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this post was submitted on 14 Aug 2025
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The reason is simple: Neither the center left nor the center right are delivering for the broad human populace. They both protect the ultra rich by not taxing them, which in turn creates a redistribution of wealth from the poor, the middle class AND the state to the ultra rich.
On a basal level, everyone understands that the economic status quo can not continue. Living standards continue to fall regardless of who is in power, and so it is inevitable that people will demand some sort of drastic change.
The loudest voice promising change is the alt right.
The second loudest voice is us, taxing the rich. It must be done, and we need to do all we can to become the loudest voice. We have several more years until the elections in eg. UK and Germany. Let’s do it. Let’s tax the rich.
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=pUKaB4P5Qns&pp=0gcJCa0JAYcqIYzv
I personally support 'taxing the rich', but I also think presenting this as a solution is hopelessly oversimplified. We need to rebuild the complex social contract, and this goes well beyond taxes imo.
It’s oversimplified on purpose. The message needs to be crystal clear, and it needs to be repeated so often that no politician can go into a Talkshow without having to explain themselves why they are not taxing the rich.
This is the only way to make progress here as a society. You need broad support here.
Having said that, I actually, earnestly believe that taxing the rich is a prerequisite to
If you are curious to learn more how this is backed up by data, you can eg. read „toxisch reich“ by Sebastian Klein (unfortunately only available in German I think)
Is this the solution or part of the problem? Don't get me wrong I don't question your good intentions, but I am not sure whether this is the right way to get there. Our information pipelines - and the talkshows - are crammed full of simple would-be solutions that doesn't bring us any further imo.
What we needed is a broad public discussion across the whole society asking questions like, "What should the state and our democratic communities be responsible for?", "How much money should the government spend, and for what?" (These are, btw, the same questions any university lecture on Public Finance starts with.)
Are talkshows (or big tech's social media such as Tiktok, Facebook, and the like) the right tools to discuss these? I don't think so. I used to believe that decentralized platforms like Lemmy may offer an opportunity to initiate such a debate, but after a few days here I am not so sure anymore. There is as much partisanship and totalitarian gibberish as anywhere else.
Maybe this comment is a bit off-topic, so just ignore it (and feel free to delete it), these are just my 2 cents.
I think most people calling for a tax on the rich understand this only works in a broader system of a well managed government. We can't tax the rich 99% and be done with it. But it's good to mention the things we need to thrive as a community:
It is the lynchpin though.
Not just for generating revenue to fund public programs. In fact, arguably, that's not even the main point.
The real problem is inequality. We need "punitive" (a better word might be "rebalancing" or "excisional") wealth taxes on the rich, to rebalance society and restore the social contract. Basically, short of a proper socialist revolution, we need to make the rich much less rich, make billionaires millionnaires again.