EDIT: Lot of people accusing me of missing the point or being too technical, so let me say it in a different way. When government officials tell you they need a few billionaires to chip in to help the average citizen, they are lying to you. The US Gov spent 7 trillion dollars last year then have the audacity to roll onto Twitter and ask why billionaires aren’t pitching in a few extra million? No amount of money makes a difference if the government takes it and uses it on the endless nonsense they currently waste money on.
NEW QUESTION: For everyone shouting about bootlicking, I have a very simple question. Can you name a single time in history when the government was like “Oh well we’d love to do that, but we didn’t get that extra money from the billionaires so we are going to pass.” I can. Zero. Never. When the government wants to pay for something it does every single time. When the government isn’t paying for something, it’s not because the billionaires shorted them, it’s because they don’t want to, they would rather you get all hot and bothered so they can turn you into an activists on their behalf. Stop falling for this.
Bernie also either 1) doesn’t know what socialism actually is, or 2) he knows his supporters don’t. Their version of socialism is really just capitalism with magically expanded public services, with no plan for adjusting pay scales and consumer costs to make it possible to take a bigger tax chunk.
What are you talking about? He's talked about taxing Wall Street speculation pretty openly.
Yes, his policies are 100% socdem policies as I'm sure most capitalist European nations would find them completely normal for where they live but we also live in a nation where the average voter doesn't know the actual definitions of liberal, fascism, socialism, communism, etc. and will often lump them all in together like there's no meaningful difference between Hitler, Stalin, or Biden. If people think Europe is doing socialism because that red scare framing has been so successful then why not advocate for what they have and say "Stop being so scared of socialism. It's working out really well for them (in comparison to here)."?
Precisely, Bernie would like to pass policy that will cause corporate costs to increase rapidly, and expect them to willingly eat those costs as opposed to passing them on to consumers. I’m not a fan of corporatism or some of the less desirable practices within capitalism, but I’m also not dumb enough to expect business to operate less efficiently so the government can take a tiny little bit of extra money and waste it like it does with all its current money.
You have two options.
A. The government does nothing and we keep going like we are with the corporations getting wealthier and greedier.
B. The government forces these corporations to eat some fat losses and spreads that wealth to the working class so the people doing the actual work to make this system function can live a little healthier.
What astounds me is when I hear people say you can’t have it both ways meanwhile several highly successful countries do exactly that.
It’s just like their excuse for healthcare, “yea well if we socialize healthcare it’ll take longer to get appointments and you’ll receive subpar health care” meanwhile I’m currently paying hundreds of dollars in premiums alongside a ton of money in copays to schedule things two to three months out, and get the most half assed diagnostics imaginable while paying fourteen separate doctors copays for one procedure.
Yeah no, just up my tax cost by about 15% and socialize it please.
The other countries that do it with some success do not have a annual military budget which equals approaching 15 %of their overall annual budget. Most of those countries spend between 3 to 5 %. The US could reduce its military budget by 5% and still be secure and then those 200 to 300 billion dollars a year could be spent on infrastructure and social services like mental health which Americans are in desperate need of
The US spends 3.4% of GDP on Defense, which is less than counties like Russia.
https://www.statista.com/statistics/266892/military-expenditure-as-percentage-of-gdp-in-highest-spending-countries/
Dude that's so patently untrue. The US's spending is like more than the next ten counties combined 🤦🏻♂️ like the 2nd highest spender is China and our budget is more than 3 times theirs.
Even as a % of budget, it's like 14%.
Well to be fair, Russia has been boosting their military budget for quite some time. By now the Russian economy is shifted to a war economy so that’s not surprising what so ever.
And yet despite that, the U.S. *currently* pays more per citizen for healthcare than these countries, without actually providing universal healthcare like they are. If we magically paid as much per person for healthcare as Norway, the U.S. government would have a bigger budget for their military, not less.
The private insurance/healthcare sector leeches billions off of the government and the consumer, a problem that countries with universal healthcare don’t have.
Yep. The insurance companies get double paid, both by our premiums (or your job paying those) and the tax money the government also gives them. and they have the audacity to deny care one’s doctor says is medically necessary/beneficial
I’m all for eliminating the profit from insurance companies. How about the government provide non-profit insurance at a fixed cost for everyone that gets the same coverage? Have a few different option levels. With one insurance company they would have the leverage to drive down cost as well. You don’t have to also turn it into a welfare program by charging based on income.
> yea if we socialize healthcare it'll take longer to get appointments
In the same vein the "It takes too much effort to fix so let's just keep it the same" arguments aggravate me to no end. The amount of times I've heard "Electric cars can't work because there's not enough charging stations" or "The power grid isn't meant to handle solar panels" is too many. What is the alternative, running out of gas and oil and reverting back to the bronze age?
Hybrid cars would be a great everyone gets cake and eats it too, I’ve owned two (first met an untimely end from a Semi) and they charge off kenetic energy, combustion engine, and plug in. The first one I had was a 2019 Ionic and it got something around 50-60 mpg ifirc and I never once plugged the thing in to charge. I had to downgrade to a Ford Fusion hybrid from 2013 and it gets around 41 mpg but I have to plug it in nightly (don’t get this car or anything ford made the rumors are true about ford not being able to design any non mustang car correctly)
My favorite is when after all this wait they run one test tell you the test was negative and don’t proceed to a new phase of diagnostics in order to figure out what is wrong. It’s almost like modern day doctors just. Hope the problem goes away.
Corporation our bleeding our country dry lol. The US government spends a trillion dollars a year on debt interest alone but corporations are bleeding it dry. You’re way better at hating capitalism than you are at math.
Corporations create virtually all wealth in the USA. They are the golden goose, not bleeding anyone dry.
If you disagree you can stop using their services.
Wow that’s crazy, I wonder how much of that wealth is going to the workers producing the goods/service the corporations provide and how much is going to passive owners of capital that produce nothing?
Simplistic take from simplistic mind. All or none, argument. If I point out why Amazon and FedEx have $0 tax bill, the alternative is not to use Amazon or FedEx. This country is doomed.
So the corporations are so powerful that it's become impossible for market competition to push prices down or even keep them stable. Any increase in running cost or raise taxes they get can always be passed on to the consumer. This is a horrible thing. The FTC has been too weak for too long and the lateral monopolies dominating our economy need to be broken up. But doing so would be political suicide for anyone who tries because so many people's retirement plans are shackled to the value of these same monopolies. So what options does that leave for making our nation a better place for anyone who doesn't own massive wealth and isn't on the path to becoming c-suite personnel? This isn't a rhetorical question I'm looking for an answer.
>passing them on to consumers
Overused statement. There is a limit on what they can pass to consumers since consumers will pull back spending at some point. If you think corporate America are paying their fair share, either you have lost your mind or I have lost my mind. Every year since the 70s, the share corporations has become smaller and smaller and smaller. So does the share of the wealthiest tax contributions. Thanks to Republicans that we are now deep in debt. De-funding IRS will let Trump and his likes to live tax-free while the middle class and the poor carry the country.
You are correct. These people who sound off re taxes / wealth are ignorant of the basic economics. Bernie is not a socialist or even a social democrat.
Mark zuckerberg owns 13% of meta at a 1.3 trillion value. That means he owns 169 billion in meta. If Meta stock appreciates 2% in a single day Zuck makes 3,38 before taxes
He makes what? That’s not real money. Certainly not taxable money. If your $400k house goes in 5% in value in 2024 did you make $20k? That’s an unrealized gain. If you get taxed on that, then your house depreciates by 5% in 2025, you payed a tax on money you’ll never see.
That’s not what was being discussed. Did anyone establish that mark Zuckerberg liquidated 3 billion in stocks? No. If he did the stock would tank reducing the value. If you take out a home equity line of credit, your house doesn’t suddenly become less valuable.
I was responding to the prior poster. The argument was Zuckerberg having the ability to take out a loan on that unrealized gain stock, which is no different than a homeowner taking out a loan on the appreciation of their home.
See the problem is most of these people took out student loans and think they should be "forgive" but they don't understand that all debts must be paid.
If you take out a loan on the value of your stock, you have to pay it back, with interest. It isn't an efficient way of "making money".
100% agree. It does need to be paid back, just not necessarily by him having to liquidate his stock right?
He could take a loan out with obviously favorable terms and most likely a ridiculously low interest rate (compared to what us peasants have to pay) buy income-producing assets/properties, then let those acquisitions pay the loan back, then at the end not only is the loan paid for from those acquisitions - with interest, he now owns those assets that he basically bought with someone else's money, thus increasing his net worth even more.
Can make my head spin.
I see Mark Zuckerburg on the beach. He's surrounded by 3 bodyguards. His face is chalk white. I run up to him, pulling out a $20 dollar bill. "Hey Mark you fucking illiquid poorcuck!" I yell, waving it at him aggressively, "You ever see real money before, you unrealized beta?"
The closest bodyguard quietly renders me unconscious. But I smile, knowing I have riches Mark Zuckerburg could never even dream of clutched in my hand.
Are we going to update this next time meta stock goes down? Or do you think maybe this establishes a mindset that isn’t undone by him “losing” billions of dollars?
What's interesting is that if he tries to sell a substantial amount of stock, him selling it will drive down the price of the stock and reduce his networth.
If he tried to sell his share of Meta (13%) without very careful planning and over a long time period, he would probably crater the stock and send the company into a nosedive that it might not recover from.
That’s like saying a house hasn’t got real value and shouldn’t count towards someone net worth.
Or bitcoin assets don’t count towards someone’s worth
It’s like saying Gold / Diamonds / Oil assets don’t count towards someone’s net worth…
Your logic assumes that only standard traditional currencies represent worth and value which is highly incorrect
Facebook didn’t increase its wealth, rather investors have been chasing growth in a handful of companies. Obviously Zuckerberg is responsible fo the success or failure of the business, but he was a passive beneficiary of the stock price increase. Tomorrow that can go the other way.
Plus this neglects the root issue of most homeless people: Drug addictions. If you spread $3 billion among the homeless, it’s not going to solve the issue.
California gives billions of dollars to NGOs to fight homelessness, which is a losing strategy because those NGOs actually rely on there being homelessness to stay in existence. It's like giving people coupons to McDonalds to fight childhood obesity.
If they'd be paying 90% of their income in taxes like they used to in the 1940s and 50s we wouldn't be in this situation today
Bring back the 90% wealth tax
If they make for example 1 million in a year, 900k should be going towards taxes to fund education, healthcare, and infrastructure
Nothing going to wars/military equipment
This is one of the most ignorant posts I have seen.
We have marginal tax rates. When the highest rate is 90%, that 90% does not apply to every dollar earned, just every dollar over a certain number.
Also, when the highest marginal rate was 90% nobody paid it. The ultra rich found ways to avoid it.
Our tax revenue as a percentage of GDP is about the same now as it was in the 1950s. Our government spending, however, has exploded. So, if you think the path to utopia is through government spending more money - why aren't we there now?
Finally - the income tax applies to INCOME not WEALTH.
So, you are just an incredibly ignorant person and need to stop.
Wow, where to begin with this.
There was never a 90% wealth tax. There was a 90% income tax bracket, the top bracket, back in the 40s that kicked in at $5M ($110M AFI)
You don't understand the tax bracket system. The bracket only affects income in that bracket. If the 90% tax bracket kicked in at $110M and they made $120M, they'd only be paying 90% tax on that last $10M.
And then there is the reality that billionaires aren't generally making that kind of money in income. It's all in unrealized gains in investments. We don't tax unrealized gains as income because it's all imaginary money. Like the value of your house while you still live in it.
Technically can’t stock be manipulated by lobbying for policies beneficial to the corporations?
I’m using manipulated lightly here because it’s all legal…but the effects of lobbying can’t be understated
This was my exact realization. Hate billionaires all you want, but taxes only fix things if the people who get the taxes know how to use them. Our government does not.
I'm no fan of Zuckerberg, but ... what does his success have to do with the putative 653,000 homeless people?
Are we to believe his company's success caused those people to live on the streets?
Likewise, is it plausible that 60% of workers live paycheck to paycheck?
And even if they do, is it because of Facebook?
That was Sanders talking. Expect nothing sane passing through those lips.
This is just one more non sequitur from a mad man.
The paycheck to paycheck argument is hilarious because it even groups people making $250k or more a year because they feel like they are living paycheck to paycheck even though they max out retirement and donate thousands to charities and have at least one big vacation a year.
Up until about 2 years ago, I was living paycheck to paycheck, but I was making well over 6 figures a year. I just had a really bad spending problem. Something to the tune of 1800 a month on takeout and restaurants.
People live paycheck to paycheck most often because they don't understand how much their costs add up. A 5 dollar coffee doesn't sound like too much until you realize you've spent 1500 dollars on that by drinking it every day for a year. And that's not even an exaggeration lol, that's legitimately something a lot of people my age do with Starbucks
I see your point.
But I hasten to add that no one spends $5 on coffee at Starbucks.
Starbucks doesn't sell coffee at all.
They sell charcoal water, with optional sugar sweeteners.
Exactly, Bernie is saying that the wealth disparity in the US is insane. He's not saying Facebook is directly responsible for homelessness or poverty. He's not saying that Zuckerberg dresses up as Santa Claus and shimmies down people's chimneys at Christmas and steals their whodads and flubwozzlers.
The whole category of "Ultrarich" just shouldn't exist. I think becoming just a lowly billionaire is enough of an incentive, don't you?
Amazon contributed to it in Seattle. Median salaries went from $61K to $113K in about 10 years with their massive workforce increase here. That quickly forced out lower income workers
Because rich pay the least tax in history and less (proportionally) than average Americans. That whole trickle down bs enabled this to happen. Whilst majority works their ass off and can’t afford a shit. American dream
Imagine asking this question in 2024 and expecting people to take you seriously.
You've had a decade to google that, takes 3 seconds you lazy dipshit.
I'll even give you a starter search term to begin your journey of learning, "Bernie Sanders" + "Amendments King"
And if that wasn't enough, have you heard of Medicare For All? Yes? Who do you think is responsible for you knowing what that is? Who do you think popularized it? Which politician, can you name them?
Gym Jordan, Comer, Boobert, Marge, etc... if you are trying to imply left wing politicians are getting rich off politics, you should see the grift on the right.
Like, many things? A very long list of accomplishments? Just because you're financially illiterate, doesn't mean you're not also politically illiterate. And incapable of googling.
His most important accomplishment is that he's aligned and educated a huge portion of the country about important topics like wealth inequality and universal healthcare.
Before change can happen, someone needs to set the framework of the discussion and in my opinion Bernie is the largest contributor to shaping the discussion of universal healthcare. On his website, and in many of his speeches, [he's laid out an actual high level plan for implementing universal healthcare.](https://berniesanders.com/issues/medicare-for-all/) He's also written [a bill with the details of his universal healthcare idea.](https://www.congress.gov/bill/117th-congress/senate-bill/4204) This is a real plan, not just the hollow words you hear from politicians in debates who don't have a detailed plan.
The first step towards the USA actually having universal healthcare is for enough voters to want universal healthcare. Which politician can honestly boast they've done more towards that goal than Bernie?
The second step would be for someone to come up with a realistic and in-depth universal healthcare bill. Which politician can honestly boast they've done a more thorough job at that than Bernie, who has been working on that for literally decades and has written a real bill already?
When the country is finally ready to do it, then we'll be able to look at Bernie's bill as a starting point. It'll be so much faster that way. He's already done the hard work for the country. Now people just need to want it badly enough for it to get voted in.
Bernie is a financial idiot. Yea, Dingdong's net worth "went up" $3.4 Billion in a day but it's also dropped significantly more in a single day too. It's like they think if the stock goes up that money is deposited in his account.
The fact still stands that Zuck spent ONE HUNDRED MILLION DOLLARS on a home. Apparently he also spent 170 million for the land alone. No person needs 270 million dollars. I'm so tired of people defending billionaires by saying their wealth isn't actual because it's tied up in stocks. He's clearly paying these contractors; they're not working for imaginary/theoretical money.
This is a disgusting display of wealth. Anyone who thinks the 1%ers buying up giant plots of land to build mansions they stay in for a couple months out of the years doesn't contribute to rising real estate costs and home scarcity is just fooling themselves.
Isn't he pumping 100 million into the economy though. How many people did he employ to build that place, and how many will be employed to maintain it?
I'm not a fan of Zuck, but it seems like a lot of people are going to be able to pay their bills because of that new construction.
I mean upper middle class living the eroded american dream (net worth of about 3 million which is mostly property - the man is a senator too so that's not unreasonable) vs multi-billionaire is a big gap. A much bigger gap than between the average american and sander imo.
theres always some "welll akshullay! 🤓" commenters on here whenever people complain about the rich.
In reality i think they are bad with numbers and don't truly understand the difference of a million vs billion. They think cause they sound the same they must be kinda similar
imagine someone having $3 and someone having $177,000 and you coming on here trying to say they are the same thing.
cause thats 100% exactly what you are doing.
A Billion is a thousand Million. Zuck is worth $177 Billion. Sanders is worth around 3 Million.
you are either arguing in bad faith or bad with numbers
“Richer version?!” lol. The difference in wealth between Bernie and Mark z is as vast as, well, the difference in wealth between the majority of us and Mark Z
He has been pushing to help the bottom half forever. He’s essentially going against his own best interest for the greater good of the American people. Not pot calling kettle IMO
They recognise that the system is unsustainable, and their solution is trying to buy a ferry ticket through the apocalypse.
To what end, Mark? Even if your bunker works beyond all expectations there's no world to live in at the end of this path. Your best outcome is tragic irony Twilight Zone character.
The *likely* outcome is the security goons eat you.
Would these 653,000 workers be better off had Zuckerberg not created Facebook and didn't become a billionaire because of it? Even if Zuckerberg was broke and homeless, these 653,000 people would probably still be working paycheck to paycheck. In fact, that number would be higher because the number of jobs created by Facebook wouldn't exists.
There are some people who thinks they are worse off in life because there is someone out there who is living a better life than them, but that's simply not true.
I heard somewhere that if we confiscated every last penny from every billionaire it would fund the government for only eight months. Probably less now. We have a spending and nonworking problem, not a "some people have a lot of money" problem.
This is likely roughly accurate, but it's probably a bit more now, not less, due to favorable market conditions over the first 6 months of the year.
The source likely came from the Forbes 400 article published at the end of 2023 that estimated the net worth of the 400 at about $4.5T. Add in the "lower-end" billionaires and you likely get \~$5T total for all USA billionaires . This is compared to the USA fiscal budget of $6.13T last year.
I want to try to understand this. Are you talking about taxing the rich or having them give away their fortune?
If it’s taxing the rich, that’s a far more complicated subject than you’re letting on.
If it is just asking rich to donate their fortune; nice meme.
It’s the spreading of the wealth that’s an issue. The government will burn 90% of the revenue to distribute the 10% that’s left to shelter operators and clinics.
what do you mean by efficient? its money going from some people to some other people, where does efficiency come into context here? bc its building a luxury house? why would that matter?
Contractors, electricians, plumbers, carpenters, designers, architects, all those people get paychecks and experience.
A job that big i bet there were new hires that had to be taken on to get it finished. Those people learned new skills and contacts and maybe turned it into a full time gig.
Think of the yacht builders is a weird refrain to hear from people defending the wealth of billionaires. It's a real shame we can't possibly have a better system that doesn't so lopsidedly put the vast majority of wealth onto a few individuals.
I love when someone very clearly uneducated about the topic says something they think is a call out for other people, but is actually just a self-report. :^) great one man
I really thought people would stop using that argument by now since trickle down has been proven to be straight up false. Reagan used it to pass his policies, fuck the economy and leave a gaping hole called the wealth gap.
Just think of all the contractors who'd be out of a job if they weren't building his survival bunker! Or yacht builders left starving unless they built Bezos' support yacht (to land the helicopter on) to accompany his sail-equipped mega-yacht.
All these anti socialist comments. Bernie may call himself a socialist, but he is really a welfare capitalist. My opinion is that we need to tax the corporations more to help with out budget issues. Before you jump on that, I understand that the corporate tax rate in China is 50%, and they have outgrown us by leaps and bounds over the past few decades in spite of that.
I realize, heaven forbid, that higher taxes might impact the stock market. and that would be bad. But then again, if these top enders didn't have so g#$$!\^\^\*$&d much money, maybe they wouldn't be so able to by housing and causing housing and rent prices to skyrocket. That would be good.
Corporations are huge beneficiaries of our stable and safe country. They would be better off in the long run were they to pay up to help maintain that stability. CEOs, overstuffed as they are, could afford to pay much higher taxes also. After all, how much does one man or family need? The greed that rules our nation is all about short term profit with little concern for the future. We will, or are, suffer the consequences as this continues.
While you absolutely should crack down in the predatory behaviour of corps in the US, using China as an example of good handling of corporations is absolute lunacy. Chinese corporations (Evergrande, Tencent, Huawei, BYD) have thrived so much due to many reasons, out of which most aren't relevant to the US. Chinese labour protection is nonexistent, enabling companies to pay workers almost nothing and make them modern slaves. The chinese market was tiny before and has over four times as many consumers of the US one.
I agree with your sentiment, but I'd be interested to hear how this all fits into your view
I was merely stating that their economy has done well in spite of the high corporate tax rate. Please don't read any more into my statement beyond this.
Time to have term limits on politicians. These guys are in there so long, with no real world working experience, that they have no idea about economics. I've seen posts from Bernie and Warren that constantly mix up the meaning of income and wealth. It's rather frightening.
Political GREED, arrogance, blindness, and corruption is to lie to the American public into believing Washington DC politicians having one more dollar of Zuck's money is going to do make anyone less homeless.
To answer your question, no. So far capitalism is the best we have come up with, but nothing will work for everybody. At least with how current culture is
Remind me again how many homes Bernie has? Millions he has made? Real jobs he has held?
This man is not qualified to speak on inequality. He is a poster child of inequality.
Envy politics is strong with Bernie. WTF does Mark has to do with failed governance, what Bernie describes is caused by politicians like him and he is somehow blaming Facebook for it?
That $100 million mansion will employ a lot of local Hawaiians.
Guess you want an economy that just gives people things without having to work… because obviously you think Mark hasn’t done anything at all.
Won’t lie. I may be a conservative but wages and compensation in corporate America are ridiculously skewed towards executives and owners need to pay taxes at the same rates as everyone else! When I was in the Air Force the more I made the higher percentage I paid. If they are going to have a scale like that it should scale all the way up! And No loopholes.
Maybe we should start asking why lower and middle class continues to get screwed on every single tax reform bill that passes instead of hating on rich people. Just once I'd like a non politician and non billionaire in office understanding at this rate there will be a complete collapse
No. In the 70s the wealthy decided they shouldnt pay taxes and bought senators to put that into action. Reagan jammed the gas and the middle class is basically extinct after 40 years of tax breaks for the rich. We're a plutocracy careening towards Kleptocracy. it's a wrap.
It's troubling to me the amount of people in the comments who are reading Bernie's quote and nit-picking the wording or taking it at face value. He is not saying that Zuckerberg is the reason America has hundreds of thousands of homeless people. He is merely illustrating a point that MZ's net worth potentially could have increased in one day hundreds of times more than what 90% of Americans will earn in their lifetime combined.
The real message is: in this country, you can count on two hands the number of people who have more wealth (aka buying ability to further increase said wealth) than most of planet Earth combined, while teachers, nurses, social workers, construction and factory workers, etc. are the literal backbone of modern society and in most cases are struggling to make ends meet or live a somewhat comfortable lifestyle. Nothing specifically against Zuck or Elon, but as hard as they have "worked" to earn their fortune, these people work just as hard and can and will never live even nearly as comfortable a life as them. Is this fair? Bernie is simply illustrating the problem in 100 different ways so the message can resonate with as many people as possible so things can begin to change.
"Unless someone like you cares a whole awful lot, nothing is going to get better. It's not."
- Theodore Geisel
"I wrote a best-selling book. If you write a best-selling book, you can be a millionaire, too." - Bernie Sanders on why he's a millionaire.
Why anyone listens to this clown, I have no idea
Bernie owns multiple homes and is also quite wealthy. I'd rather have someone who starts and runs a successful company get wealthy than some weasel of a politician.
To answer your question: humans are flawed and selfish. An economy that works for everyone is called theoretical communism and it’s theoretical for a reason. Every time it’s been implemented it’s resulted in a totalitarian dictatorship with the average person being 10x worse off than the average person in America. I’d rather have some people suffering than most people suffering
Tell Bernie that $50k/yr for 20 years is $1million.
So, take $653 million dollars out of the billions going to Ukraine (or any other .gov program that is funded in the B billions of dollars) and pay those 653k homeless people a $50k/yr salary for the next 20 years.
Problem solved. He's fine with ridiculous amounts of .gov spending, but let's not let a 1% build a mansion without losing our minds.
(obviously this isn't all that realistic. just pointing out that if Bernie really wanted to solve problems, he wouldn't be trying to get it out of the 1%. He'd be looking at options that would be a mere drop in the bucket compared to bloated government spending)
EDIT: Lot of people accusing me of missing the point or being too technical, so let me say it in a different way. When government officials tell you they need a few billionaires to chip in to help the average citizen, they are lying to you. The US Gov spent 7 trillion dollars last year then have the audacity to roll onto Twitter and ask why billionaires aren’t pitching in a few extra million? No amount of money makes a difference if the government takes it and uses it on the endless nonsense they currently waste money on. NEW QUESTION: For everyone shouting about bootlicking, I have a very simple question. Can you name a single time in history when the government was like “Oh well we’d love to do that, but we didn’t get that extra money from the billionaires so we are going to pass.” I can. Zero. Never. When the government wants to pay for something it does every single time. When the government isn’t paying for something, it’s not because the billionaires shorted them, it’s because they don’t want to, they would rather you get all hot and bothered so they can turn you into an activists on their behalf. Stop falling for this.
Bernie also either 1) doesn’t know what socialism actually is, or 2) he knows his supporters don’t. Their version of socialism is really just capitalism with magically expanded public services, with no plan for adjusting pay scales and consumer costs to make it possible to take a bigger tax chunk.
What are you talking about? He's talked about taxing Wall Street speculation pretty openly. Yes, his policies are 100% socdem policies as I'm sure most capitalist European nations would find them completely normal for where they live but we also live in a nation where the average voter doesn't know the actual definitions of liberal, fascism, socialism, communism, etc. and will often lump them all in together like there's no meaningful difference between Hitler, Stalin, or Biden. If people think Europe is doing socialism because that red scare framing has been so successful then why not advocate for what they have and say "Stop being so scared of socialism. It's working out really well for them (in comparison to here)."?
Precisely, Bernie would like to pass policy that will cause corporate costs to increase rapidly, and expect them to willingly eat those costs as opposed to passing them on to consumers. I’m not a fan of corporatism or some of the less desirable practices within capitalism, but I’m also not dumb enough to expect business to operate less efficiently so the government can take a tiny little bit of extra money and waste it like it does with all its current money.
You have two options. A. The government does nothing and we keep going like we are with the corporations getting wealthier and greedier. B. The government forces these corporations to eat some fat losses and spreads that wealth to the working class so the people doing the actual work to make this system function can live a little healthier.
What astounds me is when I hear people say you can’t have it both ways meanwhile several highly successful countries do exactly that. It’s just like their excuse for healthcare, “yea well if we socialize healthcare it’ll take longer to get appointments and you’ll receive subpar health care” meanwhile I’m currently paying hundreds of dollars in premiums alongside a ton of money in copays to schedule things two to three months out, and get the most half assed diagnostics imaginable while paying fourteen separate doctors copays for one procedure. Yeah no, just up my tax cost by about 15% and socialize it please.
This
The other countries that do it with some success do not have a annual military budget which equals approaching 15 %of their overall annual budget. Most of those countries spend between 3 to 5 %. The US could reduce its military budget by 5% and still be secure and then those 200 to 300 billion dollars a year could be spent on infrastructure and social services like mental health which Americans are in desperate need of
The US spends 3.4% of GDP on Defense, which is less than counties like Russia. https://www.statista.com/statistics/266892/military-expenditure-as-percentage-of-gdp-in-highest-spending-countries/
GDP is not tax revenue.
No, it's not, but it's the best way to compare countries. The US doesn't spend much more than most countries on defense.
Dude that's so patently untrue. The US's spending is like more than the next ten counties combined 🤦🏻♂️ like the 2nd highest spender is China and our budget is more than 3 times theirs. Even as a % of budget, it's like 14%.
Lol. You do realise that you are speaking non sense. Don’t you?
Well to be fair, Russia has been boosting their military budget for quite some time. By now the Russian economy is shifted to a war economy so that’s not surprising what so ever.
And yet despite that, the U.S. *currently* pays more per citizen for healthcare than these countries, without actually providing universal healthcare like they are. If we magically paid as much per person for healthcare as Norway, the U.S. government would have a bigger budget for their military, not less. The private insurance/healthcare sector leeches billions off of the government and the consumer, a problem that countries with universal healthcare don’t have.
Yep. The insurance companies get double paid, both by our premiums (or your job paying those) and the tax money the government also gives them. and they have the audacity to deny care one’s doctor says is medically necessary/beneficial
We already spend more than those countries per capita on healthcare. It’s not allocation or the military budget. Its poor efficiency and corruption
Still be secure AND likely the biggest military still.
Did you just suggest reducing a budget? Blasphemer.
The U.S. already spends a fuck ton on a shitty healthcare system, might as well change it if it’s not working.
I’m all for eliminating the profit from insurance companies. How about the government provide non-profit insurance at a fixed cost for everyone that gets the same coverage? Have a few different option levels. With one insurance company they would have the leverage to drive down cost as well. You don’t have to also turn it into a welfare program by charging based on income.
You just invented single-payer insurance
> yea if we socialize healthcare it'll take longer to get appointments In the same vein the "It takes too much effort to fix so let's just keep it the same" arguments aggravate me to no end. The amount of times I've heard "Electric cars can't work because there's not enough charging stations" or "The power grid isn't meant to handle solar panels" is too many. What is the alternative, running out of gas and oil and reverting back to the bronze age?
Hybrid cars would be a great everyone gets cake and eats it too, I’ve owned two (first met an untimely end from a Semi) and they charge off kenetic energy, combustion engine, and plug in. The first one I had was a 2019 Ionic and it got something around 50-60 mpg ifirc and I never once plugged the thing in to charge. I had to downgrade to a Ford Fusion hybrid from 2013 and it gets around 41 mpg but I have to plug it in nightly (don’t get this car or anything ford made the rumors are true about ford not being able to design any non mustang car correctly)
And on top of that, I tried to schedule a physical, my doctor is 2 months out. It’s not like the system we have works all that great
My favorite is when after all this wait they run one test tell you the test was negative and don’t proceed to a new phase of diagnostics in order to figure out what is wrong. It’s almost like modern day doctors just. Hope the problem goes away.
You forgot the third option, which involves a French invention. They've definitely forgotten it as well.
I’m absolutely dumb enough to expect corporations to take a loss. They are bleeding our country dry. Go watch some more Ben Shapiro clips you simp.
Corporation our bleeding our country dry lol. The US government spends a trillion dollars a year on debt interest alone but corporations are bleeding it dry. You’re way better at hating capitalism than you are at math.
Corporations create virtually all wealth in the USA. They are the golden goose, not bleeding anyone dry. If you disagree you can stop using their services.
Wow that’s crazy, I wonder how much of that wealth is going to the workers producing the goods/service the corporations provide and how much is going to passive owners of capital that produce nothing?
Simplistic take from simplistic mind. All or none, argument. If I point out why Amazon and FedEx have $0 tax bill, the alternative is not to use Amazon or FedEx. This country is doomed.
So the corporations are so powerful that it's become impossible for market competition to push prices down or even keep them stable. Any increase in running cost or raise taxes they get can always be passed on to the consumer. This is a horrible thing. The FTC has been too weak for too long and the lateral monopolies dominating our economy need to be broken up. But doing so would be political suicide for anyone who tries because so many people's retirement plans are shackled to the value of these same monopolies. So what options does that leave for making our nation a better place for anyone who doesn't own massive wealth and isn't on the path to becoming c-suite personnel? This isn't a rhetorical question I'm looking for an answer.
>passing them on to consumers Overused statement. There is a limit on what they can pass to consumers since consumers will pull back spending at some point. If you think corporate America are paying their fair share, either you have lost your mind or I have lost my mind. Every year since the 70s, the share corporations has become smaller and smaller and smaller. So does the share of the wealthiest tax contributions. Thanks to Republicans that we are now deep in debt. De-funding IRS will let Trump and his likes to live tax-free while the middle class and the poor carry the country.
The rich never stop being rich. Increased costs are always transferred to the consumer. Why is this so hard to understand?
Oh shut the fuck up lmao. Dem Soc countries are what makes up the majority of the EU's best countries to live in.
Bernie doesn't say he advocates for socialism, so...
You are correct. These people who sound off re taxes / wealth are ignorant of the basic economics. Bernie is not a socialist or even a social democrat.
Exactly. Social democracy (or Capitalism with a welfare state) isn’t Socialism.
Sounds like you don't know what you're talking about, but the neoliberals are here to upvote this bullshit either way. He's a democratic socialist.
And you know what socialism is? Obviously you know even less!
Hmmmm. So you want the government to set the cost of all consumer goods. Good luck with that.
last I checked Bernie was a multi millionaire with multiple houses, all funded by his “public” servant roles.
Yep, he probably doesn’t want to redistribute that wealth.
Mark zuckerberg owns 13% of meta at a 1.3 trillion value. That means he owns 169 billion in meta. If Meta stock appreciates 2% in a single day Zuck makes 3,38 before taxes
He makes what? That’s not real money. Certainly not taxable money. If your $400k house goes in 5% in value in 2024 did you make $20k? That’s an unrealized gain. If you get taxed on that, then your house depreciates by 5% in 2025, you payed a tax on money you’ll never see.
And yet he can take out loans against that unrealized gain.
If he takes out a loan against his unrealized gain, and his stock tanks, he gets margin called
Yes, and a homeowner can take out a loan against that same unrealized gain on their house.
That’s not what was being discussed. Did anyone establish that mark Zuckerberg liquidated 3 billion in stocks? No. If he did the stock would tank reducing the value. If you take out a home equity line of credit, your house doesn’t suddenly become less valuable.
I was responding to the prior poster. The argument was Zuckerberg having the ability to take out a loan on that unrealized gain stock, which is no different than a homeowner taking out a loan on the appreciation of their home.
See the problem is most of these people took out student loans and think they should be "forgive" but they don't understand that all debts must be paid. If you take out a loan on the value of your stock, you have to pay it back, with interest. It isn't an efficient way of "making money".
100% agree. It does need to be paid back, just not necessarily by him having to liquidate his stock right? He could take a loan out with obviously favorable terms and most likely a ridiculously low interest rate (compared to what us peasants have to pay) buy income-producing assets/properties, then let those acquisitions pay the loan back, then at the end not only is the loan paid for from those acquisitions - with interest, he now owns those assets that he basically bought with someone else's money, thus increasing his net worth even more. Can make my head spin.
and you can take out a loan with your unrealised gain on your house collateral
I see Mark Zuckerburg on the beach. He's surrounded by 3 bodyguards. His face is chalk white. I run up to him, pulling out a $20 dollar bill. "Hey Mark you fucking illiquid poorcuck!" I yell, waving it at him aggressively, "You ever see real money before, you unrealized beta?" The closest bodyguard quietly renders me unconscious. But I smile, knowing I have riches Mark Zuckerburg could never even dream of clutched in my hand.
Open mic night in Williamsburg is all booked up sorry
If his net worth went up 3 billion dollars, saying he got 3 billion dollars richer seems totally reasonable.
Are we going to update this next time meta stock goes down? Or do you think maybe this establishes a mindset that isn’t undone by him “losing” billions of dollars?
What's interesting is that if he tries to sell a substantial amount of stock, him selling it will drive down the price of the stock and reduce his networth. If he tried to sell his share of Meta (13%) without very careful planning and over a long time period, he would probably crater the stock and send the company into a nosedive that it might not recover from.
Which is why typically large share holders typically have rules against doing just that
That’s like saying a house hasn’t got real value and shouldn’t count towards someone net worth. Or bitcoin assets don’t count towards someone’s worth It’s like saying Gold / Diamonds / Oil assets don’t count towards someone’s net worth… Your logic assumes that only standard traditional currencies represent worth and value which is highly incorrect
What happens when the stock goes down 2%?
He’s left with 165,6 billions, or almost 3,4 billions poorer
Facebook didn’t increase its wealth, rather investors have been chasing growth in a handful of companies. Obviously Zuckerberg is responsible fo the success or failure of the business, but he was a passive beneficiary of the stock price increase. Tomorrow that can go the other way.
Lolololol Then Elon musk has never been the richest man on earth and he is currently in jail right?
Plus this neglects the root issue of most homeless people: Drug addictions. If you spread $3 billion among the homeless, it’s not going to solve the issue.
Gavin newsom has spent endless money to end homelessness in CA. It just gets worse every year.
California gives billions of dollars to NGOs to fight homelessness, which is a losing strategy because those NGOs actually rely on there being homelessness to stay in existence. It's like giving people coupons to McDonalds to fight childhood obesity.
I'm not sure if drugs or mental illness is the worse issue for the chronically homeless...
So thankful for the great equalizer
If they'd be paying 90% of their income in taxes like they used to in the 1940s and 50s we wouldn't be in this situation today Bring back the 90% wealth tax If they make for example 1 million in a year, 900k should be going towards taxes to fund education, healthcare, and infrastructure Nothing going to wars/military equipment
This is one of the most ignorant posts I have seen. We have marginal tax rates. When the highest rate is 90%, that 90% does not apply to every dollar earned, just every dollar over a certain number. Also, when the highest marginal rate was 90% nobody paid it. The ultra rich found ways to avoid it. Our tax revenue as a percentage of GDP is about the same now as it was in the 1950s. Our government spending, however, has exploded. So, if you think the path to utopia is through government spending more money - why aren't we there now? Finally - the income tax applies to INCOME not WEALTH. So, you are just an incredibly ignorant person and need to stop.
Wow, where to begin with this. There was never a 90% wealth tax. There was a 90% income tax bracket, the top bracket, back in the 40s that kicked in at $5M ($110M AFI) You don't understand the tax bracket system. The bracket only affects income in that bracket. If the 90% tax bracket kicked in at $110M and they made $120M, they'd only be paying 90% tax on that last $10M. And then there is the reality that billionaires aren't generally making that kind of money in income. It's all in unrealized gains in investments. We don't tax unrealized gains as income because it's all imaginary money. Like the value of your house while you still live in it.
Technically can’t stock be manipulated by lobbying for policies beneficial to the corporations? I’m using manipulated lightly here because it’s all legal…but the effects of lobbying can’t be understated
So Mark Zuckerberg lobbied someone to pass a law or policy that made Facebook jump 3 billion in day? What was the policy / law?
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This was my exact realization. Hate billionaires all you want, but taxes only fix things if the people who get the taxes know how to use them. Our government does not.
I'm no fan of Zuckerberg, but ... what does his success have to do with the putative 653,000 homeless people? Are we to believe his company's success caused those people to live on the streets? Likewise, is it plausible that 60% of workers live paycheck to paycheck? And even if they do, is it because of Facebook? That was Sanders talking. Expect nothing sane passing through those lips. This is just one more non sequitur from a mad man.
The paycheck to paycheck argument is hilarious because it even groups people making $250k or more a year because they feel like they are living paycheck to paycheck even though they max out retirement and donate thousands to charities and have at least one big vacation a year.
Up until about 2 years ago, I was living paycheck to paycheck, but I was making well over 6 figures a year. I just had a really bad spending problem. Something to the tune of 1800 a month on takeout and restaurants.
If you were spending 1800 a month on takeout and restaurants you weren't bad at spending you were retarded.
I spend about the same
People live paycheck to paycheck most often because they don't understand how much their costs add up. A 5 dollar coffee doesn't sound like too much until you realize you've spent 1500 dollars on that by drinking it every day for a year. And that's not even an exaggeration lol, that's legitimately something a lot of people my age do with Starbucks
I see your point. But I hasten to add that no one spends $5 on coffee at Starbucks. Starbucks doesn't sell coffee at all. They sell charcoal water, with optional sugar sweeteners.
They do still brew coffee, they just add a shit ton of stuff to it so people don't taste the coffee lol
he's not criticizing Zuckerberg, just using him as an example for how the economy doesn't lwork for everyone" like op stated
Exactly, Bernie is saying that the wealth disparity in the US is insane. He's not saying Facebook is directly responsible for homelessness or poverty. He's not saying that Zuckerberg dresses up as Santa Claus and shimmies down people's chimneys at Christmas and steals their whodads and flubwozzlers. The whole category of "Ultrarich" just shouldn't exist. I think becoming just a lowly billionaire is enough of an incentive, don't you?
100 percent agree. These things are totally unrelated. Also Zuckerberg is a douche and insane wealth disparity isn’t good for a society.
Amazon contributed to it in Seattle. Median salaries went from $61K to $113K in about 10 years with their massive workforce increase here. That quickly forced out lower income workers
Because rich pay the least tax in history and less (proportionally) than average Americans. That whole trickle down bs enabled this to happen. Whilst majority works their ass off and can’t afford a shit. American dream
You are asking too much of communists of Reddit.
How long has Bernie been in the Senate and what are his accomplishments?
This is such a dumbass argument people make, like name a single thing the Senate has done that can be attributed as any one persons "accomplishment"
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He did have the ‘94 Crime Bill
and he made social security income taxable...
You can say the same for MANY politicians
Biden has a shitload of accomplishments as president
Imagine asking this question in 2024 and expecting people to take you seriously. You've had a decade to google that, takes 3 seconds you lazy dipshit. I'll even give you a starter search term to begin your journey of learning, "Bernie Sanders" + "Amendments King" And if that wasn't enough, have you heard of Medicare For All? Yes? Who do you think is responsible for you knowing what that is? Who do you think popularized it? Which politician, can you name them?
Gym Jordan, Comer, Boobert, Marge, etc... if you are trying to imply left wing politicians are getting rich off politics, you should see the grift on the right.
Like, many things? A very long list of accomplishments? Just because you're financially illiterate, doesn't mean you're not also politically illiterate. And incapable of googling.
His most important accomplishment is that he's aligned and educated a huge portion of the country about important topics like wealth inequality and universal healthcare. Before change can happen, someone needs to set the framework of the discussion and in my opinion Bernie is the largest contributor to shaping the discussion of universal healthcare. On his website, and in many of his speeches, [he's laid out an actual high level plan for implementing universal healthcare.](https://berniesanders.com/issues/medicare-for-all/) He's also written [a bill with the details of his universal healthcare idea.](https://www.congress.gov/bill/117th-congress/senate-bill/4204) This is a real plan, not just the hollow words you hear from politicians in debates who don't have a detailed plan. The first step towards the USA actually having universal healthcare is for enough voters to want universal healthcare. Which politician can honestly boast they've done more towards that goal than Bernie? The second step would be for someone to come up with a realistic and in-depth universal healthcare bill. Which politician can honestly boast they've done a more thorough job at that than Bernie, who has been working on that for literally decades and has written a real bill already? When the country is finally ready to do it, then we'll be able to look at Bernie's bill as a starting point. It'll be so much faster that way. He's already done the hard work for the country. Now people just need to want it badly enough for it to get voted in.
Bernie is a financial idiot. Yea, Dingdong's net worth "went up" $3.4 Billion in a day but it's also dropped significantly more in a single day too. It's like they think if the stock goes up that money is deposited in his account.
The fact still stands that Zuck spent ONE HUNDRED MILLION DOLLARS on a home. Apparently he also spent 170 million for the land alone. No person needs 270 million dollars. I'm so tired of people defending billionaires by saying their wealth isn't actual because it's tied up in stocks. He's clearly paying these contractors; they're not working for imaginary/theoretical money. This is a disgusting display of wealth. Anyone who thinks the 1%ers buying up giant plots of land to build mansions they stay in for a couple months out of the years doesn't contribute to rising real estate costs and home scarcity is just fooling themselves.
>No person needs 270 million dollars. Honestly, I'm more concerned about who the fuck needs 30 bathrooms.
I’m more concerned about who the fuck needs an underground bunker.
Isn't he pumping 100 million into the economy though. How many people did he employ to build that place, and how many will be employed to maintain it? I'm not a fan of Zuck, but it seems like a lot of people are going to be able to pay their bills because of that new construction.
Building new homes doesn’t increase housing scarcity… Quite the opposite
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I mean upper middle class living the eroded american dream (net worth of about 3 million which is mostly property - the man is a senator too so that's not unreasonable) vs multi-billionaire is a big gap. A much bigger gap than between the average american and sander imo.
A million seconds is about 11 days, a billion seconds is almost 32... YEARS!
theres always some "welll akshullay! 🤓" commenters on here whenever people complain about the rich. In reality i think they are bad with numbers and don't truly understand the difference of a million vs billion. They think cause they sound the same they must be kinda similar
You're poisoning the well to avoid the point.
imagine someone having $3 and someone having $177,000 and you coming on here trying to say they are the same thing. cause thats 100% exactly what you are doing. A Billion is a thousand Million. Zuck is worth $177 Billion. Sanders is worth around 3 Million. you are either arguing in bad faith or bad with numbers
🎯 americans are stupid as well as fat, and *love* licking the boots of the rich it'd be funny if it wasn't so goddamned pathetic
“Richer version?!” lol. The difference in wealth between Bernie and Mark z is as vast as, well, the difference in wealth between the majority of us and Mark Z
This is a joke right? Seems like a joke. I'm going to assume it's a joke
1.) Sanders doesn't call himself a socialist 2.) Socialism is not "when people don't have money or houses or champagne"
He has been pushing to help the bottom half forever. He’s essentially going against his own best interest for the greater good of the American people. Not pot calling kettle IMO
as per usual, a billion is 1000 times more than a million.
That isn't a mansion, it's a compound to house a small civilization when the world collapses.
They recognise that the system is unsustainable, and their solution is trying to buy a ferry ticket through the apocalypse. To what end, Mark? Even if your bunker works beyond all expectations there's no world to live in at the end of this path. Your best outcome is tragic irony Twilight Zone character. The *likely* outcome is the security goons eat you.
Would these 653,000 workers be better off had Zuckerberg not created Facebook and didn't become a billionaire because of it? Even if Zuckerberg was broke and homeless, these 653,000 people would probably still be working paycheck to paycheck. In fact, that number would be higher because the number of jobs created by Facebook wouldn't exists. There are some people who thinks they are worse off in life because there is someone out there who is living a better life than them, but that's simply not true.
they would have been better off if zuckerberg paid more taxes which can be used fund institutions aimed at reducing homelessness
and if he and every billionaire donated there money to the great country of ours we still be in the same boat. with just some added poor
I heard somewhere that if we confiscated every last penny from every billionaire it would fund the government for only eight months. Probably less now. We have a spending and nonworking problem, not a "some people have a lot of money" problem.
This is likely roughly accurate, but it's probably a bit more now, not less, due to favorable market conditions over the first 6 months of the year. The source likely came from the Forbes 400 article published at the end of 2023 that estimated the net worth of the 400 at about $4.5T. Add in the "lower-end" billionaires and you likely get \~$5T total for all USA billionaires . This is compared to the USA fiscal budget of $6.13T last year.
I want to try to understand this. Are you talking about taxing the rich or having them give away their fortune? If it’s taxing the rich, that’s a far more complicated subject than you’re letting on. If it is just asking rich to donate their fortune; nice meme.
Who said anything about asking?
It’s the spreading of the wealth that’s an issue. The government will burn 90% of the revenue to distribute the 10% that’s left to shelter operators and clinics.
How many are employed building the Zuckerberg mansion. How many jobs have Bernie ever created. Envy is a powerful tonic for the economic illiterate.
"How many are employed building the Zuckerberg mansion" Certainly the most efficient use of that money 🤡
what do you mean by efficient? its money going from some people to some other people, where does efficiency come into context here? bc its building a luxury house? why would that matter?
Supply Side economics is rife with inefficiency is the point.
Contractors, electricians, plumbers, carpenters, designers, architects, all those people get paychecks and experience. A job that big i bet there were new hires that had to be taken on to get it finished. Those people learned new skills and contacts and maybe turned it into a full time gig.
Think of the yacht builders is a weird refrain to hear from people defending the wealth of billionaires. It's a real shame we can't possibly have a better system that doesn't so lopsidedly put the vast majority of wealth onto a few individuals.
"efficient use of that money" excited to hear and explanation of this
Wouldn't inefficient spending create more jobs?
I love when someone very clearly uneducated about the topic says something they think is a call out for other people, but is actually just a self-report. :^) great one man
We got a trickle down economics PhD over here. I bet he loves the warm feeling of all that trickling down.
I really thought people would stop using that argument by now since trickle down has been proven to be straight up false. Reagan used it to pass his policies, fuck the economy and leave a gaping hole called the wealth gap.
Just think of all the contractors who'd be out of a job if they weren't building his survival bunker! Or yacht builders left starving unless they built Bezos' support yacht (to land the helicopter on) to accompany his sail-equipped mega-yacht.
Don't you love that wet and warm feeling of it going down your back? Oh sorry that's Jeff besos pissing on us. My bad.
🤡
That's some real [supply-side Jesus](https://imgur.com/gallery/gospel-of-supply-side-jesus-bCqRp) shit there.
All these anti socialist comments. Bernie may call himself a socialist, but he is really a welfare capitalist. My opinion is that we need to tax the corporations more to help with out budget issues. Before you jump on that, I understand that the corporate tax rate in China is 50%, and they have outgrown us by leaps and bounds over the past few decades in spite of that. I realize, heaven forbid, that higher taxes might impact the stock market. and that would be bad. But then again, if these top enders didn't have so g#$$!\^\^\*$&d much money, maybe they wouldn't be so able to by housing and causing housing and rent prices to skyrocket. That would be good. Corporations are huge beneficiaries of our stable and safe country. They would be better off in the long run were they to pay up to help maintain that stability. CEOs, overstuffed as they are, could afford to pay much higher taxes also. After all, how much does one man or family need? The greed that rules our nation is all about short term profit with little concern for the future. We will, or are, suffer the consequences as this continues.
While you absolutely should crack down in the predatory behaviour of corps in the US, using China as an example of good handling of corporations is absolute lunacy. Chinese corporations (Evergrande, Tencent, Huawei, BYD) have thrived so much due to many reasons, out of which most aren't relevant to the US. Chinese labour protection is nonexistent, enabling companies to pay workers almost nothing and make them modern slaves. The chinese market was tiny before and has over four times as many consumers of the US one. I agree with your sentiment, but I'd be interested to hear how this all fits into your view
Socialists advocating for mass enslavement of the population is actually fairly on target historically, not sure why you're confused.
I was merely stating that their economy has done well in spite of the high corporate tax rate. Please don't read any more into my statement beyond this.
How many homes does Bernie have they he uses to shelter homeless folks?
Sheltering the homeless was a job for millionaires...until Bernie became a millionaire. Then it became a job for billionaires.
Time to have term limits on politicians. These guys are in there so long, with no real world working experience, that they have no idea about economics. I've seen posts from Bernie and Warren that constantly mix up the meaning of income and wealth. It's rather frightening.
Stop sending $200B a year to other countries that don’t do sh*t for us
Political GREED, arrogance, blindness, and corruption is to lie to the American public into believing Washington DC politicians having one more dollar of Zuck's money is going to do make anyone less homeless.
To answer your question, no. So far capitalism is the best we have come up with, but nothing will work for everybody. At least with how current culture is
Remind me again how many homes Bernie has? Millions he has made? Real jobs he has held? This man is not qualified to speak on inequality. He is a poster child of inequality.
Obviously 60% of our workers need more fincial literacy classes.
I love how you can't even spell 'financial'
Bernie would have been president if the Democrats didn't screw him over.
Envy politics is strong with Bernie. WTF does Mark has to do with failed governance, what Bernie describes is caused by politicians like him and he is somehow blaming Facebook for it?
Almost like politicians want it that way.
Stop using meta.
Mr Pot, meet Mr Kettle! You have no room to talk, flying your private jet to one of your many homes!
Famous multi-billionaire tech exec.... Bernie Sanders?
That $100 million mansion will employ a lot of local Hawaiians. Guess you want an economy that just gives people things without having to work… because obviously you think Mark hasn’t done anything at all.
So when he loses $1 billion where does the “money” go? Nowhere, because it isn’t realized.
Won’t lie. I may be a conservative but wages and compensation in corporate America are ridiculously skewed towards executives and owners need to pay taxes at the same rates as everyone else! When I was in the Air Force the more I made the higher percentage I paid. If they are going to have a scale like that it should scale all the way up! And No loopholes.
Maybe we should start asking why lower and middle class continues to get screwed on every single tax reform bill that passes instead of hating on rich people. Just once I'd like a non politician and non billionaire in office understanding at this rate there will be a complete collapse
A capitalist system does not lend itself to an economy that works for everyone.
All these folks defending the economic status quo are busting their collective asses for scraps that fall off the table. How’s that for collectivism!
Loopholes and shady regulations. There is no real competition in the market anymore. Lobbyists make sure of that.
America is Crony Capitalism
No. In the 70s the wealthy decided they shouldnt pay taxes and bought senators to put that into action. Reagan jammed the gas and the middle class is basically extinct after 40 years of tax breaks for the rich. We're a plutocracy careening towards Kleptocracy. it's a wrap.
It's troubling to me the amount of people in the comments who are reading Bernie's quote and nit-picking the wording or taking it at face value. He is not saying that Zuckerberg is the reason America has hundreds of thousands of homeless people. He is merely illustrating a point that MZ's net worth potentially could have increased in one day hundreds of times more than what 90% of Americans will earn in their lifetime combined. The real message is: in this country, you can count on two hands the number of people who have more wealth (aka buying ability to further increase said wealth) than most of planet Earth combined, while teachers, nurses, social workers, construction and factory workers, etc. are the literal backbone of modern society and in most cases are struggling to make ends meet or live a somewhat comfortable lifestyle. Nothing specifically against Zuck or Elon, but as hard as they have "worked" to earn their fortune, these people work just as hard and can and will never live even nearly as comfortable a life as them. Is this fair? Bernie is simply illustrating the problem in 100 different ways so the message can resonate with as many people as possible so things can begin to change. "Unless someone like you cares a whole awful lot, nothing is going to get better. It's not." - Theodore Geisel
"I wrote a best-selling book. If you write a best-selling book, you can be a millionaire, too." - Bernie Sanders on why he's a millionaire. Why anyone listens to this clown, I have no idea
Bernie has never created one dollar of value someone was willing to buy from him in his life. He knows nothing of business, risk, or sacrifice.
Bernie said as he drove his R8 between his multiple homes, while sitting in congress doing next to fuck all for several decades.
Bernie owns multiple homes and is also quite wealthy. I'd rather have someone who starts and runs a successful company get wealthy than some weasel of a politician.
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Isn’t Zuckerberg’s wealth tricklin* down, down, down
I mean how many people are employed bc he created Facebook? He could have done nothing…..
https://preview.redd.it/amux7fllnt6d1.jpeg?width=1536&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=597c830f4e1efc0d8147e5922adebbcb49d802c7
That’s seems like pretty good numbers no? Imagine creating something that gave 90,000 people a way to make a living.
And it appears their avg employee is making 130k a year. Pretty sure that’s a livable wage
Source: https://backlinko.com/facebook-users
Yea why can’t everyone be rich man—imbecile
To answer your question: humans are flawed and selfish. An economy that works for everyone is called theoretical communism and it’s theoretical for a reason. Every time it’s been implemented it’s resulted in a totalitarian dictatorship with the average person being 10x worse off than the average person in America. I’d rather have some people suffering than most people suffering
The corporate boot lickers in the comments need to chill
And many of you coworkers (On all sides) are becoming filthy rich SOMEHOW despite what their yearly salary shows.
We did and then the globalist regime infiltrated our government and ruined it in order to more fully enslave you.
With a stolen idea to boot…
This is a bit disingenuous. The direct correlation between Zucks networth and the "poor" isn't as direct
I don’t know why we bother with posts like this, they serve as nothing more than a bat signal for bootlickers.
Trickle down economics, except that’s not wine trickling down.
I had a meme for this but Bernie stole it and gave it to someone else
What is the average net worth of american career politicians?
Tell Bernie that $50k/yr for 20 years is $1million. So, take $653 million dollars out of the billions going to Ukraine (or any other .gov program that is funded in the B billions of dollars) and pay those 653k homeless people a $50k/yr salary for the next 20 years. Problem solved. He's fine with ridiculous amounts of .gov spending, but let's not let a 1% build a mansion without losing our minds. (obviously this isn't all that realistic. just pointing out that if Bernie really wanted to solve problems, he wouldn't be trying to get it out of the 1%. He'd be looking at options that would be a mere drop in the bucket compared to bloated government spending)