Warren's 2%/3% wealth tax is best as it reduces the growth rate of the largest fortunes to that of the mere millionaires (see Thomas Piketty, "Capitalism in the Twenty-First Century"). We all know that a system which flows increasing ownership to fewer and fewer people is not sustainable any more than the end game of Monopoly.



Of course, given the ever-changing political winds affecting how tax dollars are spent, the best tax is no tax at all but rather inducements to increase wages. For working families to receive an income which represents the same slice of the economic pie as they received during our golden economic age of 1948-1972, would require workers to get a average pay increase of $5/hr. The best way to achieve this is to fine excess corporate income (i.e. rent). Such a fine would be based upon each corporation's historical earnings to wages ratio (only wages below $250,000 per employee would be considered for this calculation). Any earnings in excess of their historical earnings to wages ratio limit would be fined at a rate of 100%. By reducing all ratios by 1.5% each year, we could achieve the economic sweet spot of wages equal to 50% of GDP over a period of 10 years.



Such a plan would have many advantages:

Simple to monitor and very difficult to cheat as ratio is based upon W2 wage and SEC earnings filings which are already in the hands of the government.

Restoration of growing demand for goods and services beyond that due to population growth.

Companies would enlarge payrolls to avoid the 100% fine, thereby increasing payments to owners.

Workers would be motivated to work with management as the preponderance of every dollar of gross profit created would flow to workers

Owners would see their businesses and income rise because of demand growth.

We could finally move away from gross stock buybacks to new investments in plant, equipment, development and people.