I apologize for the title, but it was the shortest summary of what this article is about. Alternatives like “why people in democracies always vote completely against their own interests” are better, but also too long.
Over the years, I’ve written some articles about how democracy is not bad necessarily, but our current implementations of democracy are bad. There are many ways to do voting, to elect people, to handle who gets power over what, and so forth. We picked bad ones in most countries, including where I live, the Netherlands.
Probably the biggest issue here, which you arises time and time again, is that people vote against their own interests. It’s great to give everyone one vote. But it’s not so great when the whole system is designed to make those people vote for what they don’t actually want.
What do I mean? Well, I was motivated to write this article by something I read in the newspaper.
Swiss Vote
Switzerland regularly holds votes (basically referendums) on big issues. They don’t just hold an election once in a while; people can directly vote on specific issues. And so, just a few days ago, they held a vote on a massive proposal, namely,
- A 50% tax rate on any wealth exceeding 50 million
- Embedded in the constitution
- And all extra income from that should go to saving the climate/environment
I would’ve probably voted YES, if I were Swiss, but that’s not really the point.
It’s more interesting than that, and I wanted to get to the bottom of this.
Because an overwhelming majority of ~80% (on a reasonable turnout of ~45%) voted NO.
And no, Switzerland does not have that many citizens with wealth exceeding 50 million. In fact, only some 2,000 Swiss citizens would be affected by this at all.
Why NO?
So … why? Why vote against this? Why go out of your way to say NO to something that will not affect you negatively, and is sure to affect you positively?
Of course, people online are quick to state their reasons. (And to say it’s “more complicated than that” without elaboration, always fun.)
- Lobbying, as always, including the current government pressuring people to say NO.
- Switzerland prides itself on being liberal, neutral, and having a hands-off government. Anything that changes that is simply not done.
- People fear that this would be a “starting sign” for even more tax regulations.
- It will lead to an exodus (always lovely when you can use that word) of rich people, which would actually lower the tax income.
- People call the proposal “extreme” and say that they would have voted YES if only the numbers were better and some restrictions dropped. (For example: 10% tax above 100 million, only 10% goes to climate change prevention.)
At first glance this may seem reasonable. I can understand, kind of, with effort, how many people are swayed by things like this and simply decide to vote NO and be done with it.
But it’s not! It’s not reasonable, it’s not good, it’s not how a democracy functions optimally.
When you look closer, you’ll see that all of these are hypotheticals. Wild assumptions about a potential future, which you can’t know. Some of them are even wrong to start with.
This is where it goes wrong, every single time. Politicians creating fear for some imagined bad future. If you vote X, then surely, migrants will flood the country! If you vote Y, then surely, all that wealth will magically “trickle down” to the working class!
You can’t predict the future. You surely can’t do it without a large pile of statistics and systematic evidence to back it up. All you have are your current facts and your current logical reasons as to why a certain change would be good or necessary. Anything else does not matter.
What are the facts?
So, what are the facts?
- About 2,000 people would actually pay significantly more tax now. (But still a drop in the bucket compared to their riches or the country’s treasury.)
- All income from that will be used for a proven massive, worldwide issue. (That will never stop being an issue, because we’ll always be living on some planet with some environment.)
What are some more facts?
Fact #1: The constitution already has loads of silly rules and stupid rules in there—in every country. It’s not immune to change, it’s not some holy grail that should not be touched. The whole idea of the constitution is just “these are our MOST IMPORTANT rules” (or even “these are the rules we HAPPENED TO WRITE DOWN FIRST!”). And, especially for Switzerland, tax and the ultra rich are important. It’s their whole thing.
Fact #2: Lots of rich people are still living in countries with much higher tax rates than Switzerland. You can’t just say that all millionaires will leave as if that’s a certain future. We have piles of evidence that large companies will not instantly pack up and leave as soon as you raise taxes, because there are a gazillion other things that a company needs or looks at, such as the availability of skilled workers. As such, the opposite is actually true. There isn’t even a strong reason to predict an “exodus” at all.
Additionally, this shows the funny conundrum of being a tax haven. Rich people move to your country because you barely ask for taxes … which means they barely give you any money. With the current tax rates, lots of rich people leaving Switzerland will barely change what they earn, because their tax rates are so low.
Fact #3: Similarly, most of those countries with much higher tax rates are not busy moving the goalposts every year. The fact they introduced a high tax rate on rich people years ago has not magically turned into a high tax rate for everyone else today.
So, again, you can’t just predict the future and say that, if this proposal is accepted, then it will absolutely lead to taxing lower incomes down the line too. In fact, you literally live in a country where you may vote on stuff like this, so you’ll just vote NO in the future if it comes to that.
Fact #4: There were periods in history when the rich were taxed much more heavily. This often happened because society was in a big crisis. And guess what? Taxing the rich did not ruin their lives or make them go away, but it did solve the big problems by making everyone healthier, more productive, and better off. Crisis averted, problem solved, everyone happy.
Fact #5: Fudging the numbers is completely meaningless. We’re talking about something affecting only 2,000 people. If you have 50 million, you don’t need to work another day in your life and you don’t need to worry about anything anymore. Change it to 100 million and it makes no difference—now you affect, say 1,900 people.
As a reminder: that 50% tax only happens after that first tax-free 50 million.
Fact #6: There is a long, long history of funds recovered in one place being abused in another place. It’s actually smart to lock the profits of a law onto a specific purpose. It should be done far more often. It prevents that money from just being added to the pile and disappearing in some politician’s pocket.
Fact #7: Sure, in many ways Switzerland is still quite liberal and neutral. In many ways it is also not. Like all countries, loads of things are (heavily) regulated there. And, most importantly, the point I will make at the end of this article: Switzerland is probably less liberal and neutral than most other (European) countries because they are a tax haven.
Those are some examples of facts, statistics, historic evidence and logic you actually have. If people actually voted for what they wanted, voted in their “self-interest”, then this proposal would have been accepted with a resounding YES. Nobody would lose money except that tiny minority of people who won’t even notice it’s gone, and that’s that.
How do we change this?
How do we get people to actually vote for what they want?
Because that’s, you know, the defining feature of a democracy and the only way it will work somewhat well.
If we can do that, then all governments in the world will 100% flip to the (extreme) left overnight. Because the vast majority of people is not rich and powerful, so they’ll never vote for the right-wing policies that only help that group of people. Why would they? It doesn’t apply to them! It’s not in their interest! And such choices have nothing to do with political preference or perspective.
How do we change this?
I honestly don’t know. Stop trying to predict the future. Look at the facts, look at whether something is a good idea now, and don’t be swayed by hypothetical bullshit. Yes, in a democracy, be selfish! When you do, you’ll notice there are millions like you. Struggling with the same issues, struggling with lack of money, struggling trying to find a home. If they all voted selfishly, then proposals like this would be accepted and the world would be a fairer place.
But they don’t. Poor people vote for Trump, even though none of his policies will help them at all. Migrants vote for our own little Trump in the Netherlands, Geert Wilders, despite him promising to kick all migrants out for 20 years.
In every country, the majority is not rich. The majority works hard for little reward. The majority has the same struggles to earn enough money, get food on the table, and so forth. The vast majority should be absolutely agreeing with (“radical left”) proposals like this.
But people—do not—vote—for what they want!
And that’s a massive issue.
And now, with this vote in Switzerland, the truth comes to light. Switzerland, like the Netherlands, like everywhere else, is not liberal. Not neutral. Not unbiased. Not “fair”, because everyone has equal opportunity without government intervention.
Because a tiny group of 2,000 ultra-rich has somehow convinced a huge group of poorer people to vote against this proposal. They claimed it would be terrible to the economy. They claimed they would leave, taking their riches with them, which is no different than blackmail.
The world is actually run by money, not politicians or leaders. Countries are run by the richest, no exception.
Rich people decide. Rich people hold a country hostage with blackmail and lobbying. You’re never going to win any votes like this—just like the Swiss populace, for example, voted against minimum wage—because rich people decide. At least, until people learn to actually “selfishly” vote for what they want or need.
It’s the same in the Netherlands. The past decade or two, the government has worked very hard to give loads of benefits to large companies. Tax benefits, law changes, bending the rules but only for that company. It’s even somewhat proud of that. And why? Because they’re afraid those companies will leave. We have ASML here, the biggest manufacturer of chip machines in the world, and they earn so much money and are so important that the government just won’t say NO to them. They can’t! ASML have the money, they have the power.
As it happens, the ASML campus is actually 5 minutes from my home. I’ve cycled past it a lot; my brother worked there for a bit. Almost every day, I read about or notice the GOOD things that ASML is doing in our neighborhood. Building schools, building soccer fields, sponsoring events, etcetera.
And yes, that’s good! But why are THEY doing it? Why are THEY building homes and actually creating a better and more liveable town? That’s the government’s job, but they don’t have the money.
The world is run by rich people. And they do act selfishly. It’s extremely rare that anything good comes out of their existence and their actions, especially not something good for anyone that’s not rich. Why would they? They have the power, they have the money, they decide.
So when a proposal like this manages to appear, and you are lucky enough to actually be able to vote on it, then I just can’t comprehend how you’d ever vote NO.
But it’s not fair!
Now we get to the final retort in discussions like this. People who claim that taxing wealth, taxing the rich, just isn’t fair.
Why would the government be allowed to take that away? Those people worked hard and earned more, how is it ever “fair” to take more from them than from others? Shouldn’t they get more in return too?
Let’s take a step back. What does this even mean? What is “fair”? Should society be “fair”?
Most people believe “fair” to mean that everyone is equal. Those who are lucky to be in good health carry the responsibility of helping those in poor health. Those who are lucky to inherit a large sum of money carry the responsibility of giving some of that to those who die from hunger.
Most rich people believe “fair” to mean that everyone is treated equally and gets equal opportunities. Which is insane, because most rich people did not get equal opportunities. They inherited that money or had a network, which means they had a massive advantage. They get tax benefits because of their wealth—benefits not granted to those with less money or power.
And so, their definition of fair changes based on what they want in the moment. You never hear them complain about the vast majority of taxes which impact poor people disproportionally and not them.
An example
In the Netherlands, for example, we pay a high tax over everything we buy or sell. No matter how big or small. No matter how much the government or a bank was involved at all in this transaction.
How is that fair? Why should the government get any money over something that I made and I sold? And if they were involved at all, it was only to annoy me and slow me down? I’m running my own business with zero aid from the government, working my ass off, and I need to give them 20+% of everything for … what?
That tax is high enough that it makes many things needlessly expensive and many business ventures impossible. But … only to someone like me who doesn’t happen to come from a rich family. I’m piss poor and taxed to ensure I stay that way—is that “fair”? Paying that tax over things I make/sell means I can’t live off of that income, but for a richer person it’s nothing, and yet we pay the exact same tax.
Because of that, I can’t start the business I want to start. I’ve been working every single day for 15 years, no downtime, no free evenings, but taxes like that make it impossible to grow out of that loop. Whereas a richer person does not even see the hurdle. That’s not equal opportunities, is it? Is that “fair”?
I’ve written a lot about how poor people are not lazy or stupid. Poor people lack money, that’s it. And a system with “fair” taxes, the same percentage for everyone, ensures they will keep lacking money.
People who say such things (“Why don’t you improve yourself and not just leach off others, huh?”) are just 100% wrong, no other way to put it. I’ve been working harder than anyone around me. I am rather skilled in at least a dozen different disciplines, with my massive public portfolio as proof. I can’t physically work even harder because of health issues that are not my fault (traffic accident; truck drove into me when I was young). If I were taxed less (or even subsidized), I would’ve been able to climb out of that hole already and now run a profitable business. I would be adding a lot more value to society and be absolutely fine with paying higher taxes then.
But society shoots itself in the foot and keeps poor people in that negative spiral. And for what? You could easily subsidize the poorest of all, give them some “startup money” to climb out of holes, and pay for it by taking a tiny bit of money from rich people who won’t even notice it’s gone. Instead, I pay the same tax as them, or possibly more, because they get tax benefits and can pay their way into better fiscal arrangements (or… move to tax havens like Switzerland).
The fact is that taxes, and especially their implementation in most countries, are not “fair”. They never were and they never will be. It’s just the best system governments could come up with to subsidize things “for everyone”. We’re stuck with them for the foreseeable future as the only tool for governments to get that money and to try and keep society running.
Society versus Anti-Society
But we can go one step further. How did these people get rich? Where does the money come from? Why does the money have value at all? Who brings food to their table every day? It’s, you guessed it, society. Without other people creating food, the rich wouldn’t be able to buy it. Without other people generating wealth and governments upholding financial institutions, money would not exist at all (or at least not have a consistent value that makes them “rich”).
Society makes rich people possible. Society. The thing where we agree to live together because we’re stronger together. Where we agree to live together so that one person’s strength can make up for another person’s weakness.
There is no politial spectrum of left and right. There is society and anti-society. There is rich and poor, always has been.
- Rich people only exist because of the country that facilitated commercial actions and acquiring that wealth.
- Rich people only exist because they took more than they put in (that’s how you make a profit), which automatically means someone else got less than they put in. (That’s how you get a majority of people in “modern slavery”. That’s capitalism for you!)
- Rich people provide no benefit to a country besides their money. If they don’t spend that money, and you can’t access it any other way (such as with increased tax rates), then there is no benefit to keeping them in your country. (As opposed to people who actually work, every day, to create our food and other necessary things for the country.)
They exist because of society. And then their actions are always based on breaking that society down, extracting as much wealth from it as possible and giving nothing in return. Their wealth can only grow because someone else’s wealth does not—it’s guaranteed by the laws of capitalism. The vast majority of rich people inherited that wealth; they do not work, they do not create, they did not “earn” it in any way. And now they use that power—because money is power—to be anti-society.
Tell me, now, is that fair?
So, no, I don’t see the value in appeasing them and attracting them to your country. And yes, it is fair, by the definition I and 99% of people uphold, to tax them relentlessly. One might even call it the only situation in which taxes are fair!
Just the existence of (ultra-)rich people is a threat to society and your well-being. A threat to the 99% of people who are not rich. Because they can and will turn anti-society.
Conclusion
The main takeaway is this: Vote for your selfish interests, at this moment, based on the current facts, and nothing else.
Don’t work with hypothetical futures. Don’t “vote strategically”. Before voting, ask yourself if it’s actually what you need and want, or if some marketing campaign convinced you to vote against your own interests.
The Swiss vote is just a recent example. Hopefully I’ve shown how all arguments for voting NO make zero sense. They’re based on assumptions and hypotheticals, where even the assumptions are wrong based on all the data and research we have. Rich people/companies barely contribute to society because of tax evasion, and they don’t all leave when taxes are raised. More rich people in your country does not mean their wealth trickles down to you. Accepting one law that wants higher taxes does not cause the government to try more such laws, nor does it force you to accept those later laws. And the idea that Switzerland is proudly liberal and neutral is juts hilarious, because this vote proves that a few rich people can actually blackmail the country into voting against its wishes.
Remember there are way more of us than there are of them.
Blind testing shows that the vast majority of people are “(radical) left”. And that’s logical: that’s the side that’s for society. The one that’s for those who are not rich, which is the majority. These people just don’t realize it themselves, and they vote against their own interests because of bullshit arguments and scaremongering about unlikely futures.
Rich people do not have your best interests at heart. I often doubt if they have a heart at all, especially as more and more research shows that hoarding so much wealth is paired with narcissistic and psychopathic tendencies.
They’re a tiny minority with a lot of power, yes. Which is why, if you’re lucky to have a democratic government, and it actually puts things up for vote, please go and vote for whatever is in your interest.
We are the majority! The vast majority wants a society. Their work and their perspectives are necessary for a society to not collapse. The vast majority believes “fair” means that people who can miss the money have to pay it, to be used for those who are dying in the streets. The vast majority believes “fair” means that everyone should at least have their most basic needs met. That it’s only fair for the rich, who made that money off of the backs of society’s slaves, to give some small portion of it back to make it happen.
Anyway, those were my thoughts about the whole thing,
Tiamo