Twelve European countries experimented with wealth taxes which is one more “plan” Democrat Elizabeth Warren is peddling. Nine countries have abandoned the idea because it didn’t raise the money promised and it was a costly nightmare to administer, plain and simple.
In this country class warfare is nothing new. Soaking the rich can be a popular chant especially if it’s tied to a bunch of free stuff. Since many do not think it will raise their taxes, they could support it and the candidate pushing it.
But, of course, the Democrats never attack celebs or athletes who get these incredible salaries, not the thousands of low paid workers who depend on athletes or celebs in stadiums and theaters. Instead you hear about the workers in industries or corporations who don’t make high salaries while the CEO does. That’s the favorite narrative they hope sells the wealth tax to voters.
So why did nine countries drop it and three haven’t? It doesn’t do what the socialists say it will. Look at the three countries that still have it. Switzerland, a world banking center, is a small nation that has no debt and a huge surplus unlike most of Europe or the US. Norway is next. Their citizens are taxed at a rate of 45 percent of GDP-almost four times Hong Kong and nearly twice the US. And since the big socialist takeover in 2005 the poverty rate has increased. Also the immigrant poverty rate has grown by 36 percent. So it’s questionable how much longer Norway can endure it.
Spain is the third country with a wealth tax. One of the four worst debtor nations of the early 2000s. A nation that suffered under hard recession and high unemployment, Spain recently borrowed nearly a half billion dollars from the International Monetary Fund to prop up its recovery. It is hardly the example for anyone to copy.
Yet these are the examples of socialist panacea that only succeeds in the minds of a bunch of college professors, Bernie and AOC. Enter Elizabeth Warren, former conservative Republican. She hopes to convince enough people on the low end of the financial scale to vote her into office so she undo what the Democrats have sold as unjust capitalism.
Now with almost weekly promises of new free stuff she wants to convince voters she can pay for it all by soaking the rich to the sad tune of $54 trillion dollars. But as front runner she will be under much more scrutiny like the skit on SNL talking about spending trillions of tax dollars for her Mediocre-for-all healthcare scheme. They featured the line “when the numbers are this big, they’re only pretend!”
And that pretty much sums up everything about Warren. Cue the music by Conway Twitty, “It’s only make believe.”
Ralph Miller