Kamala Harris' destructive economic policy
We need sound economic policy, not more class warfare. The politics of envy needs to end.
Kamala Harris' economic illiteracy has led her to make two particularly destructive proposals that should be rejected: Price controls and a "wealth tax."
First, price controls. The primary problem is that the federal government has no constitutional authority to implement price controls. That authority did not exist when Richard Nixon was President, and it does not exist now. While the Tenth Amendment is a dead letter and has been for generations, it does not change the fact that the Constitution does not give the federal government the authority to set or limit prices.
The primary focus is grocery stores, which already operate at a 1% profit margin. The people who will be hurt first is low-wage workers, so prepare for longer waits at the cash register, no baggers to pack up your groceries once they are rung up, and more self checkouts. Smaller grocery stores will die off first, and larger chains will devote more floor space to items with a higher profit margin. This is a feel-good proposal that has no economic basis.
The other terrible policy is a "wealth tax," or a tax on unrealized gains. That is important: If you buy stock in a small company that gets bigger, you are technically worth "more" than you were before. If you bought Facebook stocks for just under $40 a share in 2012, those shares are worth over $500 each today. Unless you sell those shares, you have not seen any actual profit from owning them. This will put a number of investors in a bind, possibly needing to sell the stocks to pay the taxes. That could crash the price of the stocks.
That does not just apply to stocks. Home values appreciate over time, and it is not unusual for the assessed evaluation of a home to be significantly larger 15 years after it is purchased - especially if that home was purchased during a downswing in the housing market. How many people will be forced to sell their homes and go back to renting if this proposal is ever implemented? This is not something that will harm only wealthy "fat cats" on Wall Street, but every middle class family in the country.
The "wealth tax" is not a serious proposal. It is "feel good" populism that ignores downstream effects for the sake of stoking envy and class warfare. It also has no realistic chance of passing Congress, especially if Republicans re-take the United States Senate in two months. Harris’ promotion of this fantasy is not just economically illiterate. It is also highly dishonest.
As with price controls, this is likely also unconstitutional. The 16th Amendment allows taxation of income, but unrealized increases in "wealth" are not income. There will almost certainly be an immediate court challenge in the unlikely event the proposed tax on unrealized gains ever passes Congress.
Kamala Harris has proven she cannot be trusted with shaping the nation's economic policy, because she is more interested in populist appeals and political slogans than doing things that would actually help the economy. She also clearly does not care about the rule of law. She should not be rewarded with the presidency.