OPINION:
The federal government is a mighty maw whose revenues rarely equal expenses. Thus, Democratic presidential contenders Sen. Bernie Sanders, a democratic socialist, and Sen. Elizabeth Warren, a confiscatory capitalist (as if there were a real difference between the two), plan to feed the maw with a new source of government revenue — a wealth tax. This has never before been assessed in our fair land, and it is possibly unconstitutional, but nevermind — because the urgency is apparently such that the uber wealthy ought to suck it up and take one for the team every year. These proposals earn shouted hosannahs, standing ovations and rhythmic applause everywhere that economically illiterate citizens gather, the unfortunate European experience with such a tax notwithstanding.
My highly degreed, white-collar, progressive friends are more envious than insightful when claiming that targets of this tax deserve to be knee-capped because they all cheat on their taxes anyway (even though loopholes are written into the tax code on a bipartisan basis and are not illegal). When envy obscures economic judgment and serves as fodder for confiscation of already taxed wealth in a highly progressive income tax system, sound sense has gone the way of the dodo bird.
PAUL BLOUSTEIN
Cincinnati
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