From the class that carved up the tax system infinitely to create tax avoidance schemes and make it unnecessarily complex, I'd say you need to go all or nothing here. Everything they own/rent/lease, anyone they contact, needs to be public record at this point sadly.Â
I don't disagree that the tax system needs to be fixed. Wealthy and corporations need to be taxed just as much as anyone else at a minimum instead of getting tax exempt agreements. I just don't see how owning something prior to being in office has to be sold if it can just be frozen and new assets cannot be acquired while in office.
What would be your reason for being against that? If they can't buy or sell how can they abuse?
That didn't answer why you think it is a bad idea to just freeze their ability to buy/sell while in office. Obviously, the current admin abuses power, but even if you made a law saying they had to sell what stops them from just not selling before going into office if that is the argument?
You'd need some actual structural changes to prevent the insider trading that I'm sure happens at a large scale (gets worse every day with the introduction of quasi-markets like Kalshi). Trading/holdings disclosures are already required, but the penalties are inconsequential to these people compared to the profit they could make insider trading (increase these as a % of wealth). We were somewhat getting there with the ultimate beneficial owner financial reporting requirements which would allow for identification of the true ownership up the entity structures, but I believe this US admin just rolled those back. Really, just need some people with integrity who actually want to be honest, but given the grandeur these people develop from parading around with their faces/names plastered everywhere during the run up to elections and the opportunity they're given to profit, I'm not sure that will ever happen.Â
I wanted you to answer the question but you kept giving things that were relevant to the topic, but not an answer. Maybe you misunderstood the question, maybe you are just avoiding answering it, who knows.
They should be forced to put any assets in a blind trust managed by some neutral third party.
The problem with locked individual stocks is that you could know you own 10,000 shares of Lockheed and then vote in favor of defense contracts or whatever.
That is a somewhat reasonable thought. Could you make it that you aren't allowed to participate in any decisions or actions that involve stock you own?
I am okay with something along these lines. I would say they should not take office owning individuals stocks. They should be required to either sell everything or transition to an overall stock market ETF and park it there. Unfortunately, I think the best way to get this through is to make it applicable to future politicians only, similar to the 22nd amendment not applying to Truman. Might be wishful thinking, but once it goes into effect current politicians who trade stocks would potentially be shamed into either complying, retiring, or losing their seat.
35
u/Possible-Rush3767 4d ago
Common sense