The big argument against raising taxes on the rich is that the fewer taxes the rich pay, the more incentive they’ll have to work hard and create jobs, but if we tax the rich heavily, then they won’t be motivated to grow their businesses. This theory ignores a fundamental truth about capitalist economies: You become a millionaire by working hard, but there isn’t enough time, energy or opportunity in one person’s life to become a billionaire through hard work. The only way is by underpaying your workers and overcharging for your products or owning stock in companies that underpay their workers and overcharge their customers. So the only way to become a billionaire is to steal. The way you do that may be legal, but it’s still stealing.

One way to fix the economy is to put a 100% tax on individual’s income over $1billion. No human being needs more than $1billion, and if you made it impossible to make more than $1billion then you will eliminate the incentive for anyone to try. This won’t stop people from working harder. It will just stop people from exploiting their workers and their customers or cutting jobs to maximize profit.

Plus, you could use those billions of tax dollars you’ve liberated from the greedy to stimulate the economy by creating new businesses. If you want to create jobs and stimulate the economy… then create jobs. The government could sell on of every product. If the government used the money it requisitioned from the rich to start businesses, it could regulate those businesses and make sure its employees got paid a fair percentage of the profit their work generates. The government could guarantee its workers are treated with more dignity than McDonald’s. Plus, it could guarantee the quality and safety of its products, which this would stimulate competition with the rest of the private companies.

Best of all, if the government sold one of every product, then the extra profit those businesses generate could go directly to paying for public programs instead of paying for a CEO’s new yacht. If the government made enough money off the goods and products it sold, we could eliminate the need for many of the taxes and fees we pay. If nothing else, we could subsidize healthcare, give our teachers raises, or invest in free education.

If you believe America is a welfare state, then instead of giving money away to the poor, clear out every other floor of the projects and replace those apartments with offices and pay for it with the money the government takes back from the ultra-wealthy. Give everyone in the projects jobs right there. That will eliminate the excuse of not being able to find a job as well as the need for the poor to buy cars and gas to travel across town to demeaning jobs that pay demeaning wages.

Americans are raised on the idea that working like a slave without complaining and hoarding money are hallmarks of virtue, but some people don’t want to work like slaves nor do they want a lot of money. If the government opened businesses that didn’t set Asian sweatshop work quotas and paid their workers good wages with lifetime job security, a lot of individuals who would have otherwise turned to a life of crime to support their unambitious lifestyle would gravitate to part-time jobs where they would be happy and not bother anyone.

Billionaires could just pay and treat their workers humanely, but they’re not going to. Poverty and crime aren’t their problems. If they won’t treat workers with respect and foresight, then the government needs to step in and do it.

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