this post was submitted on 26 Mar 2025
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You know who has the government's ear? Ultra rich people. And they feed the legislators the horror scenario that higher taxes would mean they take their money and all their business and all the jobs attached to those to somewhere with lower taxes. And then they won't get more in tax revenue while at the same time increasing benefits spending. It's the billionaires' lose/lose scenario. It's a powerful narrative. The only way to fix this is to have all countries adopt similar tax codes. And that is about as likely as Putin getting the Nobel Peace Prize.
Well, Putin is indeed very unlikely to get the Nobel Peace Price but not because war or not, Obama got it despite waging something like 13 wars including few blatant full-scale invasions.
Maybe he should try to bomb the Nobel comittee itself, who knows, maybe that would impress them.
Obama benefited from being barely in office in 2009 when he got the prize. I imagine the committee in Oslo regretted their decision later.
No one familiar with the Nobel Peace Prize would use this analogy[1][2].
If my glib comparison is what you jump onto here, then have at it and virtue signal to your heart's content.
It's not really that powerful, nor is it likely what billionaires are peddling to the politicians. Where would the billionaires go with lower taxes and yet the same secure standard of living? What's to stop the politicians from raising taxes to 0.1% lower than these mythical low-tax countries with the stability and infrastructure to support their companies? That's just the bullshit story that is fed to the public.
In reality it's just what Elon is doing, but historically has been done more privately. "Prop up my business with low taxes, lax regulations, and tasty government contracts or I'll spend $100M supporting a primary opponent." And the politicians say "Ok give my ~~wife~~ spouse a board position or something and we can deal."
I would say the powerfulness of the narrative remains strong. The big corporations find ways to the cheapest way of doing business like most rivers find the sea. It doesn't have to be switching from a developed country with socialist tax code going to a developing country where labor is cheap. You can see it in the microcosm of the EU. The Republic of Ireland has favorable taxes and a less harsh data security watchdog so big tech companies headquarter there. Amazon sits in Luxembourg for similar reasons. Wages are cheaper in the East so manufacturing jobs tend to move there (or, sadly, the workforce moves west and gets paid cents on the Euro working in Central and Western Europe). If a government increases labor costs by demanding more benefits for workers, you reach a tipping point where companies pack up and move. Not all at once but after a while the creek becomes a river. That's the spectre haunting Europe these days. It's not just about a billionaire wealth tax, it's also about the levies in employment, etc. They all need to be similar in the tax codes for the equal playing field the EU apparatus idealizes. When they're not you move the mountain range out of the way for the river to find the sea more directly.
Trump's terrific tariffs are supposed to create a pull effect, making the US attractive to manufacturing jobs. I think he will fail because be will drive up the cost of living so much that market demand will not rise along with his expectations, making investing in factories in the US ultimately not enticing enough. Never mind the fact that corporations fear uncertainty more than the Beelzebub.