• zbyte64@awful.systems
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      16 hours ago

      We don’t don’t need princes or kings doing PR. If we taxed billionaires out of existence we could fund that and so much more. This guy doesn’t get to make up for whatever he was doing on Epstein’s plane, at least not without coming clean first.

      • finitebanjo@lemmy.world
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        36 minutes ago

        I think you can simultaneously be pro-tax and acknowledge Bill Gates is a good person in a sea of villains.

        • finitebanjo@lemmy.world
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          34 minutes ago

          It was on the Kamala Harris campaign website that she supported an unrealized gains tax for amounts over $1 Million USD.

          Conservatives were freaking out that it might “destroy the economy which relies on foreign investors to prop up the value of USD” lmao.

          • Aux@feddit.uk
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            32 minutes ago

            Everyone should freak out, because it’s an utter lunacy.

            • finitebanjo@lemmy.world
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              20 minutes ago

              Compared to the Republican Shitshow destroying the economy anyways and the infinitely stacking Billionnaire wealth hack it sounds like a dream come true.

              The Chinese would figure out a way to get their stock market fix, the USA ended up loaning their gains from the transactions to struggling countries anyways so China divesting in the USA would just cut out the middleman.

          • Aux@feddit.uk
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            32 minutes ago

            I have no clue who are “we” in your case, but we don’t tax property.

      • Viper_NZ@lemmy.nz
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        13 hours ago

        We could do so much more, but would we? USAID was just shuttered. There’s every chance that money would go into the military industrial complex or something equally unpleasant.

        Not defending billionaires as a concept (they shouldn’t exist, and most aren’t as philanthropic as Bill), but I will acknowledge he’s doing a lot of good with his money.

        • 13igTyme@lemmy.world
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          8 hours ago

          If we had been taxing billionaires for the last 50 years, the education system wouldn’t be where it is now and USAID would have never been under threat. In fact USAID would have probably never had to operate within the US.

          • zbyte64@awful.systems
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            2 hours ago

            It’s also worth mentioning Gates has made our public education system worse by introducing us to the voucher system. Billionaires are part of why we don’t spend our tax dollars on things like universal healthcare or free college.

      • Auli@lemmy.ca
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        15 hours ago

        So if we tax them on wealth they doesn’t exist. Do we tax regular folk on the cost of their houses also? I mean they are worth billions but not till they sell.

        • Don_alForno@feddit.org
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          7 hours ago

          If your wealth is enough to serve as security for a credit line that you use to fund your daily spending, it’s enough to be taxed.

    • Don_alForno@feddit.org
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      7 hours ago

      If he had done that, he wouldn’t be as wealthy as he is today. Billionaires being billionaires is a big part of the problem, and the only way to remedy that is for them to not be billionaires anymore.