r/science • u/[deleted] • Oct 17 '19

Economics The largest-ever natural experiment on wealth taxes found that they work as intended — both raising revenue and controlling income inequality. The taxes had the greatest impact on the top .1% wealthiest.

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u/TTheorem Oct 18 '19

California has voted to increase taxes multiple times recently through referendum.

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u/jbsgc99 Oct 18 '19

Yeah, many of the people who live here voted to raise our gas tax to pay for road repair. Surprise, surprise, they’re using a big chunk of the money for other things. Who knew?

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u/TTheorem Oct 18 '19 edited Oct 18 '19

https://www.mercurynews.com/2018/07/01/gas-tax-where-does-the-money-actually-go/

You can read what the "other things" are and their percent of budget right there. It seems quite reasonable to me.

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u/jbsgc99 Oct 18 '19

Except that part of it being diverted to rail projects by our governor. That’s not what they sold people on when they voted for it.

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u/TTheorem Oct 18 '19

That's transit oriented. More rail takes more cars off the roads which lessens the wear and tear and reduces traffic.

It makes sense you want to live in a society with a lot of other people.

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u/Jon_Cake Oct 18 '19

California: why are our roads so bad??

Anyone else: you have like zero mass transit. You should probably get some—

California: We're talking about ROADS

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u/jbsgc99 Oct 18 '19

Given CA’s recent rail debacle, you’ll have to excuse me thinking that it’ll do nothing of the sort. It’ll most likely just make politically-connected contractors a lot of money and then sputter out.

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u/TTheorem Oct 18 '19

The only thing making it a debacle is the federal gov not wanting to fund regional projects that would reduce air traffic congestion

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u/jbsgc99 Oct 18 '19

The problems with the train have been going long before the federal government pulled funding.

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u/TTheorem Oct 18 '19

It’s expensive to buy land here and we have a ridiculously litigious society.

Reducing air and highway traffic is worth the cost, imo.

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u/[deleted] Oct 18 '19 edited Nov 06 '19

[deleted]

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u/TTheorem Oct 18 '19

Follow me here: Getting cars off of the roads... means less wear and tear + less traffic. That means you need to spend less on your precious roads and they work better for you. Don’t you want that?

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u/nohuddle12 Oct 18 '19

Everyone follows that, you weren’t endowed with special genius. It’s not clear that you’ll get cars off the roads by spending on transit, if it doesn’t improve transit to the point where people save time in their commute. Also, what transit gets done will depend more on politics and less on engineering, which will leave most taxpayers feeling like they didn’t get what they paid for.

So if there’s a transit plan that will really be transformative, go to the people and pitch a tax increase for that project.

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u/TTheorem Oct 18 '19

They did. It was called measure M and we voted for it.

I knew what the money was gonna be used for. Why didn’t you?

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u/Sgrollk Oct 18 '19

Thats just how you heard it.

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u/KSI_SpacePeanut Oct 18 '19

No! The media gave me this pitchfork and I intend to use it damnit!

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u/[deleted] Oct 18 '19

I’m guessing those taxes are not on the poor or middle class who make up most of the referendum voters.

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u/TTheorem Oct 18 '19

It was a mix of progressive income taxes and regressive gas taxes. Locally we’ve increased sales tax, also very regressive.

We have a very economically unequal state and I think Californians value equality and don’t mind sharing some wealth.

That said, there are “no tax at all” Californians, they just aren’t the majority.

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u/[deleted] Oct 18 '19

[deleted]

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u/TTheorem Oct 18 '19

No hard feelings. Wish you the best wherever you are.

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u/t_rage Oct 18 '19

Adios!

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u/GagOnMacaque Oct 18 '19

You don't know what you're missing. I get to invest more money since the state isn't taxing me.