Some family farms are land rich and dirt poor.
Five years and political ambition make all the difference. Sen. Elizabeth Warren, D-Mass., has come out in favor of a wealth tax ahead of the Democratic presidential primary.
The Warren plan was previewed by two leftist economics professors from the University of California, Berkley: Emmanuel Saez and Gabriel Zucman. They tell the Washington Post that Warren will propose a 2 percent wealth tax on individuals with assets worth more than $50 million and a 3 percent wealth tax on individuals with more than $1 billion.
“The Warren wealth tax is pretty big. We think it could have a significant effect on wealth concentration in the long run,” Saez said in an interview. “This is a very interesting development with deep root causes: the fact inequality has been increasing so much, particularly in wealth, and the feeling our current tax system doesn’t do a very good job taxing the very richest people.”
Policy aside, it is also a very interesting political development. Warren has been a progressive superstar for some time. As a freshman senator, though, she stopped short of endorsing the idea.
Warren was railing against income inequality as a Harvard Law professor and long before coming to Congress. Warren stopped well short, however, of endorsing the key progressive prescription against evening the economic scales between the rich and poor.