If You Can Afford Cell Phones, iPads, Video Games, Nike Shoes, Netflix, Then Under The ACA...

[MADem]

49. The rich go offshore in that case. It's what happened in UK.

If you go too crazy with the "progressive" income tax, the wealthy just move ... to Ireland. Or somewhere else that will give them a better deal--and believe me, the countries are lining up to give the rich a better deal, after all, they are rich, they bring money in, they hire people and add to the economy, they usually don't cause too much trouble and if they do, well, they buy their way out of it, adding to the GDP--it's a win-win for the country that takes on these tax avoiders. You don't want your wealthiest people becoming tax exiles. That is what happened in UK.

Ask Paul McCartney and a host of other wealthy Brits. http://www.wolfgangsvault.com/blog/index.php/2010/04/so-you-wanna-be-a-tax-exile/

There's a delicate balance at work there. I can tell you I didn't like living with the UK VAT. It wasn't like sales taxes are here, where they nickle and dime you to death, they "pound and fiver" you over there. It's onerous, the cost of goods/services.

I don't claim to have the answers to this conundrum, but I will say that, after initial resistance, Massachusetts likes our system now. I think it's worth giving it a try. If other states come up with better ideas, if health care providers find more efficiencies to bring costs down, well, that's all good.

We've got to start somewhere, though, and Single Payer was just not going to happen.