I just heard Nobel economics laureate Joseph Stiglitz interviewed on NPR, and noted a fascinating fact: in his estimation, only a tiny share of the so-called “1%” are entrepreneurs.  He said that the large majority of 1-percenters are people who have inherited wealth, investors, and other sorts of finance jocks (i-bankers, hedge fund managers, traders, venture capitalists, etc.).

What does that say about where America’s incentives lie, in this land where 400 people own more than the poorest 150 million?

Do the the rewards accrue to the inventors, the innovators, the skunk-workers?  To the people who have truly improved our lives?  Or does money simply make money?

When the revolutionaries raise capital gains taxes and carried interest taxes to the earned income tax rate, perhaps they can also figure out a way to eliminate taxation completely from truly value-creating entrepreneurship in technology and other vital areas…