Juergen Hannappel wrote:

Duane Bozarth writes:

[...]

Of course leveling the standard of living has to go in both
directions: better for the poor, worse for the rich.

Globally speaking, all of us in the west are rich.

Well, that change in human nature has eluded all who've tried it so far

I know.

and likely will continue to do so. Not much use in wishing for what
will never be...

Guess why I will definedly not have children.

[...]

That's an aim directly targetted by most developed nations' tax
structure--but it's not clear that punitively taxing the upper echelon
actually does anything to actually promote the objective.

Since the punitive tax is so extremely mild the effect is small.
--

In places outside the US it isn't nearly as small...I ran across an
engineer at a Canadian power plant a number of years ago while servicing
equipment on site. He was complaining that the pay packet contained
less than half of his earnings. Needless to say, it was not motivation
to improve the economics of his province, thus providing for the growth
required to "lift" the others in less fortunate circumstances. It
simply is against human nature, and thereby self-limiting.