don't pay tax because the government controls the issuing of money.

You pay tax because if you don't some large men will come to your house and make you pay tax.

this isn't a knock on the system; without some sort of centralised governments things tend to fall apart and then recreate themselves again. Even in the most lawless places someone steps in to perform the role, and usually they're much worse than a legal system with checks and balances.

Also important to keep in mind that, to a good degree at least in liberal democracies, the large men that come to make you pay tax exist because your neighbors think they should exist.

Every human, everywhere must contend with large men coming and taking their stuff. I have very little to no first hand experience with alternatives to liberal democracy. Persuading my neighbors to take more or less seems a whole lot easier than any of the alternatives I'm aware of.

The state can (and does) tax cryptocurrency. Why wouldn’t they be able to?

You're talking about capital-gains tax generated from the appreciation of cryptocurrency (only if you sell it). There's no tax for sitting on your cryptocurrency alone.

Maybe they'll begin investing without expecting fiscal returns, instead focusing on spiritual returns

For what shall it profit a man, if he shall gain the whole world, and lose his own soul? Mark 8:36

I won't hold my breath, but it's a nice thought.

That’s basically every rich lefty. “I’m rich” -> “I gotta vote for small government and low taxes” is not an obvious step to me at all. I’d much rather live in a town with happy people, low crime and high income equality than in a gated community full of rich people with guards and fences to keep the bums out.

Waiting for the rich to lift up the poors? One day never. Source: All of human history.

"Power concedes nothing without a demand." - Frederick Douglas https://www.blackpast.org/african-american-history/1857-fred...

"the perennial revolutionary programme of antiquity, cancel debts and redistribute the land." - Moses Finley

Maybe find a way to inspire in the rich the kind of philanthropy practiced by Andrew Carnegie. He wrote his views in, The Gospel of Wealth - not having read it, but having long heard Carnegie's name as an example of wealth turned to good, I'm planning to give it a read.

Unfortunately with a political system wholly owned by the wealthy (US), I fear that there may be more truth than I want in my father's admonition that things will never get better in this country until we have another revolution. I've been around a bit and so much of today seems to be a rinse and repeat of the issues I experienced when I was young - not the world I wanted to see for my daughter. Hopefully the next generation has a stronger backbone - mine and the couple after seem to have surrendered our dreams to greed and consumerism.

The uncertainty of the stock market doesn't really matter. The M3 in the UK went up around 25% over the last 3 years. So the major concern when choosing where to invest is whether the assets are optimally positioned to benefit from the growth in the money supply. Physical reality is still a concern of course.

Although arguably rich and influential are investing in the public; the UK government spending makes up about half the GDP and the wealthy are paying what I gather is a 40% income tax.

The top marginal rate of income tax (above c122k of income since this year) is 45%. On top of that, if you are employed and below state pension age then you also pay employee National Insurance of 2% and your employer also pays 13.8%. So for every additional £1 spent on salary and payroll taxes by an employer, c.53.4% goes on direct taxation.

Rates are actually even higher between 100-122k because although the income tax rate is 40%, ie 5%pts lower, the zero-rate band ("Personal Allowance") is simultaneously withdrawn by 50p for every pound earned - meaning effectively the rate is 60% and employees get to keep just over 33% of each additional pound the employer spends on salary and payroll taxes.

On the other hand, if you can take all of your money in capital gains, you'll be taxed at a top rate of 20% (or 28% for real estate and carried interest), with no payroll taxes. So the system heavily incentivises risk taking.

If you have two kids and earn 55k from work, you pay marginal tax of 60%, as you have to pay a child tax on top of income and national insurance, plus another 9% or 15% on student loans (which are funded as an income tax)

… what?

If you’re going to make the (extraordinary) claim that there is a “child tax” you’ll need to provide a link to a primary source.

This is what is being referred to: https://www.gov.uk/child-benefit-tax-charge

Yes, although that could be classed as a benefit withdrawal rather than a tax (the child benefit clawback), though I'd agree with calling student loans effectively a graduate tax under the current system (since very few would expect to ever fully repay them). More broadly benefit withdrawal rates are another horror show which create all sorts of bad incentives in the UK - the withdrawal rate for universal credit is 55% on post-tax income above the "work allowance". That can mean marginal combined tax and benefit withdrawal rates into the high 60s% for some of the lowest-paid workers!

Except the benefit isn’t withdrawn. This is especially seen when you have parent who have split up. One parent receives the benefit, the other pays extra tax.

I am quite sure that 40% is not the true tax rate that anyone rich is paying.

I also wish the world was fundamentally different.

What does that mean?

Its in the interest of the rich to exploit the poor; corner markets, destroy competition (I.e. welfare), price gouge. Hopefully a day will come that the future happens so fast that the rich cannot predict the market, and that the only way to secure their wealth is to invest in public services which will have some guarantee of being used.

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