How do you divorce being a European principally from being willing to pay taxes? What part of being uniquely European do you value that does not fundamentally require taxes?
Perhaps you’re thinking of wealth taxes rather than effective tax rates? https://www.investopedia.com/terms/e/effectivetaxrate.asp
And the oligarchs in Sweden pay very little taxes.
Wouldn't rich people still have dividends, interest, and possibly executive compensation and capital gains? And if, for example, their money is in a business, that business would be paying all taxes as well, both resulting in tax revenue, and less for the investor? Or is there a source that they don’t have income?
> oligarchs in Sweden pay very little taxes
How are you quantifying that claim? From what I can find, the top 1% pay 10-15% of Sweden’s total tax revenue, presumably a far larger share than any other similarly sized group? Or what's the quantification you're using?
The OP is presumably pointing out the discrepancies between taxation of wealth vs taxation of income. Your top 1% stat is presumably income.
For instance, I pay 52% marginal, but only 33% on capital gains. So if I am capital income heavy, I will pay less tax than someone on the same money but getting it as income.
They may also avoid selling by taking out loans instead, and just pay interest rather than any taxes.
This doesn't mean that the rich are not paying taxes or are not paying for a larger % of taxes in total, but they're far from paying their fair share because most of their wealth didn't come from income. Regular employees have higher effective tax rates, even more so if they're issued RSUs.
If everything is taken care of me from taxes, why do I need money? Take it all.
Switzerland also has a wealth tax.
TLDR: Switzerland is not the low-tax fantasy wonderland many people believe it to be.
Personal wealth above ca. $215000 (with primary residence counted at 25% of its market value, and debt subtracted) is taxed at 1% in Norway, rising to 1.1% above $2.2 million. Presumably whatever wealth tax Switzerland has is lower than that?
But despite what they said to the media, they weren't moving because of the wealth taxes. If they were moving because of the Scandinavian wealth taxes, they would have moved to the U.K. or the U.S., which don't have wealth taxes at all. Instead, they moved to another country with a wealth tax and a relatively high income tax.
So clearly it was never about the taxes. It was either politics, or they just liked Switzerland better. When you're super rich, Switzerland is a much nicer place to live than Norway or Sweden.
What about 40%? 50%?
Most people agree that taxes need to be paid for the common good of society. However, many people disagree about the correct amount and increasingly about the usage of said taxes.
That is the real problem in my opinion.
I pay about 6% for public services, around 8% for health insurance, and around 25% for the public pension insurance. The issue isn't taxes, it's almost entirely demographics.
So I wouldn’t say high taxes are fundamentally European.
Yes so if you were in the higher percentiles of wealth, like many engineers in the US, you'd end up with less wealth in Europe, while if you were in the lower percentiles then in Europe you'd end up with more wealth. That's how redistribution works, the top 10% of income earners end up with less (even after accounting for healthcare and education; they get back less then they put in), and US software engineers are in the top 10% of income earners.
(this is an actual question, not an ironic one)
> I should have taken medical leave at the first surgery, but my manager was confused about our status – the acquisition was so recent that I didn’t have six months as an Oracle employee, and she said, “You’re not eligible to take paid leave.”
> I couldn’t afford to take unpaid leave, and I was afraid I would lose my job and my health insurance, so I had to power on and pretend I was okay while I was really sick and taking an antibiotic that had horrible side effects.
> ...
In the Netherlands you get up two years paid sick leave, before your employer can fire you. If you are sick enough to not be able to work again, you'll get 75% of your last earned wage from the government.
The tricky situation is when you are considered partially unable to work. You'll get time to find a suitable job, but your benefits drop over time. Finding a job in that situation is sometimes very difficult. It's possible to fall between the cracks.
In any case, the intent is to make sure people do not get unfairly hurt by life events outside their control.
My main point was to undersatnd when (and if) the "in the US we get enough money to pay the insurance" breaks.