Comments by "Andrew Sainsbury" (@andyinsuffolk) on "We don’t need a wealth tax, yet" video.

Companies are concentrations of resources designed to make stuff, wealth, employ people etc. The idea that we tax them separately when we could just collect the same (or more?) when the wealth reaches real voting human beings is lunacy -- why do we want complexity just for the sake of it? Corporate & business taxation is about politics not equality, fairness or common sense - imagine how vast the economy would be now with no business taxes.
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@downshift4503 - Why should your neighbour subsidise/encourage your risk taking? At a basic level we tax on wealth acrual. If we have different rates for different risks or behaviours then we need a million different rates to treat all fairly. Where is the evidence that different CGT/Income rates is beneficial to the community? This is just custom & habit and breaks the 'first law of democracy' - equality of treatment before the state.
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Yes -- simplified taxation; broad, simple and low. The same rate for any sum earned regardless of source; it is immoral that the tax-payer who gains wealth by selling his labour pays a higher rate than the tax-payer who trades in assets. BUT -- in a supposed liberal democracy the idea that the state has unlimited redistributative authority is ludicrous. Nobody in the UK has authorised centralised ideology in the UK because they haven't been asked - because we don't have a constitution constraining our politicians - because Democracy has been standing still for a century. Big-State thinkers deciding what freedom they will allow others is just continuing authoritarian dystopia. In real democracies people don't spend time obsessing about relative wealth mainly because so much more is created -- see the Scandis or Switzerland who have only marginally more freedom.
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@downshift4503 - Too many points to answer there.. but you are making the (very narrow) special interest argument. If employed tax-payer gets to keep as much of his income as the asset trader he will probably more quickly become an investor himself especially as the tax implication is the same! That might even represent greater investment capacity overall - or better risk taking - or ... You also demonstrate the problem of artificial thresholds how do we know that the numerical differential between CGT/IT is good, bad or indifferent? NO thresholds is the 'natural' basis.
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@downshift4503 - The entire financial/currency sector is corrupt. Risk taking should be a function of free markets not central policy or to encourage special interest - We have a Soviet Centralised Economy and investment is generations behind because of it. Taxation by Opinion is not a solution to anything - we are supposed to be equal.
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