> efforts to redistribute wealth mostly destroy it

Not sure what you mean by this. Isn't the goal here to destroy a lot of wealth? Wealth is a relative term - someone with $1B is not rich because 1B is an inherently big number, they are rich because $1B is orders of magnitudes greater than what most people will make in their lifetimes. Making people all have about the same in the bank other would destroy wealth.

While relative wealth definitely has value (mostly because it enables you to afford the labor of others), wealth itself is not fundamentally relative.

- Almost everyone today (in western, developed nations) has more purchasing power than almost everyone did 100 years ago. Doesn't that mean that everyone is more wealthy?

- As new technology is developed, Alice's wealth depends less on Bob's poverty, because she can rely more on automation and less on Bob's labor. This might cause tremendous problems for Bob, but that's besides the point. Bob can now (if he manages to prosper) become immeasurably wealthy without reducing Alice's wealth in the least.

- You could make millions of dollars selling farm equipment. It seems clear that, in doing this, you are accumulating wealth. But it is not clear that your success needs to be at anyone's expense. Presumably your customers are buying your wares because your product helps them build wealth too. If the market is saturated, your success might come at the expense of your competitor's, but that seems like a different phenomenon from the idea of relative wealth that you've described above.

He means that by trying to redistribute wealth, we end up with less overall to go around. Something like a smaller GDP, though I don't know if that's the metric the parent has in mind. I also don't know how true this argument is; I'm just the messenger.

Wealth has been redistributed via various government means for centuries. Did the income tax help society or destroy it? What would this discussion look like without it?

There are ways of gradually doing it that don't involve mass upheaval.

History shows no such thing.

Making college free (or at least easily affordable) is highly redistributive and highly accretive. See also: public transportation, affordable childcare, and so.

You're not just wrong when you say that government efforts to redistribute wealth mostly destroy it. The opposite is true: funding the commons through progressive taxation makes modern society possible. Redistribution is at the absolute core of everything the government does.

An interesting perspective, feels cynical to me. I fully support progressive taxation, free education, public transit, affordable health care and so-forth. I would argue that government is a service provider. We can't all be expected to maintain our own defense, so we do it together. When we are provided these services that are equal to or greater than the value that we pay for them, we are richer for it. There is no redistribution there. The more wealth you have the more valuable the local police force is to you. The wealthy need educated employees. Government is able to organize childcare services that keep low income workers in the workforce, that helps everyone.

> government efforts to redistribute wealth mostly destroy it

> I fully support progressive taxation, free education, public transit, affordable health care

Choose one.

(Hint: all taxation is redistributive)

I do not accept the premise that all taxation is redistributive. When services are provided to the taxpayer that exceed the value of the taxes then wealth is created. We as a society choose to perform certain services collectively though our government because it costs less to do it together. There is a tipping point where taxation becomes redistribution.

Taxes are not exclusively redistributive, but redistribution is at the core of what the government does.

Healthcare transfers resources from the healthy to the sick. Government redistributes resources to children and to the elderly, because they can't provide for themselves.

We pay for roads we don't drive on. We pay for airports we don't fly through. We pay for parks and libraries we don't visit. All of this is redistribution from people who pay for the services to those who use them.

That these government services create wealth doesn't change that they are still redistributive in nature. In fact, the government has created and enforces the rules by which people can accumulate wealth in the first place. If the government makes the rules such that wealth automatically accumulates in the hands of the few, that's redistribution too!

It seems to me that you look at society as if there is a natural wealth distribution, and it's only redistribution when the government intervenes with that natural equilibrium by taking from some and giving to others. My perspective is that the government creates the very rules through which wealth can be created and accumulated (property law, IP law, incorporation, etc) and taxation is just part of this system.

We also pay for cell towers that we don't use when we pay our phone bill. We all see through our own lens. Heavy handed approaches to improving equality by disrupting the status quo destroys wealth, and we must instead strive for rules of wealth creation that promote decentralization without harming the net sum of wealth created.

Is that because the government redistributes the wealth, or because the powerful ones make it so that redistributing the wealth doesn't work ? (ie tax evasion)

The explanation I've heard is that it disincentives people from the hard work which creates wealth. Anyway, I don't think your explanation "the rich undermine wealth redistribution" explains the parent's conclusion that wealth is destroyed (a failure to redistribute wealth doesn't necessarily result in less wealth overall).

Yes.