The collapse of professional sports in america in Elizabeth Warren's presidency?

[darthmerrick]

I don't think we should engage in politics on sports sites, but here is a pro founding possibility that effects our team and I wanted to open it up to discussion. I recently saw a Ballmer interview about Liz Warren's 100% wealth tax and one of the things that was said after the interview was the Ballmer may have to sell the Clippers if she was elected and since she or Sanders (similar agenda) is most likely to win the nomination there is a good chance she could be elected president and her plans come to pass.

I want to ask that if we do engage in discussion we keep it about the possibility of the wealth tax and how it effects sports. I know her opponents in the last debates have already brought up the fuzzy math about her health care plan hurting the middle class, but lets keep the rules to this about the Magic and the effect on the NBA and sports in general.

I think how this effects us is the obvious is contraction and losing our team. If you tax billionaires and they are forced to sell their teams to pay taxes this devalues the brand in this case the NBA or the NFL franchises which causes losses to the franchises and salaries go way down in the next NBA players agreement. Lets go even further. NBA players could have mass exodus over seas without paying mass wealth taxes and getting higher salaries over in China or Europe...and TV deals go down. The struggling NBA would likely turn to contraction before closing their doors and the Magic would probably be chosen over the Heat. Some brands MLB, MLS may just go completely under. Would professional sports die in America and we turn to collegiate sports for our entertainment? So that's the discussion I want to have.

May be a crazy rabbit hole to go down, but I'm curious to know your thoughts at how far a "wealth tax" could go at changing American sports as we know it.

[Optimus_Steel]

I'm not gonna be sorry at all for the DeVos and their friends. Pro sports would still be around in some form, they still existed before the insane TV contracts.

[basketballRob]

Delete

[basketballRob]

I don't think we should engage in politics on sports sites, but here is a pro founding possibility that effects our team and I wanted to open it up to discussion. I recently saw a Ballmer interview about Liz Warren's 100% wealth tax and one of the things that was said after the interview was the Ballmer may have to sell the Clippers if she was elected and since she or Sanders (similar agenda) is most likely to win the nomination there is a good chance she could be elected president and her plans come to pass.

I want to ask that if we do engage in discussion we keep it about the possibility of the wealth tax and how it effects sports. I know her opponents in the last debates have already brought up the fuzzy math about her health care plan hurting the middle class, but lets keep the rules to this about the Magic and the effect on the NBA and sports in general.

I think how this effects us is the obvious is contraction and losing our team. If you tax billionaires and they are forced to sell their teams to pay taxes this devalues the brand in this case the NBA or the NFL franchises which causes losses to the franchises and salaries go way down in the next NBA players agreement. Lets go even further. NBA players could have mass exodus over seas without paying mass wealth taxes and getting higher salaries over in China or Europe...and TV deals go down. The struggling NBA would likely turn to contraction before closing their doors and the Magic would probably be chosen over the Heat. Some brands MLB, MLS may just go completely under. Would professional sports die in America and we turn to collegiate sports for our entertainment? So that's the discussion I want to have.

May be a crazy rabbit hole to go down, but I'm curious to know your thoughts at how far a "wealth tax" could go at changing American sports as we know it.

The billionaires will be fine. They have huge PR firms that are putting out misinformation. I think forgiving everyone for student debt will be a good thing.

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[orlando_joe]

the billionaires will move out of country sell everything leaving bill on middle class...does not take many to move for fuzzy math after 5 years to fail

[ezzzp]

"This politician's campaign ideas will take your beloved sports team away and destroy a source of happiness for you"

Who stands to gain from scaring "fans" (who a vast majority of are not in that wealth-tax bracket) into believing this extreme and very unlikely narrative? This looks an awful lot like a scare strategy that some group is attempting to infiltrate into the political conversation.

[orlando_joe]

I don't think we should engage in politics on sports sites, but here is a pro founding possibility that effects our team and I wanted to open it up to discussion. I recently saw a Ballmer interview about Liz Warren's 100% wealth tax and one of the things that was said after the interview was the Ballmer may have to sell the Clippers if she was elected and since she or Sanders (similar agenda) is most likely to win the nomination there is a good chance she could be elected president and her plans come to pass.

I want to ask that if we do engage in discussion we keep it about the possibility of the wealth tax and how it effects sports. I know her opponents in the last debates have already brought up the fuzzy math about her health care plan hurting the middle class, but lets keep the rules to this about the Magic and the effect on the NBA and sports in general.

I think how this effects us is the obvious is contraction and losing our team. If you tax billionaires and they are forced to sell their teams to pay taxes this devalues the brand in this case the NBA or the NFL franchises which causes losses to the franchises and salaries go way down in the next NBA players agreement. Lets go even further. NBA players could have mass exodus over seas without paying mass wealth taxes and getting higher salaries over in China or Europe...and TV deals go down. The struggling NBA would likely turn to contraction before closing their doors and the Magic would probably be chosen over the Heat. Some brands MLB, MLS may just go completely under. Would professional sports die in America and we turn to collegiate sports for our entertainment? So that's the discussion I want to have.

May be a crazy rabbit hole to go down, but I'm curious to know your thoughts at how far a "wealth tax" could go at changing American sports as we know it.

The billionaires will be fine. They have huge PR firms that are putting out misinformation. I think forgiving everyone for student debt will be a good thing.

Sent from my SM-G950U using RealGM mobile app

so for those that don't have any you give them a couple hundred thousand? a house? who pays? after money runs out?

[basketballRob]

I don't think we should engage in politics on sports sites, but here is a pro founding possibility that effects our team and I wanted to open it up to discussion. I recently saw a Ballmer interview about Liz Warren's 100% wealth tax and one of the things that was said after the interview was the Ballmer may have to sell the Clippers if she was elected and since she or Sanders (similar agenda) is most likely to win the nomination there is a good chance she could be elected president and her plans come to pass.

I want to ask that if we do engage in discussion we keep it about the possibility of the wealth tax and how it effects sports. I know her opponents in the last debates have already brought up the fuzzy math about her health care plan hurting the middle class, but lets keep the rules to this about the Magic and the effect on the NBA and sports in general.

I think how this effects us is the obvious is contraction and losing our team. If you tax billionaires and they are forced to sell their teams to pay taxes this devalues the brand in this case the NBA or the NFL franchises which causes losses to the franchises and salaries go way down in the next NBA players agreement. Lets go even further. NBA players could have mass exodus over seas without paying mass wealth taxes and getting higher salaries over in China or Europe...and TV deals go down. The struggling NBA would likely turn to contraction before closing their doors and the Magic would probably be chosen over the Heat. Some brands MLB, MLS may just go completely under. Would professional sports die in America and we turn to collegiate sports for our entertainment? So that's the discussion I want to have.

May be a crazy rabbit hole to go down, but I'm curious to know your thoughts at how far a "wealth tax" could go at changing American sports as we know it.

The billionaires will be fine. They have huge PR firms that are putting out misinformation. I think forgiving everyone for student debt will be a good thing.

Sent from my SM-G950U using RealGM mobile app

so for those that don't have any you give them a couple hundred thousand? a house? who pays? after money runs out?

Just free healthcare. I'm not advocating for Warren, but we'll be fine if she becomes president.

From what I heard she'll charge the top 1% a 2% tax. So you might be in trouble if you're in the top 1%.


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[orlando_joe]

The billionaires will be fine. They have huge PR firms that are putting out misinformation. I think forgiving everyone for student debt will be a good thing.

Sent from my SM-G950U using RealGM mobile app

so for those that don't have any you give them a couple hundred thousand? a house? who pays? after money runs out?

Just free healthcare. I'm not advocating for Warren, but we'll be fine if she becomes president.

Sent from my SM-G950U using RealGM mobile app

nothing is free ...they will run out of other peoples money...come on

[basketballRob]

so for those that don't have any you give them a couple hundred thousand? a house? who pays? after money runs out?

Just free healthcare. I'm not advocating for Warren, but we'll be fine if she becomes president.

Sent from my SM-G950U using RealGM mobile app

nothing is free ...they will run out of other peoples money...come on

It's a democracy so whatever the will of the people is.

Sent from my SM-G950U using RealGM mobile app

[Bensational]

Meaty topic, I hope the discussion can stay civil, because I find the prospect of a wealth tax really fascinating.

My understanding is that the wealth tax is a tax on the value of the assets of billionaires, but it doesn't cover the entirety of the growth of that wealth. I heard a podcast on Planet Money that broke it down, which describes the annual value increase of most wealth assets to be around 6-8%, and the suggested taxes to be 2-3% annually. That means there's still a 5-6% annual growth on the value of those assets for billionaires who own them.

The catch here is that the forecasted value is hypothetical until those assets are sold. So, using completely fake numbers, if the Clippers are worth $1B to Ballmer today, and next year they're projected worth is $1B and $80M, Ballmer would be hit with a tax for $20-30M on that growth. For Ballmer, that's a tax on something that likely isn't earning him that much in net profits, it's just the valuation of it. So he'll have to find that money somewhere amongst his revenue streams (along with the other taxes he's hit with on those other revenue streams).

That might sound unfair, because Ballmer isn't technically seeing the increase in his wealth directly in his bank account, except that whilst the valuation of the Clippers is hypothetical, Ballmer is still able to use that projected wealth as equity to chase loans to invest in other large scale ventures (let's call it an imaginary tech company called 'Tech X'). So it's capital he can still utilise.

The concept of the wealth tax, from my limited understanding, is to stop the incredibly wealthy from continuing to amass control and ownership of all these large scale ventures by limiting the invested capital they can borrow against. That's not unfair in the slightest. It's the best way to help redistribute wealth, even though the likely outcome means that the next tier of uber wealthy who aren't as impacted by the wealth tax, now become the likely candidates to invest in 'Tech X' instead. But they likely wouldn't have the individual capital to make the kind of move Ballmer could on his own, so it ends up as a collective of wealthy people sharing ownership of 'Tech X'. So Ballmer's taxes go towards helping everybody, and the sphere of influence of the elite 1%'s gradually opens up to a larger (though still very narrow in relation to the population of the US) sphere of influence.

For a more middle/mid-upper class example, think of housing (though this example may be more relevant to Australia than to the US though. Property seems more fluid in the US than in Oz).. The baby boomers had a big advantage of being able to buy in on most property at much lower prices that were more affordable in relation to their income brackets, and then property boomed through the 2000's and continues to grow. They're able to use the equity from one house to borrow against and buy another, and then the equity of that one to buy another, and so on. Suddenly they've got a portfolio of investment properties that all continue to skyrocket in value beyond the initial purchase price, and reach proportions that are beyond the affordability of the generations beneath them. Those generations get priced out and struggle to afford one home, let alone several investment homes. And when the boomers choose to sell, foreign investors are there ready to pay the premium on property, which continues to keep the next generation out of the game (because who would choose to make less money just to keep the market fair and internal?). Homes become investments and not shelter. But if there were heavier taxes on those extra homes which limited how much ownership one person could have, it forces them not to be as greedy and keeps the market in play for those looking to enter it.

That example is likely to anger anyone who's been successful and savvy enough to build up their own portfolio, same way a wealth tax aimed at stupidly rich people does. Nobody likes to feel like there's a ceiling on the amount of control they can have, even if the amount they desire is unreasonable.

However, my interpretation of all this might be completely off. I'm happy for anyone to pick it apart, because I'm truly interested in understanding more about it. Though, maybe this isn't the best platform for it, unless we're lucky to have someone who knows about taxes and investments amongst the regular posters.

[rcklsscognition]

Two pennies per dollar and these rich **** start whining like little bitches. **** them. **** them for trying to act like they have it hard. If they don't want to pay the tax, they can choose not to be rich. See how many take us up on that offer. They can't give it up. They won't. They're just trying to scare us all into obedience.

I posted this before I read we should keep this civil.

[MagicFan101]

since she or Sanders (similar agenda) is most likely to win the nomination there is a good chance she could be elected president and her plans come to pass.

There is a lot of stupidity wrapped in ignorance within this snippet of text.

[Xatticus]

These are scare tactics. Ignore them.

For a long time, real median family income nearly perfectly correlated with productivity. Since the 1970s, productivity has continued to rise, but real median family income has not. This is essentially because the wealthy have exercised political influence allowing them to siphon off an increasingly greater share of income. The United States isn't really a democracy. It is a plutocracy. There is basically no correlation between political policies and the political views of the bottom 70 percent of the population by income, while there is a very strong correlation between political policies and the political views of the top 1 percent. This has led to a steadily increasing disparity in wealth, which is problematic for our economy.

The government is pretty good at collecting income taxes, but not so good at collecting other types of taxes. This is why the effective tax rate has been declining on the wealthiest families.

https://www.cbsnews.com/news/americas-richest-400-families-pay-a-lower-tax-rate-than-the-middle-class/

The wealthy don't generate their income by punching a clock. They generate revenue from their wealth, which is much more difficult to tax. This is where the wealth tax comes in.

Economic theory doesn't really discriminate by income. We often question incentives as they relate to the wealthy, while completely ignoring the very same dynamic as it relates to those that do not possess wealth. The wealthy will try to make more money regardless of what their tax burden is.

It is also a fundamental flaw to believe that the wealthy drive the economy. Profit is an exploitation of an inefficiency. What drives an economy is demand. There is inefficiency when there is demand without supply. Industry will rise to meet this demand. This is the idea behind universal basic income (UBI), which is an old idea that has been recently popularized by Andrew Yang. The NBA will thrive as long as there is a demand for the product from consumers that possess disposable income. The NBA does not rely on owners. As long as there is money to be made, owners will show up.

I know it is really difficult to set aside political affiliations in this polarized climate, but economics really isn't about politics. It is a science. Milton Friedman was one of the most influential economists in history. He was a conservative and he was a proponent of a negative income tax, which is very similar to UBI. I don't know that Friedman was a great intellectual mind, but he was a great academic.

I know most won't bother listening to this, but I highly recommend it (or almost anything where Friedman is discussing economics):

Spoiler:

Watch on YouTube

[darthmerrick]

So thank you to everyone for those who are keeping this about the wealth tax.

It's interesting to see some see it just as a scare tactic and billionaires whining and others see it as a real threat. So again lets put the focus back on the NBA in this scenario. Do Devos family sell the Magic? Does this cause devaluation to the Magic and the potential of contraction? Does my worst case scenario occur where professional sports hurt and athletes go outside the country to make their money. Would Americans be over pro sports in that scenario and instead just embrace collegiate sports.

[darthmerrick]

since she or Sanders (similar agenda) is most likely to win the nomination there is a good chance she could be elected president and her plans come to pass.

There is a lot of stupidity wrapped in ignorance within this snippet of text.

I'm not knocking Sanders or Warren. they are front runners for a major party and could be president. They both have wealth taxes that could come to pass. If they win then how does that wealth tax effect sports and our Orlando Magic? Ballmer has danced around it, but basically said he would be forced to sell the Clippers if she is president. I think those policies effect both Democrat and Republican fans and is worth a discussion.

[basketballRob]

So thank you to everyone for those who are keeping this about the wealth tax.

It's interesting to see some see it just as a scare tactic and billionaires whining and others see it as a real threat. So again lets put the focus back on the NBA in this scenario. Do Devos family sell the Magic? Does this cause devaluation to the Magic and the potential of contraction? Does my worst case scenario occur where professional sports hurt and athletes go outside the country to make their money. Would Americans be over pro sports in that scenario and instead just embrace collegiate sports.

Pro sports will continue as they are. If Ballmer sells someone else will buy it.

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[Bergmaniac]

You do realise it's not the president that passes tax laws but Congress, right? There is no way in hell that Congress will pass a wealth tax law anytime soon regardless who the president is.

[MagicFan101]

since she or Sanders (similar agenda) is most likely to win the nomination there is a good chance she could be elected president and her plans come to pass.

There is a lot of stupidity wrapped in ignorance within this snippet of text.

I'm not knocking Sanders or Warren. they are front runners for a major party and could be president. They both have wealth taxes that could come to pass. If they win then how does that wealth tax effect sports and our Orlando Magic? Ballmer has danced around it, but basically said he would be forced to sell the Clippers if she is president. I think those policies effect both Democrat and Republican fans and is worth a discussion.

Sanders and Warren are not “likely to be the nominee” at this point. Frankly, no one can claim that yet. They both have extreme policies which aren’t exactly loved throughout their own party.

Your sweeping assumptions are misleading and dangerous.

[Popsicle1228]

You do realise it's not the president that passes tax laws but Congress, right? There is no way in hell that Congress will pass a wealth tax law anytime soon regardless who the president is.

While you are correct about Congress holding the “purse”, I respectfully disagree that there is no way they would pass the wealth tax. We currently have a democratic Congress and if Warren (a Democrat) were to be elected into the executive branch, I believe Congress’s vote would reflect her agenda if Congress is still in Democrat’s control in 2020.

I have never seen a time in US history where individual representatives are so afraid to break away from their respective herd. This is true for both Democrats and Republicans. It is entirely team sports in Washington right now and sadly there is no longer a moderate lane. The lack of a moderate lane is very bad for the country in my opinion, and unfortunately I only expect it will get worse.

President Lincoln once said “a house divided cannot stand,” and I don’t think we as a country have been more divided since the Civil War. There is no longer a center lane, it turned to pick a side. Unfortunately!