I know, it’s awful that people want rich people and rich corporations to pay their fair share of the tax burden. If they can’t pay their fair share and keep ungodly amounts of wealth, while people are homeless and children are starving, while shit, I guess they just shouldn’t have to pay taxes then. What if they had to sell some stock…ohh, the humanity! Will the horrors never cease! You sound like an absolute clown.

The problem is that they are all employing tax avoidance schemes. Corporations like Amazon will spin off their IP to a separate off-shore corporation. Then they’ll pay that corporation for the use of their IP. That reduces Amazon’s profit to near zero, meaning they’re not paying taxes. The off shore corporation doesn’t pay taxes either.

People like Bezos won’t take salaries, because they’re taxed. Instead they’ll take stock. Then they’ll take loans against that stock, so they don’t pay taxes. They just roll that loan into another loan and continue to live off of it, never paying taxes because they have no “income”.

So yes, their wealth should be taxed. Otherwise the richest among us pay next to nothing and yet benefit the most from what our taxes buy. If we weren’t adequately capturing taxes from the middle class, then sure, but that’s not the case.

Are other people paying taxes described as “ripping” away their ownership in “x”? What a bizarre framing. Also, Bezos owns less than 10% of Amazon, so he’s already given away ownership of the company. He has assets, and they should be taxed

How does Amazon exist? How do they continue to operate? They run on the Internet created by the US government, they deliver packages by flying through US airspace, and driving on roads paved by several levels of government. Their factories don’t burn down because of municipal fire departments, and aren’t burglarized because of municipal police departments. Why shouldn’t they pay for those things, which they make much more use of than you or I?

What does that matter? He doesn’t take wages intentionally. He has a large stock portfolio that he can borrow against and thereby pay no taxes on that “income”.

Yes, I’m sure if Jeff Bezos were worth 10 billion dollars less he would have just said forget it I’ll flip burgers instead. I don’t think you need to rip their company from them, you just need to tax them.