In an attempt to deal with an affordable housing crisis, the Dutch housing minister recently proposed a law that would have allowed municipalities to force some property owners to sell their homes only to low and middle-income earners. The problem the policy is trying to fix is one that’s particularly acute in Canada.
Here’s an easier solution: make real estate a poor investment by raising property taxes. It either works (great) or it doesn’t (also great, because now the government has more money and more resources to build out infrastructure and housing).
That would put a lot of pressure on those who are struggling.
Taxes should be income based.
I think taxes should be mostly wealth based, not income based.
You want to know why?
Because it’s easy for some rich bastard to report zero income while having billions in assets.
Someone who already can’t make end’s meet would feel the sting of any amount of taxation in day-to-day life compared to a billionaire.
Wealth hoarding should be severely taxed. You want more land than humanly acceptable? Six houses at 10,000sq+ each? 15 cars? A tennis court and equestrian ranch for friends and family? Fine, get ready to pay a lot for it on an ongoing basis.
I’m in the lowest tax bracket. I only made about $34k last year. The amount of income tax I paid was equivalent to about 25% of my total wealth.
Calculate 25% of your total wealth. How would it feel to pay that much in taxes? Because that’s how much I paid.
Fuck income tax.
What province do you live in?
How much is 25% of your total wealth?
I want to know which province you live in to know what the tax brackets are.
I want to know what 25% of your total wealth is so you can be confronted with number and forced to think about what it would be like to pay as much tax as I do.
My friend, I’m not against you. I don’t know why you’re acting like this.
Everytime I bring that figure up, everyone questions my wealth and my income and my taxes, but nobody reflects on their own wealth and what it would be like to carry the tax burden I’m saddled with.
That’s point of the statement: to make you consider just how large and unfair my tax burden is. Especially in comparison to people who are many times richer than I am, yet have a tax burden that is a mere fraction of mine.