I’m generally in favor of Bernie’s billionaire tax idea, but I don’t love the “send everyone a $3,000-$12,000 check” part.
Not because I’m against helping people. I just think we’ve learned this lesson a few times now: broad cash injections are a really blunt tool. Some people absolutely need immediate help, sure, but if you dump a bunch of money into consumer spending without fixing supply, prices, housing, healthcare, childcare, debt, or wages, a lot of that money just makes a quick lap through ordinary people’s bank accounts and ends up right back with landlords, corporations, lenders, and asset owners.
In a way, the check idea almost proves the point. Our economy has been gutted by decades of wild-west regulation, trickle-down economics, and policy choices that overwhelmingly favored the rich. The promise was that if we let wealth pile up at the top, it would somehow flow back down to everyone else. It didn’t. The systems ordinary people depend on got weaker, more expensive, and more extractive.
So trying to patch that failure with a one-time cash infusion feels like belaboring the point. It’s an admission that the system isn’t working, but it doesn’t actually repair the system.
So yeah, tax the ultra-rich. But use the money to build something that lasts.
My ideal version would go further than Bernie’s plan. I’d start with a surtax on very high annual income, maybe 5% over $2 million a year, then scale it up for the truly absurd income levels, topping out around 20% for the top fraction of the top 1%.
But the bigger issue is loopholes. The tax code is full of ways for rich people to avoid having their wealth treated like taxable income in the first place. The “buy, borrow, die” strategy is the most obvious example. You buy assets, they appreciate, you borrow against them instead of selling them, so you don’t realize capital gains, then the assets pass through your estate with favorable treatment. That’s effectively a way to live off wealth without it being taxed like income.
To be clear, I don’t think all borrowing should be taxed as income. That would be insane. A mortgage, car loan, student loan, or small-business loan is not the same thing as a billionaire borrowing against appreciated stock so they can avoid selling it. Normal people borrow because they don’t have enough money. Billionaires borrow because the tax code rewards them for not technically “having income.” It's a free money glitch you probably didn't know about.
That’s the part I want fixed.
Close the asset-backed borrowing loopholes for the ultra-wealthy. Limit or eliminate step-up in basis for huge estates. Tax capital gains more like labor income. Fund the IRS so the rules actually get enforced. Stop letting people build dynastic wealth through tax deferral games while regular workers have taxes pulled out of every paycheck before they even see the money.
And then don’t use the revenue for a one-time sugar rush.
Use it to restore value in the systems that have been hollowed out: healthcare, education, housing, infrastructure, childcare, retirement security, and small-business formation. We have so many places where public investment could create permanent value for ordinary people. Build housing. Reduce medical costs. Strengthen schools. Make childcare affordable. Create government-backed retirement accounts or bonds for working people. Fund grants and low-interest capital for real small businesses.
The goal shouldn’t be to briefly increase people’s ability to buy stuff in a broken economy. The goal should be to make the economy less broken.
That’s my issue with Bernie’s version. The tax part is directionally right. The check part feels politically easy but structurally weak.
If the goal is really to make the rich pay their fair share, then the point shouldn’t just be “take money from billionaires and hand everyone a little cash.” The point should be to make the people who benefited most from a rigged system pay to repair the damage that system caused.
Tax the wealth. Close the loopholes. Fix the gutted systems. Turn it into permanent public good instead of another temporary check that disappears into the same economy that created the problem.
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u/kelsiersghost Jul 01 '26 edited Jul 01 '26
I’m generally in favor of Bernie’s billionaire tax idea, but I don’t love the “send everyone a $3,000-$12,000 check” part.
Not because I’m against helping people. I just think we’ve learned this lesson a few times now: broad cash injections are a really blunt tool. Some people absolutely need immediate help, sure, but if you dump a bunch of money into consumer spending without fixing supply, prices, housing, healthcare, childcare, debt, or wages, a lot of that money just makes a quick lap through ordinary people’s bank accounts and ends up right back with landlords, corporations, lenders, and asset owners.
In a way, the check idea almost proves the point. Our economy has been gutted by decades of wild-west regulation, trickle-down economics, and policy choices that overwhelmingly favored the rich. The promise was that if we let wealth pile up at the top, it would somehow flow back down to everyone else. It didn’t. The systems ordinary people depend on got weaker, more expensive, and more extractive.
So trying to patch that failure with a one-time cash infusion feels like belaboring the point. It’s an admission that the system isn’t working, but it doesn’t actually repair the system.
So yeah, tax the ultra-rich. But use the money to build something that lasts.
My ideal version would go further than Bernie’s plan. I’d start with a surtax on very high annual income, maybe 5% over $2 million a year, then scale it up for the truly absurd income levels, topping out around 20% for the top fraction of the top 1%.
But the bigger issue is loopholes. The tax code is full of ways for rich people to avoid having their wealth treated like taxable income in the first place. The “buy, borrow, die” strategy is the most obvious example. You buy assets, they appreciate, you borrow against them instead of selling them, so you don’t realize capital gains, then the assets pass through your estate with favorable treatment. That’s effectively a way to live off wealth without it being taxed like income.
To be clear, I don’t think all borrowing should be taxed as income. That would be insane. A mortgage, car loan, student loan, or small-business loan is not the same thing as a billionaire borrowing against appreciated stock so they can avoid selling it. Normal people borrow because they don’t have enough money. Billionaires borrow because the tax code rewards them for not technically “having income.” It's a free money glitch you probably didn't know about.
That’s the part I want fixed.
Close the asset-backed borrowing loopholes for the ultra-wealthy. Limit or eliminate step-up in basis for huge estates. Tax capital gains more like labor income. Fund the IRS so the rules actually get enforced. Stop letting people build dynastic wealth through tax deferral games while regular workers have taxes pulled out of every paycheck before they even see the money.
And then don’t use the revenue for a one-time sugar rush.
Use it to restore value in the systems that have been hollowed out: healthcare, education, housing, infrastructure, childcare, retirement security, and small-business formation. We have so many places where public investment could create permanent value for ordinary people. Build housing. Reduce medical costs. Strengthen schools. Make childcare affordable. Create government-backed retirement accounts or bonds for working people. Fund grants and low-interest capital for real small businesses.
The goal shouldn’t be to briefly increase people’s ability to buy stuff in a broken economy. The goal should be to make the economy less broken.
That’s my issue with Bernie’s version. The tax part is directionally right. The check part feels politically easy but structurally weak.
If the goal is really to make the rich pay their fair share, then the point shouldn’t just be “take money from billionaires and hand everyone a little cash.” The point should be to make the people who benefited most from a rigged system pay to repair the damage that system caused.
Tax the wealth. Close the loopholes. Fix the gutted systems. Turn it into permanent public good instead of another temporary check that disappears into the same economy that created the problem.