2026 Mid-Term Elections

[Derec]

Stacey has said numerous times that she sees herself in a leadership role and not as a Senator.

US Senate would be a good stepping stone toward leadership roles. Certainly a far better one than GA House or the political wilderness she finds herself in for almost a decade now. In other words, she made a strategic mistake.

I saw her interviewed recently. She is still writing books, I think, and hopefully will work to get out the vote. She didn't mention any plans to run for any political office. Maybe she's had enough. I wish Biden had chosen her as his VP as I think she would have been better than Harris. Oh well. No sense in regretting what we can't change.

She certainly wasn't ready to play the role of the running mate, and if elected, of the Vice President. She was only ever elected to our state legislature, and that from districts that are so lopsided she never faced an opponent in the general election. Kamala had a lot more experience both getting elected in competitive races and in roles like Attorney General and US Senator.

I was a bit shocked to see that Bottoms won the Dem primary by a substantial margin. It almost made me feel as if Republicans voted for the Dems in the primaries just to vote for her, knowing she doesn't have a chance of winning.

I don't think so. First, the Republican primary is very competitive, with none of the candidates even clearing 40%. Jones and Jackson will have to duke it out in the primary. Second, it's not like Lance-Bottoms' competitors were that compelling that one would think that they have a much better chance at winning that she does. It is likely that more Democrats crossed over and took the Republican ballot than vice versa.

I've lived in the same house for 29 years and we've never had a Democratic Congress person.

I live in suburban Atlanta and have mostly lived in D+double digits districts, although I was in a R+double digits briefly due to redistricting before I moved across district lines. And my state legislature districts are so bad, they are usually uncontested (both GA House and GA Senate are safe D).

 

[lpetrich]

Thomas Massie of KY-04 lost the Republican primary to former Navy SEAL Ed Gallrein, 45% to 55%. It was the most expensive US House primary ever, at $32 million, with AIPAC and two like-minded groups spending $16 million against him.

AI ‘deepfake’ ads attack Massie and Gallrein in northern Kentucky GOP primary

The new ad attacking Massie from MAGA KY PAC shows a fake video of him holding hands with Democratic congressional members Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez and Ilhan Omar as they check into a hotel, implying they go into a room together. The first words on the screen read “Thomas Massie caught in a throuple!”

In white letters at the bottom of the ad, which includes faked CCTV footage and tabloid-style photos, it states “This satirical ad was created with artificial intelligence.”

Also,

A month ago, Gallrein was also falsely depicted in an ad by Kentucky 4th PAC, which supports Massie. In an AI-generated video, a scared Gallrein flees from a Trump rally and, in another clip, Gallrein appears to flee from a battlefield as Trump shoots at unseen enemies. It does not include any apparent disclosures that AI was used.

“Trump was in the foxhole,” the narrator says, “Woke Eddie Gallrein tucked his tail and ran.”

 

[unapologetic]

they will be geographically contiguous i.e. a continuous line can be drawn around the district, no gaps and no pieces elsewhere.

Garrymandered districts ARE geographically contiguous. None have gaps or seperate pieces.
The question is how to keep politics out of forming districts.

Requires apolitical electoral commissions

Great idea. One state recently did that. (I forgot which).
It took citizens collecting N signatures on a petition just to get a referundem on the ballott.

 

[unapologetic]

The PA primary was boring. Most canidates ran unopposed. Incumbant Repugs all won.
It's a closed primary, you only vote for your own party's canidates.
Explosion scare in Lehigh County

PA’s 2026 primary election goes well despite a few incidents

An explosive device went off near a polling place, but voting was not affected and few other issues were reported.

www.spotlightpa.org

According to the Pennsylvania State Police, shortly after 9 a.m. someone threw an “explosive device” near the Salem United Church of Christ polling place in
Catasauqua Borough, a suburb of Allentown in Lehigh County.

Police said the device did detonate about a half-block away from the polling place, but that there were no injuries and voting was not disrupted.
...
The Morning Call reported Wednesday morning that two men, Matthew Pletz, 56, and Jack Pletz, 24, were charged for allegedly throwing a small homemade
explosive from a truck as they drove in the vicinity of the polling place. It isn’t immediately clear whether the men are related.

The Morning Call reported that 17 other small explosive devices were found in the truck, and that the men were charged with felony possession of weapons
of mass destruction and risking catastrophe, as well as related misdemeanor crimes.

Another report:

Explosive device detonates near Lehigh Valley polling site

PA State Police said there was no information that indicated the incident was related to the polling place.

www.spotlightpa.org

... Siegel said one vehicle was partly destroyed by the explosive, and while it initially seems that the polling place was not the target, the investigation is ongoing and little is known at this point. ...

 

[Jimmy Higgins]

they will be geographically contiguous i.e. a continuous line can be drawn around the district, no gaps and no pieces elsewhere.

Garrymandered districts ARE geographically contiguous. None have gaps or seperate pieces.

Not all of them. Ohio had a discontinuous one connecting Toledo and Cleveland.

The question is how to keep politics out of forming districts.

Requires apolitical electoral commissions

Great idea. One state recently did that. (I forgot which).
It took citizens collecting N signatures on a petition just to get a referundem on the ballott.

But that means districting will be in the hands of <echo>unaccountable</echo> selection committees. OMG!!!

The ads against doing that in Ohio typically had people talking about loving their job and family and then complaining about unaccountable people, vote no! No on what?

 

[ZiprHead]

On Wednesday morning, Jeff Bezos said in an interview on CNBC that Americans earning in the bottom half of incomes should not pay taxes.

“Why is a nurse in Queens who makes $75,000 a year paying more than $1,000 a month in taxes?” Bezos said. “That’s $1,000 that could help with rent, or groceries, or anything … To me, it’s kind of absurd that we’re doing this. We shouldn’t be asking this nurse in Queens to send money to Washington. They should be sending her an apology.”

Bezos argues that the lower half of earners contributes just 3% of total tax revenue — yet someone like that nurse is devoting roughly 16% of her salary to produce that negligible share. She’s paying a meaningful personal price to fund a rounding error in the federal budget.

This moment of empathy may be surprising coming from Bezos, one of the wealthiest people in the world. Billionaires like Bezos have taken advantage of holes in the tax system so that they pay income tax on just a small percentage of their annual gains. In 2007 and 2011, Bezos didn’t pay income tax at all. According to a ProPublica investigation, Bezos’ wealth increased $127 billion from 2006 to 2018, but he reported $6.5 billion in income. While this amounted to a huge $1.4 billion tax payment, this represented a tax rate of only about 1%.

This isn’t illegal. Americans are not taxed on unrealized capital gains, meaning that if Amazon’s stock balloons to make Bezos even more wealthy, he will only pay taxes once he sells that stock. The ultra-wealthy do whatever they can to hold on to their investments. Instead, they take out massive loans using their stock as collateral, live off of those loans, and avoid paying taxes on them, since those loans are technically debt.

Has Jeff Bezos finally realized how unfair this is? Does he now understand the frustration of the middle class, who can’t just take out loans on their heaping piles of company stock to avoid reporting capital gains?

Yes, Jeff. Do you realize this?

Jeff Bezos, you were so close to making a good point | TechCrunch

"Why is a nurse in Queens who makes $75,000 a year paying more than $1,000 a month in taxes?" Bezos said Wednesday morning on CNBC. "That's $1,000 that could help with rent, or groceries, or anything."

techcrunch.com

 

[Shadowy Man]

On Wednesday morning, Jeff Bezos said in an interview on CNBC that Americans earning in the bottom half of incomes should not pay taxes.

“Why is a nurse in Queens who makes $75,000 a year paying more than $1,000 a month in taxes?” Bezos said. “That’s $1,000 that could help with rent, or groceries, or anything … To me, it’s kind of absurd that we’re doing this. We shouldn’t be asking this nurse in Queens to send money to Washington. They should be sending her an apology.”

Bezos argues that the lower half of earners contributes just 3% of total tax revenue — yet someone like that nurse is devoting roughly 16% of her salary to produce that negligible share. She’s paying a meaningful personal price to fund a rounding error in the federal budget.

This moment of empathy may be surprising coming from Bezos, one of the wealthiest people in the world. Billionaires like Bezos have taken advantage of holes in the tax system so that they pay income tax on just a small percentage of their annual gains. In 2007 and 2011, Bezos didn’t pay income tax at all. According to a ProPublica investigation, Bezos’ wealth increased $127 billion from 2006 to 2018, but he reported $6.5 billion in income. While this amounted to a huge $1.4 billion tax payment, this represented a tax rate of only about 1%.

This isn’t illegal. Americans are not taxed on unrealized capital gains, meaning that if Amazon’s stock balloons to make Bezos even more wealthy, he will only pay taxes once he sells that stock. The ultra-wealthy do whatever they can to hold on to their investments. Instead, they take out massive loans using their stock as collateral, live off of those loans, and avoid paying taxes on them, since those loans are technically debt.

Has Jeff Bezos finally realized how unfair this is? Does he now understand the frustration of the middle class, who can’t just take out loans on their heaping piles of company stock to avoid reporting capital gains?

Yes, Jeff. Do you realize this?

Jeff Bezos, you were so close to making a good point | TechCrunch

"Why is a nurse in Queens who makes $75,000 a year paying more than $1,000 a month in taxes?" Bezos said Wednesday morning on CNBC. "That's $1,000 that could help with rent, or groceries, or anything."

techcrunch.com

i note the article has no quote of what Bezos is suggesting would be a good fix. It seems he is basically saying “there’s no point in raising my taxes because the government won’t use it to help the nurse anyway.” Oh well…

 

[Bomb#20]

Buffett thinks his effective tax rate is too low. It doesn't matter what he does with his income to get the rate that low.

...
But morality aside, consider: if your total tax rate is 18% because you invested in a tax-shelter, that means the IRS is letting you keep 82% of your money for yourself. If your total tax rate is 18% because you voluntarily gave away 30% of your income to the American people, that means the IRS is letting you keep 52% of your money for yourself. Compare these numbers to the 67% that the other people in Buffett's office are allowed to keep for themselves. What makes 18% < 33% a better measure of progressivity vs. regressivity in the tax system than 52% < 67% would be?

Who cares if both they think both numbers are too low?

Sorry, I can't parse that. Feel free to clarify if you want.

But here's another way to look at it that may get the point across better. My local nonprofit radio station keeps doing pledge drives, more than ever now that fed funding is cut off. Sometimes during a pledge drive they'll announce that some donor has offered "matching contributions" -- that XYZ Corporation says if the ordinary listeners pony up some money by 7PM they'll match it up to $50K or whatever. It's a smart strategy -- everybody who pays can feel his donation is going further.

So let's imagine the government did something like that too, not just for radio stations but for charities in general. To encourage charitable giving the government promises to give 50 cents to the charity of your choice for every dollar you give, up to 20% of your income. Say your tax rate is 28%. You give 20% to charity, so the government makes a matching donation of 10%. The net effect is that you keep 52%, the government keeps 18%, and the charity gets 30%.

Well, that's pretty much the situation Buffett finds himself in. Calling it a 30% donation and a 10% tax rate reduction, instead of calling it a 20% donation and a 10% matching contribution, doesn't change the underlying economic reality. What's in a name? The government choosing to use tax revenue to support charities can't make the tax system regressive. That's why it matters what Buffett does with his income to get the rate that low.

But, since you bring up the topic... What Buffett did was clearly not a scientific measurement -- he didn't have tax accountants collect everyone's tax returns and analyze them; he just asked around the office and averaged the answers. Of course Buffett knows how to compare effective tax rates, but that doesn't mean all the respondents did. Buffett's 17.7% was his total tax rate, so presumably that's what he asked his employees about. But what are the odds that they all understood this? Their answers averaged 32.9%. Would you bet a nickel that none of them told Buffett their marginal tax rates?

Why would they tell him a marginal rate when he was asking about the average?

That's not a yes.

 

[Bomb#20]

Thanks, that clarifies things. Drilling down the numbers, it turns out the reason Buffett's total tax rate is so low is because he gives so much to charity.

Another luxury most people cannot afford.

Also, I would like a citation where you came up with that.

According to Sohy's link,

... he found that while he paid a total tax rate of 17.7%, ...
...
So why is it that Buffett himself doesn't pay more tax? It's because the bulk of his income comes from dividends and long-term capital gains, which are taxed at a much lower rate than ordinary income.
...
Income Range: Single Tax Filers / Income Range: Joint Tax Filers / Tax Rate on Qualified Dividends and Long-Term Capital Gains
$0 to $40,000 / $0 to $80,000 / 0%
$40,000 to $441,450 / $80,000 to $496,600 / 15%
Over $441,550 / Over $496,600 / 20%
...
Being charitable could help lower your tax burden, too. In fact, another reason Warren Buffett pays such little tax is that he donates a respectable amount of his wealth to charity.​

So I did the arithmetic. It's a 2007 interview, so presumably he meant his 2006 taxes. Buffett made about $250 million in 2006. He's married, so the joint rates apply. The lower rates on his first $496K would bring his total capital gain rate down from 20% to 19.98%. So something else must account for the 17.7% total. I don't know how much he donated that year but he's famous for donating a lot.

 

[Bomb#20]

So the economy did not collapse when the tax rate was 91% and some people became billionaires anyway. So what’s the problem with a 91% tax now on billionaires and near billionaires?

You tell me -- you're the one who said "We need to eliminate all billionaires by taxing them down to size.". Well, a 91% tax evidently does not eliminate billionaires. So apparently 91% wouldn't be enough confiscation to satisfy you. What would?

A marginal rate of 91% in a tax code without all the loopholes would probably do the trick. Not sure about the resulting economy.

A marginal rate of 91% in a tax code without all the loopholes means those far above the cutoff get to keep 9% of their income. A marginal rate of 37% means those far above the cutoff get to keep 63% of their income. That means they'd need seven times as much income to get to any given take-home pay as now. This suggests, to first approximation, that the people who'd still be billionaires under the proposed system are the people who could make over $7 billion in the current system. America has about 35 septibillionaires. So, no, I don't think it would do the trick.

But why are you hung up on an ultra literal interpretation? At least to me, it is pretty obvious from the discussion that Toni did not literally mean no one should have 1 billion dollars of wealth.

She disagrees. I'm hung up on it because it seems painfully obvious to me that people trying for taxation levels sufficient to eliminate billionaires aren't doing it for the sake of extra tax revenue -- a guy who gets to a billion half way through the year and is prohibited from making any more is going to go on vacation rather than agree to work for nothing, so actual tax receipts will go down when the tax rate is hiked up that much. So they're motivated by a wish to hurt their outgroup, not by a wish to accomplish anything positive for anyone. I don't think pure harm is an appropriate goal for government policy.

 

[Toni]

So the economy did not collapse when the tax rate was 91% and some people became billionaires anyway. So what’s the problem with a 91% tax now on billionaires and near billionaires?

You tell me -- you're the one who said "We need to eliminate all billionaires by taxing them down to size.". Well, a 91% tax evidently does not eliminate billionaires. So apparently 91% wouldn't be enough confiscation to satisfy you. What would?

A marginal rate of 91% in a tax code without all the loopholes would probably do the trick. Not sure about the resulting economy.

A marginal rate of 91% in a tax code without all the loopholes means those far above the cutoff get to keep 9% of their income. A marginal rate of 37% means those far above the cutoff get to keep 63% of their income. That means they'd need seven times as much income to get to any given take-home pay as now. This suggests, to first approximation, that the people who'd still be billionaires under the proposed system are the people who could make over $7 billion in the current system. America has about 35 septibillionaires. So, no, I don't think it would do the trick.

But why are you hung up on an ultra literal interpretation? At least to me, it is pretty obvious from the discussion that Toni did not literally mean no one should have 1 billion dollars of wealth.

She disagrees. I'm hung up on it because it seems painfully obvious to me that people trying for taxation levels sufficient to eliminate billionaires aren't doing it for the sake of extra tax revenue -- a guy who gets to a billion half way through the year and is prohibited from making any more is going to go on vacation rather than agree to work for nothing, so actual tax receipts will go down when the tax rate is hiked up that much. So they're motivated by a wish to hurt their outgroup, not by a wish to accomplish anything positive for anyone. I don't think pure harm is an appropriate goal for government policy.

Tax rates are and should continue to be progressive. Someone who has an income of $1B would still have an income of $90M if they paid 91% income tax without loopholes.

I have zero respect for anyone who cannot manage to get by on that.

When I say there should be no billionaires and that at least part of the problem is the tax code, it is for a more than one reason: Yes, to raise tax revenues but also because we have demonstrated over and over again that we do not expect billionaires to follow the same laws that we do. We allow billionaires to have an outsize influence over every aspect of society, including law enforcement. They have far too great an influence over elections ( end Citizens United) and they have far far too great an influence over legislators and it appears these days, courts and federal and state agencies.

THAT undermines our democracy and what is turning our country into a kleptocracy.

We should all object to that.

 

[laughing dog]

Buffett thinks his effective tax rate is too low. It doesn't matter what he does with his income to get the rate that low.

...
But morality aside, consider: if your total tax rate is 18% because you invested in a tax-shelter, that means the IRS is letting you keep 82% of your money for yourself. If your total tax rate is 18% because you voluntarily gave away 30% of your income to the American people, that means the IRS is letting you keep 52% of your money for yourself. Compare these numbers to the 67% that the other people in Buffett's office are allowed to keep for themselves. What makes 18% < 33% a better measure of progressivity vs. regressivity in the tax system than 52% < 67% would be?

Who cares if both they think both numbers are too low?

Sorry, I can't parse that. Feel free to clarify if you want.

But here's another way to look at it that may get the point across better. My local nonprofit radio station keeps doing pledge drives, more than ever now that fed funding is cut off. Sometimes during a pledge drive they'll announce that some donor has offered "matching contributions" -- that XYZ Corporation says if the ordinary listeners pony up some money by 7PM they'll match it up to $50K or whatever. It's a smart strategy -- everybody who pays can feel his donation is going further.

So let's imagine the government did something like that too, not just for radio stations but for charities in general. To encourage charitable giving the government promises to give 50 cents to the charity of your choice for every dollar you give, up to 20% of your income. Say your tax rate is 28%. You give 20% to charity, so the government makes a matching donation of 10%. The net effect is that you keep 52%, the government keeps 18%, and the charity gets 30%.

Well, that's pretty much the situation Buffett finds himself in. Calling it a 30% donation and a 10% tax rate reduction, instead of calling it a 20% donation and a 10% matching contribution, doesn't change the underlying economic reality. What's in a name? The government choosing to use tax revenue to support charities can't make the tax system regressive. That's why it matters what Buffett does with his income to get the rate that low.

It doesn’t change the underlying economic reality. Neither would it do that if the charity in question provided food to indigent Nazis or supported christian nationalists.

IMO, how someone chooses to dispense their income in order to satisfy their nerds, desires and con science is not relevant to the issue of the progressiveness of the tax code. The higher the income, the more political power, especially at the billionaire strata. Which, imo, is incompatible with a democratic republic.

But, since you bring up the topic... What Buffett did was clearly not a scientific measurement -- he didn't have tax accountants collect everyone's tax returns and analyze them; he just asked around the office and averaged the answers. Of course Buffett knows how to compare effective tax rates, but that doesn't mean all the respondents did. Buffett's 17.7% was his total tax rate, so presumably that's what he asked his employees about. But what are the odds that they all understood this? Their answers averaged 32.9%. Would you bet a nickel that none of them told Buffett their marginal tax rates?

Why would they tell him a marginal rate when he was asking about the average?

That's not a yes.

Yes it is.

 

[Bomb#20]

The higher the income, the more political power, especially at the billionaire strata. Which, imo, is incompatible with a democratic republic.

Why would you think that? There have been hundreds of democratic republics. When has there ever been a democratic republic where high income people didn't have more political power than low-income people? The only country I know of where high income people didn't have more political power than low-income people was the one where Stalin died owning 900 rubles, six tobacco pipes, and a few shirts, pants and boots. The policies it takes to prevent higher income leading to more political power -- abolition of free speech, for one -- are incompatible with a democratic republic.

 

[bilby]

The word "billionaire" seems arbitrary and ephemeral in this argument. There's nothing magical about $10⁹; The same discussion could have been had in the 1920s about mere millionares.

What matters is what a person wants more money for.

A poor person who gets more money spends it on necessities (food, clothing, rent, bus fares, etc.).

A middle class person spends it on luxuries (gormet dining, designer wear, houses, cars, etc.).

A rich person spends it on indulgent super-luxuries (personal chefs, personal shoppers, mansions, private jets, etc.).

Once an individual gets to this "rich" level, they can have pretty much any object or experience they want. They can eat anything, wear anything, live anywhere, travel anywhere, But even this is not the kind of wealth under discussion.

The hyper-rich person spends their next dollar on political power, influence and legacy. They are aristocratic, despite their lack of formal aristocratic titles, and despite the (hypothetical) absence of aristocracy at all in the USA and the (hypothetical) removal from lower of aristocracy in Europe.

It is this to which people who object to "billionaires" are opposed. Not the $10⁹, nor even (for most objectors) the private jets or yachts. Political power in modern democratic nations is supposed to be held equally by all voters. Having $10⁹ should ideally give a man no more (or less) say in who will be President than having $0 does.

Whether this problem - this breaking down of the democratic ideal by aristocrats - can be solved by progressive taxation or other wealth limiting laws; Or whether it should be addressed by other legal means (such as bans or severe restrictions on lobbying, political advertising, political fundraising, political parties, etc.) is an interesting question, but one that the USA may be unable to ask due to the very broad rights granted to Americans by their first ammendment.

In Europe, aristocrats (in the broad sense that includes anyone with abnormal political clout, whether due to wealth, title, or position) are limited in what they may say or do to influence the choice of political leaders and representatives. Perhaps not limited enough; But there are rules about what can be said and done by such people, including prohibitions on, or strict spending limits on, political advertising. It's a balancing act, in which free-speech absolutism is as extreme, and as foolishly ineffective, at protecting the people from aristocratic excesses as was Soviet Communism.

As such limitations seem to be unconstitutional in the US, the remaining option for preventing or curtailing aristocratic (mis)behaviour that undermines democracy is to limit the ability to be wealthy enough to do it. THAT is what this discussion seems to me to really be about; "Billionaire" is a shorthand for "Aristocrat" here, rather than strictly meaning "person who has $10⁹".

The question is not "How do we eliminate billionaires", so much as "How do we prevent anyone from becoming wealthy enough to significantly distort democracy".

The aim is to ensure that the next dollar the richest Americans acquire will go to non-political expenditure. If the only way to do that is to confiscate that dollar (or 99¢ of it), then that's the price of defending the revolution. If you wanted to be ruled by an oligarchy of aristocrats, why did you bother secceeding from the British Empire?

Government of the people, by the people, for the people, is not (or may not be) incompatible with the existence of billionaires per se, but it is incompatible with letting billionaires influence what laws get passed (or repealed), or who sits in Congress, or who sits in the Oval Office.

 

[laughing dog]

The higher the income, the more political power, especially at the billionaire strata. Which, imo, is incompatible with a democratic republic.

Why would you think that?

Because the influence of a person should not depend on their wealth or income, IMO.

The policies it takes to prevent higher income leading to more political power -- abolition of free speech, for one -- are incompatible with a democratic republic.

I think you are trying to argue just to argue, because there is no necessary reason to think policies to prevent higher income leading to more political power require abolition of free speech.

 

[bilby]

The higher the income, the more political power, especially at the billionaire strata. Which, imo, is incompatible with a democratic republic.

Why would you think that?

Because the influence of a person should not depend on their wealth or income, IMO.

The policies it takes to prevent higher income leading to more political power -- abolition of free speech, for one -- are incompatible with a democratic republic.

I think you are trying to argue just to argue, because there is no necessary reason to think policies to prevent higher income leading to more political power require abolition of free speech.

That depends how broadly you define "free speech". At the very least, such policies must tell people how they may (or may not) spend their own money in promotion or distribution of their speech.

 

[Derec]

“Why is a nurse in Queens who makes $75,000 a year paying more than $1,000 a month in taxes?” Bezos said. “That’s $1,000 that could help with rent, or groceries, or anything … To me, it’s kind of absurd that we’re doing this. We shouldn’t be asking this nurse in Queens to send money to Washington. They should be sending her an apology.”

Bezos argues that the lower half of earners contributes just 3% of total tax revenue — yet someone like that nurse is devoting roughly 16% of her salary to produce that negligible share. She’s paying a meaningful personal price to fund a rounding error in the federal budget.

His point is good, but a nurse making $75k is above the median, not below.
He is also neglecting the fact that due to all the reproduction-dependent tax credits almost half of people do not pay federal income taxes (and even have a negative rate). But depending on how many children they have, a lot of those (Romney's infamous 47%, percentage might be even higher now) are in the top half of earners.

This moment of empathy may be surprising coming from Bezos, one of the wealthiest people in the world.

Why exactly would it be "surprising"?

Billionaires like Bezos have taken advantage of holes in the tax system so that they pay income tax on just a small percentage of their annual gains.

That's not a "hole in the tax system". Income tax is paid on income, not on "gains". Note that this is the same for everyone. If you stock portfolio gains $50k one your, that is not taxable either.

In 2007 and 2011, Bezos didn’t pay income tax at all. According to a ProPublica investigation, Bezos’ wealth increased $127 billion from 2006 to 2018, but he reported $6.5 billion in income. While this amounted to a huge $1.4 billion tax payment, this represented a tax rate of only about 1%.

No, it represents a tax rate of 21.5%. Is that too low? Do we need to add a couple of income and capital gains tax brackets? I would say so.
But let's not pretend that you can just divide two numbers and call it a "tax rate".
This ProPublica article did a lot of damage to people's understanding of how taxes work.

This isn’t illegal. Americans are not taxed on unrealized capital gains, meaning that if Amazon’s stock balloons to make Bezos even more wealthy, he will only pay taxes once he sells that stock.

Finally, a glimmer of sentience.

The ultra-wealthy do whatever they can to hold on to their investments. Instead, they take out massive loans using their stock as collateral, live off of those loans, and avoid paying taxes on them, since those loans are technically debt.

They hold onto these investments because these investments represent ownership of - and thus control over - their companies.
They also hold onto them because they only need a fraction of them to live on, even incredibly lavishly. Bezos is far more interested in traditional trappings of enormous wealth than somebody like Musk. I am talking huge mansions, megayachts, lavish parties like that wedding of his. According to the numbers above, Bezos realized ~$500M per year of taxable income to fund this lifestyle, which is a huge amount by anybody's standards. Should billionaires be required to take out even more gains just so Uncle Sam gets his?

I have already calculated why this "buy, borrow, die" does not work as a long term strategy. Bank interest is not free, and it cumulates. That's why somebody like Bezos over the years still sold billions in equity and paid the appropriate taxes on the capital gains. If BBD worked as imagined by people like this writer, why bother?

Has Jeff Bezos finally realized how unfair this is? Does he now understand the frustration of the middle class, who can’t just take out loans on their heaping piles of company stock to avoid reporting capital gains?

Technically you could, but you'd have to pay interest.

And yes, the tax rate paid by Bezos is not fair. There should be higher tax brackets. But it does nothing for the argument, and in fact it undermines it, to understate his tax rate by a factor of 20 like ProPublica and those parroting it are doing.

 

[ZiprHead]

Income is money or value received by an individual or business in exchange for goods, services, labor, or investments. It is the total consumption and saving opportunity gained within a specified timeframe, and serves as the foundation for measuring economic growth, assigning tax burdens, and evaluating wealth. [1, 2, 3, 4] - Legal Information Institute

It was a political decision to exempt stock gains from income.

 

[Elixir]

The higher the income, the more political power, especially at the billionaire strata. Which, imo, is incompatible with a democratic republic.

Why would you think that?

Indeed. There has never been a time or place where or when wealth wasn’t correlated with political power AFAIK.
Of course, come famine or losing a war, prospects can become bleak even - or especially, for the wealthy and politically powerful. The concept of eliminating such correlations is not useful for solving the problem. If it’s a problem.
I suggest that the electoral college be eliminated, election budgets of major party candidates paid by taxpayers, the senate representatives made to have some correspondence to the size of the population they represent… term limits, open financial books etc etc.
I have SOOO many fabulous ideas.
Stimulate the consumer sentiment! Drive the qualify of American education above its current Third Word quality!
Why can’t we dominate in cricket!!!

The only thing I can do IRL is try to be nice to people with whom I interact.
And VOTE!

 

[Derec]

Income is money or value received by an individual or business in exchange for goods, services, labor, or investments. It is the total consumption and saving opportunity gained within a specified timeframe, and serves as the foundation for measuring economic growth, assigning tax burdens, and evaluating wealth. [1, 2, 3, 4] - Legal Information Institute

It was a political decision to exempt stock gains from income.

Note the verb "received". You do not receive "money or value" from an increase of an asset until you sell it or receive periodic payments such as interest and dividends.

But you are right, any taxing decisions are inherently political. It was a political decision to pass the 16th Amendment which authorized the income tax to begin with. But there is a reason why unrealized gains are generally not taxable worldwide. For one, what happens if an asset goes down in value? Do you get a tax refund?