The funnest part of Liz Warren't 'Wealth Tax' proposal...

[Wounded Bear]

she's proposing to audit and tax all the shit wealthy people use to launder money: Jewels and bling, artworks, property.

[Wounded Bear]

1. What, no comments?

[allgood33]

24. You can get a bigger tax break for your yacht than many get for their home mortgage.

Plus all that goes with it. The Luxury tax break that poor people can't get for the auto they need to get to work.

[CloudWatcher]

29. what tax break is that?

I don't own a yacht, but this is the first I've heard of a tax break for yachts. Any pointers to what you're talking about? Thanks.

[CloudWatcher]

2. It's a cute idea.

But the chances of this ever happening? I'm starting to wonder about negative odds, as 0% doesn't seem low enough.

Just the first part -- putting an accurate valuation on property -- is so complex. So subject to error and honest (and dishonest) mistakes. Just ask the banks that placed valuations on houses and then got destroyed when the market collapsed.

I think the odds would be higher if she proposed just shooting the top 0.1% and just confiscating all of their assets.

[pnwmom]

6. It's not bad for her to make people think about it. France, Portugal, and Spain have them. n/t

[TexasBushwhacker]

7. Exactly

Real estate gets appraised already for property tax purposes. Holdings in banks, brokerage accounts etc will be reported at year end. Cars and boats are licensed through the states. Sure, there will be some personal bling that might escape appraisal, but I imagine the bulk of the 1%'s net worth is in real estate, banks and brokerage accounts.

[TeamPooka]

18. many sophisticated parties use art to launder money, hide assests, or evade taxes

[Tanuki]

32. Like Jarvanka, David Koch, and Wilbur Ross, for instance

https://news.artnet.com/art-world/jared-kushner-new-disclosure-1031153

"Jared Kushner and Ivanka Trump have released new financial disclosures, including more than 70 assets “inadvertently omitted” from Kushner’s initial filings. Among them is Kushner and Ivanka Trump’s contemporary art collection, valued somewhere between $5 million and $25 million.

As previously reported by artnet News, Kushner and Ivanka Trump maintain that their art is for “personal enjoyment,” not for investment purposes, for which a disclosure form is not required under federal law. An attorney who helped Kushner and Trump prepare the disclosure documents said the art was included on the updated form out of an abundance of caution, according to CNN."


https://news.artnet.com/art-world/25-top-art-collectors-also-big-republican-donors-394218

....."Private equity billionaire Wilbur Ross is reported to have an art collection worth in the range of $150 million. Additionally, he owns 25 Magritte paintings that are alone valued at $100 million."
......."Number 6 on Forbes Magazine’s list of wealthiest billionaires, Koch was the only billionaire on this list to draw art world protest for his rabidly conservative political views. That happened at the 2014 inauguration of the Metropolitan Museum of Art’s David H. Koch Plaza, to which the infamous libertarian donated $65 million. That sum is a pittance compared to the hundreds of millions David Koch and his brother Charles have poured into tea party causes over the years (they gave Republicans $400 million during the 2012 election, and $290 million in 2014). Together the Koch brothers have been called politically and environmentally “toxic” and “the poster boys of the 1 percent.”

[DFW]

31. In France, art got excepted

When the Socialists took over in 1981, the father of the finance minister, Laurent Fabius, was an art dealer. So art got excepted from the wealth tax. That's where this kind of thing leads.

[GReedDiamond]

10. See post #5 below...nt

[nilram]

12. My county puts a valuation on my real estate, and

also requires that businesses pay a tax on "business personal property"--machinery, furniture, equipment (including stuff not currently used and in storage). The state to the north of mine puts a valuation on cars, mobile homes, recreational vehicles, and boats and charges them against that valuation. There's state valuations, user inventories, appeal processes, bills going out, checks coming in. It's all so untidy and complex it makes the head spin. And it makes money.

[AZ8theist]

13. It's an excellent idea.

Insurance companies do valuations of wealth all the time. Indeed, your life expectancy and earning potential has a "value".

The chances of implementation are slim, I agree. That's because the billionaire class owns the media in America so have fought and won the class war through massive propaganda.

The American Rube class still thinks (after nearly 50 years of failure) that "trickle down" economics works.

[whathehell]

26. Elizabeth Warren doesn't do "cute"

She's a senator, former Harvard professor and creator of the Consumer Protection Bureau
You're entitled to disagree with this particular tax plan, but don't even think about patronizing her

[CloudWatcher]

28. I'm aware of her cred

And I'll happily vote for her if she gets the nomination. But I've worked with way too many PhD's over the years to be impressed by a CV.

I didn't mean to come off as patronizing. I like that she's thinking outside the box. I just don't have much belief that this idea is going to go anywhere ... not in 1 year, not in 10 years. Wealth inequality could ruin our society, but I don't think this is an approach that can work.

[DFW]

30. "just shooting the top 0.1% and just confiscating all of their assets."

Well, that has actually been tried. It didn't save the regime that did it, though.

[Julian Englis]

3. You'd have to. eom

[mysteryowl]

4. Great idea. When can it start?

[dlk]

5. Much of this Property is Already Valued

There are insurance valuations, loan collateral valuations and so on. Also, Warren stated we already do valuations for estate purposes. It’s not difficult.

[TimeToGo]

8. It may be a good idea

But don't kid yourself, it is very difficult.

Now, you could only tax the stuff that is more easily identified and valued, but I still don't see that happening.

What I do feel strongly about us that we have to figure out something. Something fair and effective. Just not sure this is it.

[ProudLib72]

9. She has no right to tax my valuable painting!

[roamer65]

11. We need to go back to these kind of rates.

https://www.tax-brackets.org/federaltaxtable/1978

[Hermit-The-Prog]

15. that's much more likely and fair

[h2ebits]

17. Oops! Needs to be adjusted for inflation

[ancianita]

14. Indeed.They have them stored in "non-state jurisidiction" freeport warehouses, though, so good luck.

Warren's idea is good. It's just that finding their wealth will be the tricky part, and might end up being a fairly embarrassing investigative process. About all she could do is tax their yachts, helicopters, private jets and

These freeport warehouses exist in areas that are not subject to laws of the country in which they reside, and so everything from luxury custom cars to art works to jewels are stored there by the globe's wealthy.
And that's why the wealthy rig jurisdictions to be apart from national laws. And why they consider themselves "above the law," something they have in common with the Trump crime syndicate.

Such freeport warehouses exist in Geneva, Luxembourg, Singapore, the Bahamas, and other countries all over the world. And they advertise. Here's an example.

Which means they don't exist, necessarily, on any asset ledgers.

[safeinOhio]

16. Make the penalty for hiding property

forfeiture of all unreported or under value items.

[ancianita]

19. You have to prove they own it, first. That's near impossible. They can tie you up in court for years

[safeinOhio]

20. Well, if you don't own it

you won't miss it.

[ancianita]

21. You mean our tax investigators go in and just tax whatever freeports' records say? Good luck

dealing with the international law firms their clients hire.

You're being a bit clever, but in the end, we won't get taxes from those who hide and hoard their wealth.

[safeinOhio]

22. The Professor has it covered.

[ancianita]

23. Adorable.

[safeinOhio]

25. Explained....

https://www.washingtonpost.com/outlook/2019/01/24/senator-warrens-plan-tax-ultrawealthy-is-smart-idea-whose-time-has-come/?utm_term=.b9e02bfc5298

[ancianita]

27. Yes, it explains exactly my point. Stratosphere wealth is in non-liquid investments located beyond

Warren's and U.S. and other governments' jurisdictions.

Even your source says it won't happen in any years soon, but it's a good idea. It just won't work.

You really just don't get it.