Thursday, January 2, 2020

As Piketty Demands 120,000 Euros Seed Capital for Everyone, An Inequality Board Game Was A Surprise Christmas Hit

The seed capital idea makes more sense than simply forgiving student loans, which, let's face it, simply advantage those already advantaged by their degrees.

First up. from Austria's Kontrast.AT via Scoop, October 30:

Star economist Piketty demands 120,000 euros seed capital for everyone – financed by a 90 percent tax for billionaires
....5. PARTICIPATORY SOCIALISM AS NEW LEFT POLITICS. A VISION OF PIKETTY
In Capital and Ideology, however, Piketty outlines a way in which the right can be defeated and the rampant social inequality reduced. He calls this new path “participative socialism” and builds it on three pillars:
  1. Codetermination at the workplace
  2. Nationalization
  3. Tax progression.
Thomas Piketty builds upon the Central and Northern European model of social partnership but he wants to push the codetermination even further, Workers should have more say in the management of their companies. This private sector with strong co-determination should stand alongside a strong public sector. The sate should organise education, health and infrastructure, not the market.
However, Piketty’s most radical demand concerns the tax system:
He advocates a top income tax rate of 90 percent. In addition, he argues for a wealth tax that is higher than the average increase in wealth. This would reduce wealth inequality instead of increasing it.
With the tax income from wealth taxes, each citizen gets an unconditional capital stock. The capital stock should be 60 percent of the average wealth and would be paid to everyone on the 25th birthday, according to Piketty’s proposal. For every Austrian that would be a share capital of €120,000. That would be the democratisation of wealth.
Perhaps a bit much for some of our readers, (99%?) [see what I did there?] so here's something else to think about.  From Radio France Internationale, December 28:

Board game exposing French wealth gap is an unexpected Christmas hit
There’s been a clear winner to emerge from pension reform strikes that have crippled France this Christmas: a board game that exposes the gap between the country’s rich and poor.

Kapital, the brainchild of husband and wife sociologists Monique and Michel Pinçon-Charlot, sold out of all 10,000 copies within three weeks of its launch.

A mixture of Monopoly and Game of the Goose, Kapital “seeks to make people understand the notion of wealth” as they battle their way through the game’s 82 boxes (the average life expectancy of a French person) leading to the almighty Tax Haven.

Not only do the wealthy have money, they also have social, symbolic and cultural capital. Just as in real life, the dominant players have the best chance of winning.
One player will have a good draw and end up among the rich, while others will be the struggling poor and middle classes.

Kapital has been such a hit that an extra 5,000 copies have been ordered. That a game about class struggle and injustice has been so successful has come as a surprise to its creators....
....MORE
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