Redistribution of Income

as I see it...though it's easy to say "I want more and I want someone else to pay for it", eventually the costs of what we want comes down to us, directly or indirectly. For example, if property taxes are raised renters wind up paying for them, and that makes sense since the renters are the ones living there (or the business that is operating there). The alternative to passing the cost of things to the people who consume them is a killing of the "golden goose" and a diminishing of the total produced for all of us. If the landlord cannot pass the cost to the people or business existing in his rental property, a simple question of profit or loss directs that he no longer offer the space to his tenants.

In a democracy like ours, when hard times come, people can lose a sense of "I can do that as well as he can, and I too can be prosperous" and instead shout that "we want the government to take away what they have, and give it to us." and they vote that way. The problem is that "they" generally have earned what they have by providing things that "we" need or want. And if they are not incentivised by prosperity they don't go through the pain and risk of providing. Nor would you or I do it.

The Soviet example should make it clear that incentives work for the betterment of society as a whole.  I have asked my students who have good grades if they would work as hard if I took their points away from them (say 30% a la the "Buffet Rule"), and gave it to their "not as productive" fellow students. Not surprisingly the gave a resounding NO.

We already have a system of income distribution called the "Progressive" Income tax. And we have a history of being a loving and generous people. But lets be sure not to strangle the golden goose.