Well yes, but if you don't get paid your promised wages, you can generally call up a government agency and get them to make your employer pay up. If you buy stock and it drops by 90%, nobody is going to help you.

>you can generally call up a government agency and get them to make your employer pay up.

Thats not how it works, you can pay out of pocket for a lawyer to help you, but people in this position can't generally afford a lawyer. Take a look at all the stories of Trump not paying employees, they didn't have a government hotline to call that got Trump to pay up.

> The Department of Labor's Wage and Hour Division (WHD) is responsible for enforcing the Fair Labor Standards Act (FLSA). The most common remedy for wage violations is an order that an employer make up the difference between what the employee was paid and the amount he or she should have been paid.

> The WHD conducts investigations as a part of its enforcement of the FLSA and many investigations are initiated by worker complaints.

Not only that, but it can go beyond civil actions:

> Employers who willfully violate the minimum wage or overtime laws are subject to civil penalties of up to $1,000 for each willful violation. Willful violations of the FLSA may result in criminal prosecution and the violator can be subject to a fine of up to $10,000. A second conviction may result in imprisonment.

https://employment.findlaw.com/wages-and-benefits/how-to-rep...

Yes, but to couch Department of Labor's Wage and Hour Division as a phone number you call to get your money is not how it works.

Nearly 50% are denied after a 6 month process on average. Like disability claims or VA claims or immigration application...or any other administrative legal action, you generally need a lawyer to navigate through the process successfully.

But perhaps you have a personal experience you can share where you called and they got your unpaid wages from your employer.

A 50% chance of recovery in 6 months is still a drastic improvement over a 0% chance of recovery if you lost money in stocks.

Also, loss of wages accumulates over time and you're probably going to look for another job or quit if you're not getting paid. But you could easily invest several years of worth of salary in the stock market, and lose the majority if it crashes hard enough.

>A 50% chance of recovery in 6 months is still a drastic improvement over a 0% chance of recovery if you lost money in stocks.

Not from a taxation standpoint. And investors shouldn't get better tax rates than workers because their is a non-zero chance of losing their investment, if nothing else the deduction of their loss is already built into the system so why give them additional lower rates?

>But you could easily invest several years of worth of salary in the stock market, and lose the majority if it crashes hard enough.

The only people who can "invest several years of worth of salary in the stock market" are independently wealthy people. Again 40% of the country don't have $400 in savings, the numbers speak for themselves the median savings of the top 10% is $170k (even that wouldn't be several years of salary for them).

Risk has nothing to do with capital gains being lower than payroll/income taxes.

Bank bailouts anyone?

If they don't get paid they sue their employer for their unpaid wages. The employee would not owe taxes on the money not received either.

You realize it costs time and money to sue?

All capital represents what was at some point someone's labor. So I labored, was paid, then hired people to labor in exchange for money, then made more money from the products of labor, then risked the value of that labor in an investment. It's not less, and not more.

True but that has a small ceiling: capital can be your life's savings.

Yes, but the time is worth only $3.

Given the current market conditions, a person must risk $100 to get a return of about $3 max. The capitalist needs to put about 30 times as much at risk for the same reward.