Americans Lose Faith That Hard Work Leads to Economic Gains, WSJ-NORC Poll Finds

Wealth inequality is high. High enough you can feel it like a vibe in the air. The richest people in the world are telling everyone to get onboard with technology that is determined to make a lot of those same people's jobs redundant. All with an explicit goal of increasing the price of stock most of those people do not own.

IMO there's two economies, maybe divided by those who participate in the stock market and those who don't. We, Americans, have largely given up trying to improve the lives of people not in the first group. Economies are living, breathing entities and we're just grinding poorer people for fuel so richer people can have another house, another boat, another company. A lot of regular joes are really stressed out about paying rent. The loss in faith is warranted.

Huh? Where did he attack the middle-class?

If you're smart or lucky enough to to land that 6-figure job, then times are pretty good. There are tons of stories on subreddits, e.g. r/FIRE, r/investing, r/fatfire, etc., of people with large nest eggs and home ownership at an early age. But those are outliers. There are many opportunities to get rich if you are lucky and or smart enough to land them, like in tech or finance. But this is not much consolation for those who lack those attributes. By statistical certainty, most people cannot be exceptionally smart or talented.

Income taxes are higher than capital gains taxes.

This isn't based on economic theory or anything, it's just a political choice we have made as a country. We've chosen to reward those who move money around and trade capital more than we reward those who labor. And this at a time when, supposedly, the country is trying to increase its ability to build things.

I thought this specific fact worth mentioning.

Are they good? Sure you can go on vacation and drop some coin living lavishly, but if the rest of your friends and family are struggling to pay rent while you've FIREd, wouldn't you, oh I dunno, feel guilty? Wouldn't you rather not watch the world burn? Wouldn't you rather live in a world where you want to have kids and they'll have a future?

1. Only long term capital gains are lower than income tax

2. Long term investors invest in things that great new jobs, it is not just moving capital around.

We're on the same wavelength. To me, I find it hard not to think about our explosive growth as a country happening at the same time we refuse to expand representation of the public. These charts are very frustrating to me: https://www.congress.gov/crs-product/IN11547

The people in power do not want to lose control, but clearly have no idea how to manage the scale of what has been built. There's an American leadership crisis going on right now that is hard to ignore, both in public and private life.

I've only known a "good" economy from about 1995-1999 when the internet went mainstream and for the briefest of moments, we got a taste of what public investment in tech feels like.

The powers that be quickly saw the danger in that and IMHO orchestrated the Dot Bomb, 9/11, the Housing Bubble, etc to keep as much money as possible out of public hands so that the average person wouldn't have the means to participate in the stock market.

Suze Orman told everyone to put their savings into Vanguard in the 2000s and they did. But since America chose to invest in McMansions and SUVs instead of moonshots and automation, Vanguard is now cannibalizing US real estate rather than making venture capital available to small businesses and startups in its insatiable hunger for profit. Along with countless other zero-sum game thinkers who choose to work within existing systems of control rather than pursuing innovations which could raise the median standard of living. This is why as America has been losing its empire status as holder of the world's reserve currency, it's been colonizing itself, particularly its young.

So that's my greatest disappointment with the present era. That we collectively chose to invest in private profit rather than shared prosperity.

Now, tons of people will complain that I'm oversimplifying and will kick and scream in resistance to what I'm saying. But at the end of the day, personal wealth represents wages withheld from workers. I don't know why we worship people who have reached positions of power and wealth, whose purpose for existing seems to be to withhold resources from everyone else.

If we want to build things we need capital investment and a reward for risking capital.

3. Private equity has made long term investment a poor mans game.

The following site breaks down the living wage required for families of various sizes, and the wage of various industries.

I compared the living wage for my own family size with the average wage per industry and realized there were only 3 industries I could earn a living wage in, management, computers, or legal. Fortunately I have experience in the computer industry (surprise HN).

Let me spell it out. The following industries provide a below living wage, on average, for a single parent with one child: business & financial operations, architecture & engineering, life, physical, & social science, community & social service, education, training, & library, arts, design, entertainment, sports, & media, healthcare practitioners & technical, healthcare support, protective service, food preparation & serving related, building & grounds cleaning & maintenance, personal care & service, sales & related, office & administrative support, farming, fishing, & forestry, construction & extraction, installation, maintenance, & repair, production, transportation & material moving.

https://livingwage.mit.edu/ example: https://livingwage.mit.edu/states/49

We should go back to having the house filled with 1 representative per 10,000 people. Also, we should do something new and have all the representatives in the house be chosen by lottery.

Normal people are not represented in congress, because politicians are not normal people, but if we chose people by lottery we would have a branch of congress filled with normal people. They would have time enough to study the issues. Some of them would be stupid, but this is no worse than the current crop of politicians.

This is simply incorrect.

To make the tax incidence on wages and capital gains equivalent, you must first deduct losses due to inflation and risk. For wages, inflation and risk round to zero. For long-term capital gains inflation and risk are large and often the majority of the "gain". Short-term capital gains are already taxed like wages.

In the US, unlike some other developed countries, there is a very limited ability to deduct losses due to inflation and risk from long-term capital gains. Consequently, if they made the tax rate the same as wages then the tax incidence on capital gains would be much higher than wages.

As a policy matter in the US, they fix this large difference in tax incidence by reducing the tax rate instead of adjusting the cost basis for inflation and allowing full deductibility of losses.

If you pencil out the implications of these two policies, I suspect you'd find that you like the way the US does it better. Making risk and inflation deductible to equalize tax incidence enables a lot of financial structuring.

I don't normally reply twice to the same thread, but I just wanted to say that I wish that the US had been founded with a co-equal branch of government comprised of people drawn via lottery (probably voluntary) like in ancient Greece:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sortition

I believe that this was one of the great mistakes by our founders. I'm sure that many suggested it, but unfortunately their ideas were suppressed due to our roots in slavery, colonialism and aristocracy (meritocracy today).

Sincere question: Do you have thoughts as to how we can invest our $ if our goal is to support the "good economy" instead of attempting to ride the wave of the rich getting richer?

I would like to be part of the solution instead of contributing to the problem, but it is challenging to identify companies in which to invest without supporting the status quo.

I am not "rich," but wish I could better vote with what assets I do have.

"Long term" is 1 year, right?

What a joke. Everyone can judge for themselves if 1 year is "long term".

Capital gains should be taxed as straight income. We should favor dividends over capital gains, which are harder to game with debt, PE burnouts, etc.

Inflation should be low and we should make it in the interests of the rich that it stays so.

Yes. And that reward should be called "profits" delivered as dividends.

> Wealth inequality is high. High enough you can feel it like a vibe in the air.

I agree, but I think it's more than just a "vibe in the air". Throughout my youth and young adulthood, we (GenXers) knew vaguely about rich people, but nothing specific, just that rich people existed and they had nice stuff. Now, thanks to social media and the decline of humility, the lifestyles of rich people isn't just known, it's pushed in front of our faces constantly. And too often the message is straight from A Bronx Tale: "The working man is a sucker".

Imagine the risk of not being able to diversify your portfolio and putting all dependency on one income source. How do layoffs, broken health/major sickness, automation, local downturns get compensated by reducing future taxes? If I'm laid off for a year, then find a new job, I still pay the full tax amount on my income from that point forward, no 'loss deduction' from a year being unemployed. If I get sick with cancer and miss years of work then return, I still pay the full tax amount on my income.

My issue with "living wage" calculations is that they never compromise. I live in a county with great public transit. The living wage before taxes is listed as 61k for a single adult. Over 9k of that is allocated to transportation costs. Did I mention the great public transit? All of the buses are free.

Internet + mobile is 1500? Well gigabit fiber + mint mobile would run you 1200/year, so where is the extra 300 coming from?

American consumers are unwilling to tighten their belts for long term gains, and it shows. The comment you replied to mentioned r/FIRE - a lot of people on that subreddit don't have insane incomes, they just live well below their means.

This isn't to say it's not hard: it is. We live in a consumerist society and going against that is not easy. Having a low wage job is not easy. But saying the cost of living is as high as the livingwage site says is just not true. Their methodology is to obtain data from expenditure statistics - the problem is the average American is way too into consuming and spends beyond their means.

I think that also assumes that you're able to use that entire 6 figures for yourself. And that you're able to save in these HCOL places that the 6 figures are made. And/or that you're married.

Many of the people that I know in that 6 figure range (the "normal" 100-300ish range) are helping others. Family and the like.

It's also 3-4k for an apartment in many of the HCOL places. That's before food, transportation, and taxes.

And many people are doing it solo, not married.

I'm not saying 6 figure earners are to be pitied. I'm just saying that the money goes out the door just as quickly as it comes in.

its not only capital gains, it is the property and the system of shells and offshores that hides assets

https://x.com/Finance_Nerd_/status/1952063667458978160

https://x.com/Finance_Nerd_/status/1952063659599106545

its not only capital gains, it is the whole system of shells/offshores that splits large wealth into smaller chunks and takes advantage of tax code

https://x.com/Finance_Nerd_/status/1952063659599106545

> maybe divided by those who participate in the stock market and those who don't

In many places there's a divide between home owners and people who rent.

“I would rather be governed by the first 2000 people in the Manhattan phone book than the entire faculty of Harvard.” -- William F. Buckley, Jr.

>> The richest people in the world are telling everyone to get onboard with technology that is determined to make a lot of those same people's jobs redundant.

The richest people I know are trying to convince everyone

1. There is a "worker shortage" in an attempt to bring in immigrant workers whom they can boss around and keep on a leash

2. That "AI is taking jobs" so you cannot point the people who are really taking jobs -- policy makers

3. There is "low unemployment" to perpetuate the myth that the economy is great

4. "Anyone can make it" while their nepo-babies get back-door access to jobs at top firms and claim "they worked hard up the ranks"

> Vanguard is now cannibalizing US real estate rather than making venture capital available to small businesses and startups in its insatiable hunger for profit.

I'm not sure you understand what Vanguard does. They are not an investment bank nor a VC firm. They run mutual funds and ETFs, so the assets that "Vanguard" owns are owned by the fund holders (in fact in the case of Vanguard, the fund holders also own Vanguard itself).

<By statistical certainty, most people cannot be exceptionally smart or talented.

These are words that most won't like to read or reply to, but are none the less true. After working with many people for many years, it became apparent that some of us are "smarter" then others. Through the fluke(?) of genetics/whatever of life, some can only attain a certain job status. A compassionate society and government must take this into consideration. We tend to label some as "lazy" who can't rise in economic status, but in many instances,they are doing the best they can.

I agree, I think this is a longer way to say what I was feeling. It's a rigamarole by people with too much money. If they had less money, they wouldn't be able to do it. So at the end of the day the root cause to me is the inequality. it allows special treatment and the ability to manipulate our daily life (through social apps, news, etc) in a way that they are completely insulated from, feeling no pain whatsoever. Huge policy failure to let so few people have so much influence

I thought about that, but anecdotally i know many renters addicted to Robinhood. i think housing prices and therefore the cash necessary to get a loan have shifted this divide a bit

Your point is undercut by the vastly lower effective tax rates rich Americans pay vs middle class workers. It's the norm in this country for someone making millions of dollars/year to pay a significantly lower tax rate on that income than anyone working a decent paying job.

A horseshoe shaped tax graph by income is clearly against the intent and spirit of a progressive tax code so something is very much broken and has been so for decades.

Consider politicians like Graham Platner. Invest money, or even time, to help people who put working Americans ahead of the oligarchy get elected. If you're in Maine, even better, you can vote with your vote as well.

Importantly, pay attention to primary elections as well general elections.

I guess, but ... people then vote to give those rich folks power.

I don't doubt there are vast differences in opportunity and even rights at this point, but I don't think that's how people see it. Not if they're trying to get more of those folks in power.

This reply is a complete non sequitur. Taxing capital gains as ordinary income does not mean the removal of a "reward for risking capital" because the potential upside is still unlimited compared to working a wage job.

Balderdash! Inflation and risk do not round to zero for wage income - wage income for the most part is NOT indexed to inflation and is certainly NOT guaranteed.

You make some good points.

I guess a "living wage" probably implies living an "normal" American life, which isn't maximally tightening the belt.

Even with good public transportation, driving saves a lot of time. The extra $300 probably comes from a combination of needing to buy a new phone and new computer periodically, hidden taxes and fees, and also it's reasonable to expect a "normal" living wage to include enough to cover at least 2 or 3 of the cheapest options--more than just one single bottom-of-the-barrel option.

Again, you make good points, and I agree some skepticism about their "living wage" numbers are justified. At least they break it down to give a glimpse into some of their logic.

The way we calculate risk is inherently extremely biased towards the wealthy.

In terms of real, relative risk, being a laborer is much more risky than being an investor.

The investor may lose hundreds of millions, but it doesn't matter. The laborer may lose 500 dollars after being fired, and it could kill them.

We've detached risk from real risk. Real risk is - will I eat, will I survive.

You do not owe future taxes on wages based on inflation, capital does. This difference is separately meaningful in both economics and policy. If you do not understand the distinction then you will always be confused by capital tax policy globally, not just in the US.

Whether or not your wages increase with inflation is an unrelated discussion.

I agree with you that it is unfair that people with variable income pay more taxes than people with steady income even if average income is the same. I’m a poster child for people disadvantaged in this way.

That said, I do recognize that mitigating this is really hard without introducing even more complexity to the tax code, which has its own cost.

Wages have no risk when you receive them. It is cash on the barrel. The only risk is counter-party such as your employer going bankrupt before you receive your paycheck. Not zero but statistically very low. Any inflation that happens after receiving wages is on the individual to the extent no one requires them to eat that inflation. (This is an issue during hyperinflation but the is very far from that.)

Ancient Greek politics were chaotic and violent, especially cities like Athens.

>> This isn't based on economic theory or anything, it's just a political choice we have made as a country

Is it? I've heard that low capital gain taxes are better for long-term GDP growth.

> Inflation should be low and we should make it in the interests of the rich that it stays so.

The prevailing opinion of a lot of progressive economists is just the opposite: standard policy for 40 years post-Volcker was to run with low inflation, loose money and slack labor markets, and probably all this did was keep wage growth depressed.

The brief inflationary period in 2022-2023 was fantastic for low-income workers, it was the only serious growth in real wages they'd seen in a half-century. But voters revolted and probably guaranteed we'll go back to the low inflation, high unemployment policy for another generation at least.

Growth in wages is meaningless if inflation consumes it.

My opinion is that inflation is generally a bad idea but the thing that really matters is inflation volatility. The market will adjust for whatever the inflation rate is (unless its extreme) but volatility just results in loss.

That's why I specifically said real wage growth. In 2022-2023 wages for the bottom ~35% of workers increased at their fastest rate after accounting for inflation. Inflation-adjusted wages for the middle ~40% were basically flat and decreased for the upper quartile. And since that last cohort is the one which dictates policy, they'll make sure it won't happen again.

A couple of American politicians were executed in their homes a few months ago and one of the two presidential candidates was nearly JFKd in front of hundreds of cameras last year. A few years ago, a mob stormed the capital and erected a gallows to hang the sitting vice president if they could lay hands on him.

That’s violent enough even if you don’t consider the fact that de facto martial law is about to descend on major cities all over the country in the next few weeks. I’m doubtful that Greeks were anywhere near as volatile or violent as Americans are today.

You shouldn't want a low inflation with such massive pile of debt, both personal and government.

I do want low inflation, as well as a debt jubilee[1] and a system reset to a sustainable economic model not based on usury.

[1] - https://michael-hudson.com/2020/12/jubillee-perspectives-wit...

Do you have another suggestion to address the core problem of how to inventive long term investments?

So you are saying only ultra rich benefit from long term capital gains taxes?

Any data on that?

But your point is undercut by the fact the vast majority of middle class workers do invest and benefit from long term capital gains taxes.

Around 40% of stocks are in retirement accounts.

please refer to the tweets I quoted for receipts

And how exactly does capital owe "future" taxes on gains or dividends based on inflation?

That capital gains is not adjusted for inflation, so if you buy something and it keeps its inflation adjusted value and then you sell it, you have to pay capital gains tax as if that inflation was your profits.

As for risk, if you buy something, then you go bankrupt so you lose it all, the state doesn't pay you the negative capital gains tax from your losses. That is the risk part that workers never have to deal with, there is no such thing as negative salary but negative capital gains happens all the time. You can't cancel out those losses if you didn't make profits elsewhere.

> The way we calculate risk is inherently extremely biased towards the wealthy.

We are talking money here, we tax money so we talk about how money is risked.

We don't tax your health or wellbeing, it is true that those are serious risks worse than monetary risk, but it isn't something the tax office should deal with so it isn't a part of this conversation.

What you're describing are anomalies. Most Presidental candidates are not "nearly JFK'd" nor do mobs storm the Capitol with regularity. For all of its cultural pretensions of being a nation of armed patriots always ready to "water the tree of liberty with the blood of tyrants" the US political system is for the most part incredibly stable and nonviolent. In ancient Greece, meanwhile, violent mobs, assassinations and tyranny were the norm rather than the exception.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stasis_(ancient_Greece)

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thirty_Tyrants

You've also heard that giving billionaires more money would "trickle down" to the rest of us...

The problem is that the "normal" American consumes greatly beyond their means. What I described isn't maximally tightening the belt, it's a very reasonable and satisfying way to live.

I don't have a car, I ride a bike, walk, or take public transit. In no way do I feel restricted in my daily life. I have a 6 year old iPhone that if you amortize would be $100/year (well under that extra 300).

A lot of Americans would consider no car and an old phone to be untenable. How would I get to work? You live closer to work. It's too expensive to live closer to work. Well is it once you get rid of your car(s)? There are genuinely going to be some areas of the country where this is not possible (living in proximity to work where a car is not needed). But those areas typically do not have a "cost of living crisis."

yeah but wages are also taxed on nominal terms, not real terms.

It doesn't seem like this is strictly a contradiction. It could easily be smoke and mirrors if the end result is the same.

Around 50% of the entire market cap of the NASDAQ is owned by the top 1%. Tax it.

What about needing a laptop for the internet? There's $1000, and you need to upgrade every couple years. I spent $2000 to build a desktop myself 10 years ago; it still works well enough, it plays the games I like, but Windows wont support it anymore, it's end of life; there's $200 a year.

Again, "living" implies a little wiggle room and having access to more than just the one cheapest bottom-of-the-barrel option.

What if you lose your phone? You'll have to buy another. Can we include that potential expense in the budget? A "living" wage implies you're not set back for years because you lost one item.

Many of them are not married, and even then the wife works, and they have tons of savings anyway .

The living wage calculation on that website does not constitute your last paragraph. I'd argue that not including a savings/retirement investment portion makes it a much worse number.

As for a computer, your desktop will work fine with Linux. A laptop doesn't need to cost 1000, again we are over consuming. If your hobby requires a computer, that would be from recreational expenses, not required technology spending.

Living has lots of wiggle room, but it starts with understanding what you actually NEED vs what you think you need, then wiggling from there. If you start with inflated base monthly expenses your true requirements become obscured.

I'm privileged. I don't actually know what a healthy retirement savings rate is because I'm certainly well above that in my own savings. But part of why I'm well above that is because I truly cut down on a lot of unneeded spending that I see many of my peers doing.

A living wage should allow recreation. Gaming is one of the cheapest forms of recreation.

You're also claiming average people should know how to install and use Linux, so I don't know if we can reach further agreement.

One person's anomalies is another person's new normal.

Basically, don't invest through investment companies. They'll chase the big profits because that's what they're paid to do. Even "green" or "sustainable" funds might invest in pharmaceutical companies that produce treatments instead of cures, or psuedo-science companies chasing net-energy loss concepts like clean coal or hydrogen, for example.

Instead, invest in specific technologies and goals:

  - Low-cost solar panels and windmills
  - Alternative chip designs like RISC-V and high-multicore (64+ cores)
  - Peer to peer communications systems, alternatives to cellular/5G
  - Robotic/hydroponic automated organic food production
  - Incubated/cloned meat and meat alternatives without side effects like FODMAP
  - mRNA vaccines, CRISPR, treatments for genetic disorders
  - Low-cost EVs, LiFePO4 batteries, high-kW inverters, axial flux motors
  - Heat pumps, thermal energy storage, concentrated trough solar
  - Labor-saving inventions and assistive devices for freight, construction, etc
  - Companies that openly support public education, single-payer healthcare, etc
  - Incubators like Y Combinator but that provide smaller $10,000-$100,000 VC
  - Open source projects/collaborations that distribute risk like Humble Bundle
  - Mass transit like electric busses/high-speed rail (boring but global demand)
  - Strike Debt and other loan forgiveness efforts that buy up loans in default
  - PACs, unions, environmental groups working to unseat incumbants
  - Foreign aid programs aimed at education, especially women and girls
  - Independent investigative journalists and media
  - Local bond efforts for better public schools, libraries, parks, etc
  - Stocks/groups working to legalize cannibis and end the war on drugs
  - Builders of tiny homes and alternative housing like yurts and earthships

Avoid:

  - Crypto (untraceable exploitation, black markets, human trafficking, etc)
  - Mutual funds and index funds (same reason as investment companies)
  - FAANG/GAMMA (high profit, low innovation over market cap)
  - MLMs (often tied to fundamentalist religious organizations and lobbyists)
  - Foreign currencies (profits from exploitation and environmental degradation)

People to emulate (these are merely breadcrumbs towards ways of thinking):

  - MacKenzie Scott
  - Bill McKibben
  - Michael Pollan
  - Derrick Jensen
  - Thom Hartmann
  - Howard Zinn (deceased)
  - Ed Abbey (deceased)
  - John Muir (deceased)
  - Frank Church (deceased)
  - Terence McKenna (deceased)

See also:

  - Capital in the Twenty-First Century by Thomas Piketty
  - The Jungle and other books by Upton Sinclair (deceased)
  - Nickel and Dimed and other books by Barbara Ehrenreich (deceased)

If I ever win the internet lottery, I'll work towards getting matching funds to tackle the biggest problems facing humanity:

1) That starts with liberating all peoples from forced labor, exploitation and subjugation so that they can self-actualize. Which looks like freeing capital from "black holes" of concentrated wealth, specifically moneyed interests and wealthy individuals who hoard resources and choose to do none of what I've stated above, at great expense to the rest of humanity. That's done not through competition or direct confrontation, but by getting everyone "off the grid" to disrupt the supply and demand curve which always results in the wealth inequality and late-stage capitalism we see today when there isn't regulation.

2) Then also improving quality of life universally, so working towards providing free treatments for all conditions/illnesses/injuries across borders.

3) Then also promoting kindess, mindfulness, and other cultural movements which move us away from othering and back towards reconnection to foster the common good. This looks like a rejection of reason for its own sake, and replacing that with the pursuit of meaning. So deciding collectively that using electronic devices in public is impolite, ending surveillance capitalism, tearing down the economic walls which separate us from our neighbors, etc. So that we can once again gather in small communities that provide mutual aid, childcare and tool/resource sharing so that we aren't forced to take on so much individually for our basic survival.

I think it may be possible to recruit AI to do all of this holistically and rapidly shift into the reality that we may have envisioned for the 21st century, a bit like the rapid technological growth we saw during COVID-19, when the first vacation that billions of people ever had resulted in 10-20 years of innovation in just 1-2 years. That's the key, that getting real work done requires escaping the menial labor that extracts profit from the working class.

So that's what I would do: use AI to examine thousands of stocks to find which ones trend similarly and which one correlate inversely, and come up with a plan to start moving profit the opposite direction from where it's moved traditionally. Then invest that cashflow into countless underemployed people whose talents, dignity and divinity haven't been recruited yet effectively because they've only been put to use in the service of capital.

After sleeping on it, I realized that what I wrote is based on my perceptions and projections. Putting one's disposable income towards ego-based goals and expecting a return is no different than what billionaires do. So the most altruistic thing to do instead is to put resources into goals that are determined democratically, without expectation of recognition or reward.

In other words, pay our taxes. Help the poor. Be of service to others. I'm not sure that it's possible to be the change we wish to see in the world and also make a profit.

I know that flies in the face of western culture and philosophy. So I would propose that the cognitive dissonance we experience when we try to integrate the views of people who see everything that's wrong with the world and the views of people who are grateful for what is, stems from imbalance. Sitting with opposing viewpoints makes us uncomfortable because we're confronted with inconvenient truths that implicate us. Then our avoidance of accountability creates the systems of control which trap us in the never-ending cycle of endless work with nothing to show for it.

Some examples of that might be the pageantry of the British royal family that papers over the class war happening under its watch, the performative displays of strength put on by China to curtail clandestine shell games carried out by the US, and even our idolization of celebrities who dine on the backs of the proletariat while the world burns.

The best way to break the spell is to get educated. If you think that Jordan Peterson, Ayn Rand and Milton Friedman make a lot of sense, then try Scott Galloway, Margaret Atwood and John Keynes. Loosely: the former build walls, the latter tear them down.

What I've learned in my own life is that wrestling with tough decisions and making the hard calls creates shadows in our psyche. Our choices form an identity which cements attachments that connect to densities that lower our spiritual vibration. So the wealthiest and most powerful people who have gone to the greatest lengths to achieve their goals are the ones most separated from their souls.

Meaning that if we want to help the less fortunate and reduce suffering, we need to work on healing our leaders. They don't want to be healed though. But maybe they can be reminded.

I had the utmost respect for Elon Musk when he was sleeping in his car to get real work done. But when he used his power and influence to dismantle the federal government through DOGE and cut aid that could result in millions of deaths worldwide ..not so much. When he arguably got the first reusable rocket into orbit with SpaceX, great! When he ignored the concerns of astronomers to fast track Starlink without bothering to give the satellites an anti-reflective coating, boo! It's not him I'm disappointed with, but his choices and lack of empathy when it counted.

The blind pursuit of efficiency creates injustice, and the refusal to rectify it creates intolerance. I think we've lost sight of what evil is because we've tied our identities to an immutable past which doesn't actually exist, because there's only now. I'm reminded of the quick and easy path in Star Wars, and when the Oracle in The Matrix said that we can never see past the choices we don't understand.

If we keep viewing the world through duality, with black and white thinking, good vs bad, us vs them, then we'll merely be custodians cleaning up the mistakes of the uber rich.

I think what I'm trying to say is that if we envision a better world and embody our dreams now, then we'll manifest a new timeline that escapes the will of people who would subjugate us.

What that means as far as where you place your energy is up to you. Imagine that!

We need labor more, and labor investment always involves substantially more risk for that person, than any capital investment ever carries.

I don't understand how inflation and risk wouldn't/aren't priced in. You have $1000. You can: put it in your mattress, put it in 'safe' treasury bonds at inflation +a few percent, or yolo it in NVIDIA. Yes if bonds are returning less than inflation you don't buy them and that makes financing more expensive but it's not somehow unfair vs the other things you could do with capital.

Seems like return is roughly proportional to risk(1-tax)investment so changing tax should affect everything proportionally (barring cheating/avoiding the system in some way).

Seems like it'd be relatively easy to allow one to 'smooth' their income over multiple years. Imagine paying 100 income at 40% tax year 1 and 0 income year 2. A scheme where you could retcon things to be 50, 50, each at say 30% for a 10k refund (or at least credit) seems very doable.

also tax their other assets...

The point wasn't to suggest doing that.

It was to point out, that giving asset sales an insurance break, or risk break, would only makes sense if we gave working people gapped-income and risk breaks.

Which is to say, that neither makes sense.

The way I would put it is, money inflates if you simply hold it, but it has time value almost always greater than inflation. If you don't at least do that, you are choosing to waste value.

So giving a tax break for inflation would be giving people a break on losses, that capitalism already accounts for. Such as naturally higher interest rates when inflation is higher.

(Yes return on asset balancing mechanisms are not perfect in time, but as noted, neither is employment.)