Why Wealth Taxes Fail

Eat the rich…then what?

Andrew Heaton | 5.1.2026 10:00 AM

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California progressives are pushing for a tax on billionaires; so are senators like Elizabeth Warren (D–Mass.) and Bernie Sanders (I–Vt.). But as Andrew Heaton explains, such programs don't work. Just ask France.

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wealth tax Comedy California Elizabeth Warren Bernie Sanders Taxes Wealth Billionaires Progressives

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TrickyVic (old school) 2 hours ago

They need the rich to fund their programs.

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JFree 2 hours ago

Wealth taxes fail because the actual wealthy distort the proposed tax (by buying pols) so it falls on 'the poorer' half of the 'truly wealthy'. The poorer half of the truly wealthy are those who depend on income generation to build wealth. The Shohei Ohtanis or A-list celebrities or doctors/lawyers/Indian chiefs don't necessarily already have the assets to generate lifetime income and build more assets. The truly wealthy push those folks off the wealth building ladder by ensuring that a 'wealth tax' is nothing but an income tax targeted at the really high income.

Wealth taxes that work are those that change BEHAVIOR of the truly wealthy. eg that force a Bezos/Musk/etc to use their controlling asset stakes to pay dividends to non-controlling (and controlling) asset holders. Or are a tax base that cannot distort behavior - eg (land tax).

Reason is entirely useful idiot economics and has never produced one word of non-cronyist insight.

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1. Sir Chips Alot 57 minutes ago
  
  those poor pols being forced to sell themselves to the highest bidder!
  
  Why do you always want to steal from others and use force to do so?
  
  How about you start a company and give all its money to the "poor"? You can't, because you are too stupid and low IQ to start a business, but like all brainwashed low IQ far left Democrat cultists you want to steal from the successful
  
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  1. JFree 53 minutes ago
    
    If you can't read, you should probably not try to write. If you can't understand - well stupid is certainly a bigger problem.
    
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2. Mickey Rat 45 minutes ago
  
  Wealth taxes fail because the value of wealth assets are a constantly shifting target due to market conditions and create perverse incentives. That makes them inherently difficult enforce and prove the actual value as what the government is chasing is unrealized vapor of a guesswork value. It is an economically destructive kind of taxation that destroys the overall value of society. It something only a greedy moron of a politician would suggest.
  
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3. Rossami 22 minutes ago
  
  No, even a "perfectly applied" wealth tax would still fail. As the video clearly explains, all wealth taxes depress economic activity and lower asset values of both the wealthy and poor alike.
  
  Your assumption that paying dividends is the correct "behavior" to encourage assumes many things that are only sometimes true.
  
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Idaho-Bob 1 hour ago

The truly wealthy push those folks off the wealth building ladder by ensuring that a 'wealth tax' is nothing but an income tax targeted at the really high income.

Stupid DNC take.

FYI - All taxes are wealth taxes.

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1. JFree 52 minutes ago
  
  Taxes are for the little people.
  
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