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“In 1894, Democrats in Congress passed the Wilson-Gorman tariff, which imposed the first peacetime income tax. The rate was 2% on income over $4,000, which meant fewer than 10% of households would pay any. ($4,000 was 19.3 times the 1894 nominal GDP per capita of $207.23; the corresponding income in 2021 is $1.3M.)“
If the assertion is (for example) "taxation on the rich tends to end up including middle-class and maybe lower", why would an example from Rome or medieval Europe not be applicable?
Back to here, I don't think tax policy from the 1800s is especially relevant because the United States has gone through extensive reform with respect to monetary and economic policy since that time. The fed didn't exist and we were still on the gold standard. It's weird to use an obscure law nobody has every heard of to argue against taxing a class of wealthy Americans that are paying historically low tax rates.
Also, do you see those old tax rates? People love to make comparisons about how housing was affordable half a century ago, then check out the tax rates, that’s partly why.
We are at absurd tax rates and all because the government doesn’t make any effort to control their spending.
Rich individuals who are born into money will always find ways to escape these taxes, but your average person who built their wealth will not and in a decade when they hit the middle class, they will just contribute to extending the wealth gap.
Bringing up tax codes from before 1900 is just an absurd way to start a discussion about this because we've had over a century of development in monetary policy and taxation since then.
There's basically just a lot of things going on such that the natural result is that the scope of policies increases over time. And that's a good thing.
Sure, it's possible the law will be written in such a short-sighted way that it won't take inflation into account in any way.
It's also possible that in the future, another law will be passed that expands this law to affect people who could not reasonably be considered "very wealthy".
But if the former happens, that's fixable, and also unlikely to affect ordinary people due to simple inflation for a good long time, so there's plenty of opportunity to fix it. And if the latter happens, that's when you need to fight it.
There is a very real, very serious problem with income and wealth inequality in this country. Study after study shows that the inequality is real, and that it is causing a raft of issues, from psychological to economic to political. It's really hard, at this point, to take seriously anyone who says we shouldn't try to fix that by reducing the inequality, especially if their only argument is, "Watch out! If the government comes for their billions, soon they'll come for your billions! Er, I mean millions! Er, I mean thousands!"
And when it's you that's likely affected where such short-sightedness to happen, and when there are multiple examples of such short-sightedness just in these comments already, I think that is a worry. Also, since the party proposing the law tends to have socialist and postmodern-Marxist leanings, there's even a potential motive for some less honest short-sightedness. Because, after all, inequality is a serious issue.
In terms of my statement about many working people having trouble paying taxes, that too is quantifiable. As someone with many working poor friends I could offer anecdotes where people have to sell a car or do something drastic to pay their tax bill. The reason is that many working poor don't have normal middle class jobs where a portion of their salary is set aside for taxes. Everyone should pay taxes, even poor folks who don't have bank accounts or steady employment. My point is that these people hate taxes as much, likely more, than jeff bezos does. The people who seem to like taxes and tax increases (you may be one), tend to be upper middle class professionals who have never had to scramble to pay them for fear of prison or wage garnishment.
What does the word "first" in that sentence imply?