Politics thread (USA Elections 2016) - Page 93

Macron has called for a "great national debate" recently and he has already decided what would be talked about lol. The whole point is that people are sick of not having any power of decision and he reminds them that they don't get to decide anything. One of the things he said would not be talked about during the debate would be taxing the rich, so of course everyone is still pissed and they don't give a fuck about his "debate". Violence has ramped up.

On January 15 2019 19:57 Loco wrote: One of the things he said would not be talked about during the debate would be taxing the rich, so

France has a more equal income distribution than the average of the European Union, better than Germany, Canada, Korea, US, Australia UK etc, and has in fact improved slightly over the past 40 years.

What do you have to say about that?

France is probably the most social country in the entire world, I really don't understand the protests. Macron just wants the "common guy" to actually start working cause the country will fail in the long run. 10% of the country is employed in the administration, that is fucking absurd...

France already taxes the rich by shitton, there is a reason a few years back many French businessmen fled the country and bought citizenship elsewhere. Their education is free and there are shitton of scholarships for students which basically support them throughout their entire study without the necessity to work (the money is enough to survive not more than that but still..). No idea about their healthcare system but it's Western Europe so i doubt its bad. Their average salaries compared to other European countries is quite competitive... so what the hell is the problem?

This whole thing feels like it has been started by an external source to cause chaos in the country. Yellow vests have nothing to protest for

On January 16 2019 02:17 Baalim wrote: Show nested quote + On January 15 2019 19:57 Loco wrote: One of the things he said would not be talked about during the debate would be taxing the rich, so France has a more equal income distribution than the average of the European Union, better than Germany, Canada, Korea, US, Australia UK etc, and has in fact improved slightly over the past 40 years. What do you have to say about that?

As an anarchist, when people turn against the government, especially after they have implemented austerity measures, the last thing that would come to my mind would be to say, "hey, why are you doing this? You're getting more scraps than most of these other people - you can't complain!" I don't care to argue about who is getting the shorter end of the stick in different neoliberal economies. It should be resisted. The YG movement (and other similar protests) are occurring in most of those other countries too, it's just not as publicized.

Macron wasn't elected to shift the burden on the under and middle classes even more than it already was, and opt for an outdated pro-rich ideology at the expense of the campaign against global warming. If he wants to save the rest of his term, he absolutely has to reestablish the solidarity tax on wealth, and he has to allocate the revenue to compensate those who will be the most affected by the new carbon tax, which has to remain. The only way that the carbon tax can succeed is if the entirety of the net proceeds from the solidarity tax is allocated to the social measures associated with the ecological transition. People are outraged because the government did the opposite: only 10% of the 4 billion Euros rise in fuel duty in 2018 and the extra 4 billion expected in 2019 were earmarked for social measures. The remainder financed the abolition of the wealth tax and the flat tax on income from capital.

On January 16 2019 08:49 Spitfiree wrote: France is probably the most social country in the entire world, I really don't understand the protests. Macron just wants the "common guy" to actually start working cause the country will fail in the long run. 10% of the country is employed in the administration, that is fucking absurd... France already taxes the rich by shitton, there is a reason a few years back many French businessmen fled the country and bought citizenship elsewhere. Their education is free and there are shitton of scholarships for students which basically support them throughout their entire study without the necessity to work (the money is enough to survive not more than that but still..). No idea about their healthcare system but it's Western Europe so i doubt its bad. Their average salaries compared to other European countries is quite competitive... so what the hell is the problem? This whole thing feels like it has been started by an external source to cause chaos in the country. Yellow vests have nothing to protest for

What is really happening is that France is one of the first world nations where the bill is coming due; the government has been over expending for decades and can't do it forever. Macron tried to cut back on some expenses/add some taxes (using the enviroment as an excuse) and is facing the backlash.

Add that, to a country with lots of people who believe the non sense that loco does (that wealth grows out of thin air and that government simply has to hand it out to people and that it doesn't because rich people bad) and the importing of poor people that further strain the system, and you get rioting.

People never want higher taxes, but they always want more government stuff. It's usually too late when they realize "the rich" cannot pay all the taxes.

The US debt is about to hit 22 trillions. When is that bill "coming due", do you think?

Here are some facts. Debts don't have to be repaid. The US certainly isn't going to pay theirs. Germany, France and the UK had debts ranging from 200% and 300% of GDP in post-WW2, which has never been repaid. Their debts were written off in a few years by a mix of cancellation, inflation and exceptional taxation of private property (which is the same thing as inflation, but is more civilized: the rich can be made to pay more and the middle class protected). The German external debt was frozen by the London Debt Agreement in 1953, and then definitively written off in 1991. This is how Germany and France found themselves with no public debt and able to invest in growth in the years 1950-1960.

However, the most relevant comparison is the French Revolution in 1789. The Ancien Régime was unable to force its privileged classes to pay taxes and had accumulated a debt of approximately one year of national income, even a year and a half if the sale of charges and offices (official posts and functions) are included (these were a way for the State to obtain money immediately in exchange for the future revenue to be collected from the population). In 1790, the Assembly obtained the publication of the list of names in the "great book of pensions" which contained both annuities to courtiers, as well as payments to former senior officials, with payments 10-20 times higher than the average income, which created a scandal. It all ended with the setting up of a somewhat fairer form of taxation and above all, the bankruptcy of 65% of those named and major inflation of the assignats or promissory notes.

In comparison the present situation is both more complex (each country holds a part of the debt of the others) and more simple: there is, with the European Central Bank, an institution that can freeze debts and could allow the adoption of a fairer system of European tax system by setting up a sovereign Assembly. But if people continue to say that it's impossible to make the richest Europeans pay and that only the immobile classes have to pay, then inevitably there will be serious rebellions in the future.

On January 16 2019 15:23 Loco wrote: The US debt is about to hit 22 trillions. When is that bill "coming due", do you think? Here are some facts. Debts don't have to be repaid. The US certainly isn't going to pay theirs. Germany, France and the UK had debts ranging from 200% and 300% of GDP in post-WW2, which has never been repaid. Their debts were written off in a few years by a mix of cancellation, inflation and exceptional taxation of private property (which is the same thing as inflation, but is more civilized: the rich can be made to pay more and the middle class protected). The German external debt was frozen by the London Debt Agreement in 1953, and then definitively written off in 1991. This is how Germany and France found themselves with no public debt and able to invest in growth in the years 1950-1960. However, the most relevant comparison is the French Revolution in 1789. The Ancien Régime was unable to force its privileged classes to pay taxes and had accumulated a debt of approximately one year of national income, even a year and a half if the sale of charges and offices (official posts and functions) are included (these were a way for the State to obtain money immediately in exchange for the future revenue to be collected from the population). In 1790, the Assembly obtained the publication of the list of names in the "great book of pensions" which contained both annuities to courtiers, as well as payments to former senior officials, with payments 10-20 times higher than the average income, which created a scandal. It all ended with the setting up of a somewhat fairer form of taxation and above all, the bankruptcy of 65% of those named and major inflation of the assignats or promissory notes. In comparison the present situation is both more complex (each country holds a part of the debt of the others) and more simple: there is, with the European Central Bank, an institution that can freeze debts and could allow the adoption of a fairer system of European tax system by setting up a sovereign Assembly. But if people continue to say that it's impossible to make the richest Europeans pay and that only the immobile classes have to pay, then inevitably there will be serious rebellions in the future.

Yes the US debt is the nation's biggest existencial threat. However, unlike France, the US economy has been growing steadily and is a much more productive nation overall. That makes the nation's standing as debt holder a lot more solid. Adjustments will have to be made there aswell, hopefully sooner and gradually rather than later and dramatically.

I will ignore the rest of your ramble and the idea that all problems are solved by having a supra national institution dictating how countries should be ruled, violating all democratic and national sovereignity principles (and of course, taxing more the mythical rich)

I get that GoTunk, but people are randomly starting to complain.. like what did they expect? (I know .. naive thinking of me to think that people actually use their brains)

@Loco the difference between the USA and France is that the USA lets big companies fail, except banks, while France keeps pumping government money into businesses that are beyond saving. Which results in everything that GoTunk has said.

The problem with France's fail is that it will drag down the whole EU plus a good chunk of Africa which still has its fiscal policy bound to France, even though they are not colonies anymore.

France requires to go under massive cuts, Macron tried to do it, unfortunately people are too blind to see the real reasoning behind it and blame him.

On January 16 2019 18:34 Spitfiree wrote: I get that GoTunk, but people are randomly starting to complain.. like what did they expect? (I know .. naive thinking of me to think that people actually use their brains) @Loco the difference between the USA and France is that the USA lets big companies fail, except banks, while France keeps pumping government money into businesses that are beyond saving. Which results in everything that GoTunk has said. The problem with France's fail is that it will drag down the whole EU plus a good chunk of Africa which still has its fiscal policy bound to France, even though they are not colonies anymore. France requires to go under massive cuts, Macron tried to do it, unfortunately people are too blind to see the real reasoning behind it and blame him.

The gas tax started it... social unrest just needs an ignitor to reveal the multiple layers of problems. I would add you have liberterian-esque protestors against gas tax and inmigration, and hardcore leftists protesting for x benefits from government all grouped together. It's like me and loco protesting together.

On January 16 2019 11:45 Loco wrote: Show nested quote + On January 16 2019 02:17 Baalim wrote:   On January 15 2019 19:57 Loco wrote: One of the things he said would not be talked about during the debate would be taxing the rich, so France has a more equal income distribution than the average of the European Union, better than Germany, Canada, Korea, US, Australia UK etc, and has in fact improved slightly over the past 40 years. What do you have to say about that? As an anarchist, when people turn against the government, especially after they have implemented austerity measures, the last thing that would come to my mind would be to say, "hey, why are you doing this? You're getting more scraps than most of these other people - you can't complain!" I don't care to argue about who is getting the shorter end of the stick in different neoliberal economies. It should be resisted. The YG movement (and other similar protests) are occurring in most of those other countries too, it's just not as publicized. Macron wasn't elected to shift the burden on the under and middle classes even more than it already was, and opt for an outdated pro-rich ideology at the expense of the campaign against global warming. If he wants to save the rest of his term, he absolutely has to reestablish the solidarity tax on wealth, and he has to allocate the revenue to compensate those who will be the most affected by the new carbon tax, which has to remain. The only way that the carbon tax can succeed is if the entirety of the net proceeds from the solidarity tax is allocated to the social measures associated with the ecological transition. People are outraged because the government did the opposite: only 10% of the 4 billion Euros rise in fuel duty in 2018 and the extra 4 billion expected in 2019 were earmarked for social measures. The remainder financed the abolition of the wealth tax and the flat tax on income from capital.

But your conclusion is incongruent I mean, how come a country with a much better Ginni coefficient has this much social problems in regards to their economy? And no other countries dont have protests of these sizes and are just being hidden... come on.

On January 16 2019 18:34 Spitfiree wrote: I get that GoTunk, but people are randomly starting to complain.. like what did they expect? (I know .. naive thinking of me to think that people actually use their brains) @Loco the difference between the USA and France is that the USA lets big companies fail, except banks, while France keeps pumping government money into businesses that are beyond saving. Which results in everything that GoTunk has said. The problem with France's fail is that it will drag down the whole EU plus a good chunk of Africa which still has its fiscal policy bound to France, even though they are not colonies anymore. France requires to go under massive cuts, Macron tried to do it, unfortunately people are too blind to see the real reasoning behind it and blame him.

"Randomly starting to complain" -- have you done 0 reading on the situation? It's almost like you entirely skipped my post too. I don't understand how you can have such a distorted view of what is going on there. It seems you have not even yet understood that the tax on wealth has been abolished in 2017.... you claim that France is already "taxing the rich a shitton" -- where are you getting that from?

These protesters span the entire political spectrum, and all age ranges. There are a bunch of retirees in there, grandfathers, protesting in the cold, risking to be mutilated by the police (Amnesty International issued two reports on the extreme police violence) or killed, and your first thought is that they don't understand what is going on? They're just motivated by, what, greed? Many of them can't put food on the table or find a job, some are homeless; they understand what's happening. They don't need a trickle-down economics lesson, but you need to read Thomas Piketty if you still operate on that level, he'll slap you out of that delusion.

"what did they expect" -- I think they expect that their children won't have a worse quality of life than they do. You know today's children are expected to die earlier than their parents? You think that's acceptable when we are at the peak of technological advancement and with all the promise of future technology? Seems to be a logical thing to fight for when you have kids.

Most of the yellow jackets don't blame Macron, they want him and his government out, sure, but they clearly blame the system. They are asking for participative democracy. Sure, the referendums that they are asking for wouldn't begin to deal with the public debt, and that's why freezing the debt and creating an European Assembly is necessary, but their push back is what can fuel such massive actions to be undertaken. Think back on the Roosevelt days. The rich will only ever give up some of their power/money in one instance: if they are guaranteed that if they don't, they will lose all of it due to a revolution, so it's in their best interest to do so.

On January 16 2019 15:23 Loco wrote: The US debt is about to hit 22 trillions. When is that bill "coming due", do you think? Here are some facts. Debts don't have to be repaid. The US certainly isn't going to pay theirs. Germany, France and the UK had debts ranging from 200% and 300% of GDP in post-WW2, which has never been repaid. Their debts were written off in a few years by a mix of cancellation, inflation and exceptional taxation of private property (which is the same thing as inflation, but is more civilized.

You don't understand national debt at all, you can't just default it without severe consecuences, read a bit about government bonds.

Most countries prefer to pay national debt with "blood" meaning hyperinflation which is basically making your currency worthless ergo the debt comes worthless, obviously this means economic collapse but its better than plain defaulting the debt.

Foreign debt can't be defaulted easily too, England invaded Egypt because of it and the US has a strong grip of many latin american countries policy because of that too, they are sometimes condoned as you mention because of political reasons, but to think "debts dont have to be paid" is just wrong.

On January 16 2019 20:44 Baalim wrote: Show nested quote + On January 16 2019 11:45 Loco wrote:   On January 16 2019 02:17 Baalim wrote:   On January 15 2019 19:57 Loco wrote: One of the things he said would not be talked about during the debate would be taxing the rich, so France has a more equal income distribution than the average of the European Union, better than Germany, Canada, Korea, US, Australia UK etc, and has in fact improved slightly over the past 40 years. What do you have to say about that? As an anarchist, when people turn against the government, especially after they have implemented austerity measures, the last thing that would come to my mind would be to say, "hey, why are you doing this? You're getting more scraps than most of these other people - you can't complain!" I don't care to argue about who is getting the shorter end of the stick in different neoliberal economies. It should be resisted. The YG movement (and other similar protests) are occurring in most of those other countries too, it's just not as publicized. Macron wasn't elected to shift the burden on the under and middle classes even more than it already was, and opt for an outdated pro-rich ideology at the expense of the campaign against global warming. If he wants to save the rest of his term, he absolutely has to reestablish the solidarity tax on wealth, and he has to allocate the revenue to compensate those who will be the most affected by the new carbon tax, which has to remain. The only way that the carbon tax can succeed is if the entirety of the net proceeds from the solidarity tax is allocated to the social measures associated with the ecological transition. People are outraged because the government did the opposite: only 10% of the 4 billion Euros rise in fuel duty in 2018 and the extra 4 billion expected in 2019 were earmarked for social measures. The remainder financed the abolition of the wealth tax and the flat tax on income from capital. But your conclusion is incongruent I mean, how come a country with a much better Ginni coefficient has this much social problems in regards to their economy? And no other countries dont have protests of these sizes and are just being hidden... come on.

Not saying that they are the same size, but the yellow jacket movement has spread out in many countries.

First of all, the graphs from the World Inequality Database are much more useful than the Gc. Secondly, your question doesn't make any sense to me. In other words, how come complexity exists? How come we can't predict human behavior based on a single number, isolated from all context? What more do you need to know other than the fact that these people are unsatisfied with their living conditions? You think they should fall for the fallacy of relative privation? They don't live everywhere, they live in France, and they act based on their needs and what they expected from their government. Macron was a bit of a wild card going into his term but he ended up being the "president of the rich" and they didn't accept it. They know what's possible (at least in part, informed by their history) and they are willing to fight for it. It's pretty straight-forward.

On January 16 2019 21:05 Baalim wrote: Show nested quote + On January 16 2019 15:23 Loco wrote: The US debt is about to hit 22 trillions. When is that bill "coming due", do you think? Here are some facts. Debts don't have to be repaid. The US certainly isn't going to pay theirs. Germany, France and the UK had debts ranging from 200% and 300% of GDP in post-WW2, which has never been repaid. Their debts were written off in a few years by a mix of cancellation, inflation and exceptional taxation of private property (which is the same thing as inflation, but is more civilized. You don't understand national debt at all, you can't just default it without severe consecuences, read a bit about government bonds. Most countries prefer to pay national debt with "blood" meaning hyperinflation which is basically making your currency worthless ergo the debt comes worthless, obviously this means economic collapse but its better than plain defaulting the debt. Foreign debt can't be defaulted easily too, England invaded Egypt because of it and the US has a strong grip of many latin american countries policy because of that too, they are sometimes condoned as you mention because of political reasons, but to think "debts dont have to be paid" is just wrong.

First, I got that quote straight from Piketty, one of the world's leading economists. So if you understand economics better than him, good on you. Secondly, you're confusing two different things. One is debt relief, or debt freezing, and the other is sovereign defaulting. It's you who should do some reading because, while it usually has to be repaid, history shows that it is customary to resort to exceptional solutions when the debt reaches this type of level. The practice goes way back: in Ancient Mesopotamia as another example, they practiced periodic debt forgiveness for over 1000 years. The other option for the French is for them to pay taxes that are higher than the expenditures benefitting them, with a difference of 3.5% of GDP, possibly for decades. That's not the ideal way to go, as it will have severe political and social consequences.

I actually didn't know that the tax which was aiming to get 75% of the income of the richest people was reversed. Read a bit on it, it didn't really work out now... did it? Turns out rich people would prefer to simply avoid the system altogether and keep their profit elsewhere, what a surprise... it also made it very hard for big businesses to find people to work for them at the highest levels.


Read some more, apparently, a bit above 14% of the population in France is considered to be living on the brink of relative poverty, which is earning about 1,000 euros a month. The amount of people that are homeless is quite insignificant to mention between 0.2-0.5%


What do you propose the government of France should do exactly considering they are already one of the most social governments in the entire world? Sure the application to the social program is quite slow due to the bureaucracy, which Macron wanted to fix by firing a good portion of the administration which does absolutely nothing productive and actually slows the system. I'm sure you are aware of Price's law of 50% of the work being done by sqrt root of the total workforce, now imagine it being applied to a mundane system of 6 000 000 people, ooh boi.

Unlike the times in which the previous revolution happened in, the rich can now just pack their bags and move before being beheaded, they also have international structures and laws protecting their businesses.

So I went ahead and looked into SOME (about 1/3) of the demands of the yellow vests:

-End of the tax hike on fuel.
-Promote the transport of goods by rail.
-Tax on marine fuel oil and kerosene.
-Monthly minimum wage at 1,300 euros net ($1947 CAD per month after taxes) ](thats really 150eu away from what it is right now)
-Indexing of all wages, pensions and allowances to inflation. (there has always been an european law which requires this???)
-Nationalization of the fuel for home heating and electricity sectors. (oh yes nationalization viva la revolution what could go wrong apart from losing any international business for the next 2 decades)
-More progressive income tax (more marginal tax brackets).
-The end of the austerity.
-No withholding tax.
-Restoring the taxes for the ultra-wealthy. (yes cause that worked well)
-Same social security system for all workers, including the self-employed. (at last a reasonable demand)
The pension system must remain in solidarity and therefore socialized.
No retirement pension below 1,200 euros ($1797/month CAD).
The increase of disability allowances.
-Retirement at age 60, and a right to early retirement at 55 for workers who have worked a hard manual labour job.(im actually surprised they dont have that, this is ultra bad indeed)
-End of outsourcing of work for French corporations. (they took arrr jobs? this is ridiculous)
Limit the number of fixed-term contracts for large companies, replaced with more full time employment.
-Maximum salary fixed at 15,000 euros [monthly] ($22469/month, or maximum annual salary of ~$270,000). (we tried socialism already people...)
-Jobs for the unemployed. (created by whom? what type of jobs? what qualifications do the unemployed have? can this be any less specific?)

There were much more ridiculous ones in the list but didnt want to make this post TLDR

Full list could be found here - https://www.reddit.com/r/neoliberal/c...irectives_demands_made_by_the_yellow/


They also have some selfcountering claims like

1. end austerity asap
2. End of the business tax credit. Use this money for the launch of a French hydrogen car industry.

?? You want to end austerity by the government, while the government forces its hand even more in the private sector? Sure thing guys, that works. Not only so but you are practically forcing international businesses to simply leave, while really butchering the small to mid companies, which they are supposed to be helping in the first place?

what the fuck is this absolute nonsense of intelligent people in this thread for some reason supporting the absurd greed of the wealthy and the oppressive pro-corporation pro-bank stances of the governments?

"why are they complaining they don't have it as bad as some other country!"

- really????

good on france for trying to make change. the entire world is shit compared to what it could be

On January 16 2019 21:42 Loco wrote: First of all, the graphs from the World Inequality Database are much more useful than the Gc. Secondly, your question doesn't make any sense to me. In other words, how come complexity exists? How come we can't predict human behavior based on a single number,

Exactly, the economy is comlpex yet you are the one who were talking about taxing the rich as a problem and solution for this in a country that already has better income equality than the rest of the European Union that doesn't have this kind of social crisis.

First, I got that quote straight from Piketty, one of the world's leading economists. So if you understand economics better than him, good on you. Secondly, you're confusing two different things. One is debt relief, or debt freezing, and the other is sovereign defaulting. It's you who should do some reading because, while it usually has to be repaid, history shows that it is customary to resort to exceptional solutions when the debt reaches this type of level. The practice goes way back: in Ancient Mesopotamia as another example, they practiced periodic debt forgiveness for over 1000 years. The other option for the French is for them to pay taxes that are higher than the expenditures benefitting them, with a difference of 3.5% of GDP, possibly for decades. That's not the ideal way to go, as it will have severe political and social consequences.

No fucking clue who Pikketty is but let me guess, he is some kind of leftist economist (lol) who is either an idiot, disingenious or most likely, you are simply misinterpreting him.

"pay taxes higher than expenditures" IS paying the fucking debt lol, that means a budget running on surplus used to pay the national debt.

Also lol @ talking about Mesopotamia when discussing national debt on fiat economies.

On January 17 2019 00:46 asdf2000 wrote: what the fuck is this absolute nonsense of intelligent people in this thread for some reason supporting the absurd greed of the wealthy and the oppressive pro-corporation pro-bank stances of the governments? "why are they complaining they don't have it as bad as some other country!" - really????

Because these intelligent people realize that the economy is not a zero sum game and that a system that forces wealth redisribution creates certain incentives that causes that everybody is equally poor.

Nobody here is supporting banks or corporations or even the government

Also nobody is saying that they have it better than X country, Ï said that they want a more flat income distribution yet France has better income distribution than the EU and you dont see these problems in Germany et al.

good on france for trying to make change. the entire world is shit compared to what it could be

and the world could be way worse, in fact it has been worse since men crawled out of the slime and certainly it isn't going to be better by lighting your infrastructure on fire demanding that the government stop budget cuts when it has to cut budgets when they are running the country with an absurd deficit due to ridiculous social programs

On January 17 2019 02:15 Baalim wrote: No fucking clue who Pikketty is but let me guess, he is some kind of leftist economist (lol) who is either an idiot, disingenious or most likely, you are simply misinterpreting him.

It was a literal quote from Piketty, I am not misinterpreting him. In all of your time on this website, this is perhaps the best evidence of how overtly ideological you are, and how little you care about the truth. "Let me guess, he's just a leftist, an idiot or disingenuous". Let's just inject our prejudices before we know anything about the guy, how could that go wrong. Yep, that's the most likely option. It couldn't be that someone who has devoted his life to studying wealth inequality could know more about it than you.

Absolutely zero intellectual effort was made by you to explore this matter because you already assume that you know the best way of dealing with the problem. It's as Hawking said, the greatest obstacle to discovery is not ignorance—it is the illusion of knowledge. Piketty, as a matter of fact, is one of those rare people from whom you have the most to learn from, but your deeply rooted confirmation bias and intellectual laziness stands in the way. I hope for you that you'll get a wake-up call one day and finally decide to start challenging yourself intellectually.

In any case, I've had my dose of reactionary nonsense for quite a while. You guys enjoy yourselves.

I generally don't care for namedropping but if you have no clue who piketty is then you actually have some mandatory reading to do.. I mean you don't have to read capital in the 21st century, but you should absolutely be familiar with who he is and the book.

Quick wiki synopsis

The book's central thesis is that when the rate of return on capital (r) is greater than the rate of economic growth (g) over the long term, the result is concentration of wealth, and this unequal distribution of wealth causes social and economic instability. Piketty proposes a global system of progressive wealth taxes to help reduce inequality and avoid the vast majority of wealth coming under the control of a tiny minority. However, at the end of 2014, Piketty released a paper where he stated that he does not consider the relationship between the rate of return on capital and the rate of economic growth as the only or primary tool for considering changes in income and wealth inequality. He also noted that r > g is not a useful tool for the discussion of rising inequality of labor income.[2] On May 18, 2014, the English edition reached number one on The New York Times Best Seller list for best selling hardcover nonfiction[3] and became the greatest sales success ever of academic publisher Harvard University Press.

I did see some decent critique of part of his data/methodology, something something about not properly taking property into account. You don't have to accept all his claims as gospel, but dismissing him as a 'leftist disingenuous or idiot' is really lazy. He is a leftist for sure, but he is also serious academic who has gathered and analyzed an enormous and impressive amount of data to reach any of his conclusions.

I didn't know who the dude was either, put the book Loco suggested on my reading list, then I saw that Nassim Taleb completely discards Piketty, calls his methods flawed.... Call me prejudiced or naive but I know that following Taleb's calls is a good move cause the guy gives zero fucks to enter a debate with anyone and really does his research before coming to conclusions considering he is one of the most skeptical people alive (skeptical towards himself mostly) .. .so yeah, I will still probably read Piketty's book but just to understand where his logic is flawed, but generally disregard any argument which points the guy as some 21st century economy guru.