Dude, I understand your frustration.
But these people just want to be safe and raise their kids without worrying that some neo-nazis are going to harm them or their kids for having the wrong race or creed.
They aren't necessarily affluent, though not poor either. Just middle-class progressive people that need to have both parents working to afford a house, car, groceries.
Yes, I am sorry you got f-d by the medical costs. I really wish it were different.
I'm European, and I get miserable reading about the USA.
It's also quite telling that I see so many American expats here nowadays. It used to be quite rare, usually if you met an American living here they would be either working for an American company, or have a relationship with a local.
Now, I'm just meeting a lot of super talented and smart Americans who took a major paycut just to not live in the US anymore.
Most of them, along with most houses in general, are in cities where the unhoused do need them.
Yes, people are sadly dumb and fall for bad messaging. I recognize that as a weakness.
The messaging should therefore be: lower property taxes for normal people by making it progressive and combating tax evasion by foreign investors.
My scheme significantly empowers normal people vs. speculators/investors. Speculators need a positive return to justify their investment.
Therefore, it will basically put a moat around the housing market that greatly benefits owner-occupiers.
I can support this.
Brazil and Suriname back into the European world.
🇧🇷🇸🇷
I like your thinking. Personally, I prefer easier schemes that are difficult to avoid.
Schemes like yours, while good on paper, are often circumvented through shell companies and foreign residency.
I prefer a scheme where we just tax all real estate at a quite high rate, somewhere in the 1-5% range. Let's say that a simple apartment would then result in €5K tax. A family home €10K.
Every citizen gets to subtract up to €5K of property tax from their income tax. So a family might pay €20K income tax, but can subtract €10K.
End result is a progressive property tax, which actually decreases tax on normal people.
People with expensive homes, foreign owners of homes and people who own multiple homes would be paying significantly more tax without the possibility to subtract it
Canada shares a land border with Denmark and a maritime border with France.
I think that is sufficient to include them in any extended EU schemes.
(To the degree that they want it, of course)
Here in the Netherlands, the government agency for housing has the figures on how many second homes people own, but refuses to publish it.
Journalists have estimated that the number is about equal to the number of people looking for a house. About 400K on a population of 18M.
The scarcity is artificial.
The US still holds about $100B in oil money it stole from Iraq.
But it actually stole way more, perhaps more than a trillion, which Iraq had to pay to private US contractors. The American taxpayers and soldiers got fleeced in that war, too.
Also the post-WW2 world order heavily favours their economy.
Their allies buy their debt, and their weapons. They give access to theiir markets to US companies, and support US wars around the world. They invest in the US economy in an unbalanced way that favours the US economy.
And all of this was in exchange for US security.
And he is exploiting the tools the establishment has built over the decades. Including huge transfers of power from Congress to the POTUS, a rigid two party system, voter suppression and gerrymandering.
You have no idea what they did or did not do.
You have no idea what they went through in the USA.
Look, I get you. I come from a family that actively resisted the Nazi occupation with guns, smuggling and at great risk.
And if it ever came to it, I would stay to fight. That's just my nature.
But it's not for everyone.