Short answer: It depends on your goals. If your priorities are raising revenue sustainably and reducing inequality, then yes—well‑designed increases on very high incomes and wealth‑based income are defensible. If you’re most concerned about investment, entrepreneurship, and capital flight, blunt rate hikes can backfire unless crafted carefully.
How to think about it
•Fairness (ability to pay): Because an extra dollar is worth less to someone already very well off, progressive taxes can raise funds with relatively low loss in welfare.
•Efficiency: Very high statutory rates can push avoidance, shift income into lower‑tax forms, or move activity abroad. The key is the effective marginal rate after deductions, shelters, and state taxes.
•What you tax matters more than the headline rate: Much high‑end income is capital gains, dividends, pass‑through profits, and inheritances; labor‑only hikes miss much of the base.
•International competition: Mobile capital and people limit how far any one country can go without coordination.
A pragmatic “yes, but do it right” package
•Target the very top: Add a modest surtax or higher brackets only above multi‑million dollar annual incomes; avoid broad increases lower down the top decile.
•Equalize treatment of income: Narrow or eliminate preferential rates for capital gains and dividends at the very top; tax gains at death and curb shelters (e.g., carried interest).
•Broaden the base first: Cap or phase out high‑end deductions/loopholes; strengthen information reporting; fund enforcement to reduce evasion and aggressive avoidance.
•Set guardrails: Keep combined top marginal rates within a range that empirical research suggests doesn’t sharply reduce the tax base (often cited around the high‑40s to ~60% when you include all taxes), and pair changes with international anti‑avoidance rules.
•Consider estates over annual wealth taxes: If the goal is wealth concentration, a tighter estate/gift regime with fewer valuation games is usually simpler than an annual wealth tax.
•Use the revenue well: Channel it to high‑return public investment or deficit reduction to limit macroeconomic drag.
Bottom line: I’d support higher effective tax burdens on the ultra‑wealthy primarily through base‑broadening, aligning capital and labor income treatment at the top, and a carefully calibrated bump to top brackets—implemented with strong enforcement and international coordination. That approach raises meaningful revenue with fewer distortions than a large across‑the‑board rate hike.
If you’d like, tell me your priorities (fairness, growth, deficit reduction, simplicity), and I can sketch a concrete plan for the U.S. federal level.