Yeah, I'm generally onboard for higher top tax rates, some additional higher brackets, and higher tax on investment income, ideally paired with lowered rates on the lower brackets/higher standard deduction. This would hit me, but I think we need it to avoid some of the more extreme populist futures.
But we also really need to fix spending, especially procurement, the amount of wealth that we're collectively being cheated out of via terrible government contracts is staggering, there's a large network of extremely inefficient businesses that live off of the federal govt. Also, the medical system, though my understanding is that Medicare is generally getting a better deal than private insurers.
But 99% of the time, if you say "reduce spending", everyone, on both sides of the aisle, will hear "stop helping people", which is deeply counterproductive, as well as being cruel.
One of these things is not like the others, one of these things just doesn't belong...
Austerity and entitlement cuts are what we've been trying since Reagan. They haven't worked. They don't work.
Raising taxes is unpopular, sure, but a) it can actually solve the problems—not just the symptoms, but make a good hard dig in at the root causes—and b) if we do it right, only a tiny fraction of the people will have to bear those increases.
Because what we need to be doing is returning tax rates to what they were like before Reagan. Before "trickle-down economics". Before all this black magic shit that has never worked, will never work, and any actual economist with a brain and a functioning heart could tell you would never work right from the start.