Does taxing the rich keep you poor?

0:00Who cares about rich people, right? I mean, who cares about the top 01%, the upper class, the people that live lifestyles that you and me, we could only imagine, right? Tax the rich, eat the rich, the rich people, right? What if I told you that this is a mindset that is likely going to keep you poor, keep you in the lower class, whether you want to be or not. It's one of those things that it's kind of like I surrender. I give up. I'm not ever going to be in a higher income bracket than I am right now. It's never going to happen. the rich. tax the rich because it's not fair. It's not fair.

0:55We should all have to chip in and you have all this money. You know that if you wanted to, you could use all your money and you could feed the homeless people. You could solve the homeless issue. That sounds really good. makes up people with money problems. It seems ironic, but money is rarely the fix. People with money problems have a mindset problem. People that want to attack the rich, tax the rich, go after the rich. Like they are these creatures, these evil beings that are sent here just to show us what a demonic force really looks like. actually, you know, a a devil incarnate, something that is just disguised as a human being, but it's really just here to show us, to prove to us that we are the good ones.

1:53We are the ones that are on the right side. Money is rich. I mean, money is evil, right? Money is super evil because rich people, they have to be evil. Money is the root of all evil. Haven't you heard that? It's in this little thing that I like to call the Bible. There it is. Money is the root of all evil. So take that. the rich. Tax the rich. Go after them. Because like I said, it's not fair, right? If you have all this money, you just rolling around in that like Scrooge McDuck. What you think this is? There are homeless people. There are people that live on the streets and you're just rich. Have more money than you could ever spend that your children's children's children probably wouldn't be able to spend if they never added to it.

2:59That's That's crazy. you. you. You heard me. tax the rich. And what do you mean this is gonna keep me poor? I'm not surrendering. It's funny how when we are put in this position, we as in people, the peasants and the royalty, the halves and the have nots, us and them, the 99 and the 1enters. It's crazy how we can paint them out to be a villain, but how quickly things would change if things changed. How would you feel if you were rich? Sincerely, and rich is one of those words like successful.

4:00You know, what does that mean to you? You get to define that. And of course, there is objectively like, bro, you're rich. But somebody with a hund00 million dollars can go kick it with a billionaire and kind of feel not so rich. So what's rich for you? You know, whatever that number is, you get to just throw a little coin in the wishing well and wish for whatever number that is. Let's say you are the rich now. still them. It's It's evil, right? All All money is evil. Anybody with money must be evil. And not only that, they should have to pay the most. They should have to not only pay the most, they should continuously pay more to where they they basically have more, but it's not that much more.

5:05They're doing they're doing so much giving back that it makes us feel better. It makes us as the other 99enters feel more at ease like things are right and just and fair and smiles. It's really easy to say tax the rich, the rich when you're not rich. And one of the quickest ways to stay poor is to join a team for some reason. Like it's like you're on a team like, "Yeah, the rich people." As if you would never have an opportunity or a chance to become rich. Instead of looking at this as an opportunity to have an objective standpoint, you want to say, "No, let's just let's just claim the this isn't fair card and continuously demand more and more money.

6:18The exact numbers of things don't really matter, but think about how much taxes somebody like Elon Musk or um Bill Gates, you know what I'm saying? How how much taxes do they pay in their lifetime? Do you even come close? your what you pay for taxes. How about your entire income for your lifetime? Do you even come close? Do you even make as much as they pay in taxes? I don't. Wait a minute. Wait a minute. What are you saying? You're one of us. What are you doing? What you doing, EXO? What do you mean? Yeah, man. I uh I'm rich by no means.

7:14I'm rich in spirit, I guess. Um and that's a right now thing that can continue to change. You can become rich and then lose that So, by no means is one of those white flags being raised and saying I'm not rich. This is me saying I'm not taking the standpoint of this to defend a class that I'm technically not a part of yet. And maybe I never will be. But one thing that I will say whether or not I become rich or not, I'm never going to stop trying. I'm never gonna try to become embody the bottom 99%.

8:19Yeah, I'm in the lower class. Oh, you know, I'm just in the middle class. Like, what about us middle class people? Like making it seem like it's like an identity. Never will I ever. It's like a It's like a status, man. and my status can be updated at any time or I can just choose to let this remain forever. And it's like, what about our debt, man? The United States is in trillions on dollars of debt. And I by no mean am any sort of like economist or anything of that nature. I don't see I don't even know another phrase to use. That's how stupid I am in a way. In a way. In a way.

9:16I got other things that I'm good at. And my mom says I got a nice smile and I look good in orange. She said it's a good color on me. So, thanks, Mom. But when it comes to like the economy, and I mean legit, let's get down to brass tactics solutions. What are we going to do? What is the actual problem? Can you explain it completely as if I'm a fifth grader that doesn't really know much? Not really, actually. In fact, all I really understand is the simplified, broken down version that I've been able to comprehend or take in at my level. So, yeah, I'm kind of stupid with that. I'm not sitting here saying that, hey, I have a solution, but one thing that I know isn't true, the people that are making the most money and like that.

10:17Yes, if there's corruption and and things, people are like, "Yes, but rich people are evil. They could be doing this and they're doing all the if they're doing anything illegal, that hopefully will come out into the, you know, the uh the light of day. But if they're just like making money and you're just winning the game too well, you for winning the game so well. You were handed a good deck because you were born into money and you're like a trust fund baby. And actually, you're not like most trust fund babies and you just blow this and actually have no real purpose because you've never had to work for anything. You're one of those trust fund babies that they got with the program. They understood the game. They actually wanted to know the game of money and how it works and how to continue to build a legacy and have some longevity in the game just like their people.

11:13Even if you were dealt those cards. So what it's like you. these people for winning. these people for getting ahead. these people for not being on the same playing field. That's like playing the game of Monopoly. And when somebody starts to obviously win, that's like saying, "Hey man, you're doing too well. Every time you pass go, you you don't get $200 anymore. You got to start paying for the money that gets put out for us when we pass go and we get our 200. You got to start paying towards that. You just got to start putting in towards the pot of monopoly. You just have too much money. And then the more you put in, the more we're going to ask for. And then eventually it's just going to feel like we have the same amount of money. It's like, wait, wasn't I winning? Wasn't I dueling the game, right? And yeah, there's a whole bunch of different tax strategies and like ways to pay less taxes if it's legal.

12:16Can Why? Why? Why are we mad at that using real estate or whatever? I don't know, whatever tactic that's being used to pay less in tactics or taxes rather. Why Why would we be upset at that? I feel like there's some real crab in the barrel. You know what I'm saying? I don't I don't like to be a loser, you know. I want to I want to have it where no there are no winners and there are no losers and we don't keep score in this sport and everybody gets a trophy. Kind of sound like a I don't know. Little bit of an observation I'm going put out there. You kind of sound like a sore loser. emphasis on loser. Who wants to be a loser? Who wants to? And it's like I I personally know people, there's people in my family.

13:14So, it's like I'm not trying to attack people that have the standpoint of tax the rich, the rich, they could pay for all of this. It's like, bro, I'm not saying I'm some by any means some, you know, economics wiz, but you do not know what you're talking about. These people have the money to live wherever they want. So if you try to start with their money, just like they find ways to pay less in taxes and even with all of that, they still pay way more than all of us do in taxes. You know what I mean? Let's just side eye roll our eyes and ignore that right? Just ignore the billions in taxes that they already pay. We're going to ignore it. But they're going to be able to come up with other ways, find other places, be able to outsmart, out maneuver their money around.

14:10Even if that means, hey, we we can't really live in the United States anymore, guys. You know, we got to we got to leave. We got to go, I don't know, to whatever other country that's better that treats their rich people better. And I don't know, it's it's honestly it's honestly kind of sickening. Again, I could I could do the metaphor with any type of game. It's like somebody you're playing football, somebody scores too many touchdowns. Hey, you, man. It's like, you got to start giving us points. Every time you come out into the field, you give us one point since you keep trying to score a six every time you get get a touchdown. It's like, what? Yeah, you're too good. You're too good at the game. And people are like, "Bro, this isn't a game.

15:07I told you people are homeless. They're homeless and you're going to hell. How dare you? How dare you make light of this situation? How How dare I? Oh my god. It's kind of up. I guess it's not a game. Life isn't a game. Oh, this isn't a game. Well, there's winners and losers, man. That's all I'm seeing. There's rules to the If you break the rules, you up in the game. Sometimes you have to start over. And like a lot of games, once you start to get a little bit of momentum, once you start to know what you're doing, you start winning and it becomes even easier to win.

16:07And it it might suck for people that are losing. I I get that. I can empathize with that. Again, I know so many people that that feel that way that tax the rich, puck the rich. I think it's become such a cringe thing for me anytime I hear anything that's like I'm accepting the financial position that I'm in right now or that we're in right now like as a family as a unit cuz this thing let's face it it's it's almost like generational like if your mom and your grandparents your all that if they're acting this way it's it's infectious bro it spreads and it continues to make its way through the next generations.

17:07And there's like little sayings that I've even grown not to like um like something my people would say a lot when I was a kid is let's say like, "Oh, I want to watch TV." And they might say something like, "Oh, well, I want a million dollars." as in saying you're not going to watch this TV. You watching this TV right now because it never worked. I never got to watch the TV. Oh man, never worked for me as a kid. I don't know how the y'all grew up. Get your ass to bed, So with all that whining, I never got the TV. It wasn't until I was an adult that I just like, damn, that's such a up thing. Not only to say to your kid, but to say to yourself, and not knocking my parents, love them so much.

18:11They are like all of us, just people that try the best that they can. But hindsight 2020, now that I'm looking back and now that I get to look at the world and decide how I want to move through it, you ain't watching this TV. I ain't getting a million dollars. That's kind of like two lessons in one. Like, stop whining. You're not getting this just for whining. And you ever getting your way by whining is about as likely as me getting a million dollars, which isn't even that much these days. It's not even that much. And this again is somebody that is not rich. I'm not sitting here like, "Yes, h small loan of a million dollars.

19:07It was nothing. No, man. Singing, bro, I could do math. You can see how fast like $10,000 goes by. Well, it leads me to believe like before I remember it's like $10,000. What? Before it's like, damn, imagine having $1,000. You get $1,000. How fast $1,000 can go by? What the Before that, you know, you're just dreaming of like how $1,000. So, you get $100. $100. Oh, man. Get a couple things, maybe one good thing. I don't know. $100 is gone, man. That shit's gone. Where? Where was that $100? You can't go in a Walmart without spending $100. You feel me? Like, the $100? What? $100? million dollars isn't even that much.

20:09That was a phrase that was told to me so much. Can I get this when can I get a million dollars? Bro, you ain't going to get no. That's that's another like another way it was used. It's a little bit different though. Like, oh, I want this. Oh, I want a million dollars. That's kind of like personal. But can I have this as in can you give this to me? Oh, can I like can I get a million dollars? You ain't got no million dollars though. It's almost like again an impossible task. Who are we? We are the lower class, the lower middle class, the middle class, the upper middle class. anything but that upper class in your dreams. Johnny, I don't know, man.

21:09It's little sayings like that. Want to make sure my kids don't hear that cuz you could get a million dollars. There are kids that make a million dollars. they get an idea or they start some I don't know YouTube channel or some You know what I mean? Like we like to say you could do anything you want. You could be the president. You could, you know, be an astronaut. You could do all these things. It's just crazy how depending on the environment where you grew up in, that's kind of like going to determine your relationship with money at first, you know? Are you in a household where your people are always stressing about money?

22:06It's always, oh, we don't have enough of this. Oh, oh, God, I got to get more money. It's like it's like uh you know more passive about it, more peaceful about money. And that doesn't even necessarily mean do you have more, do you not? Which of course that plays a factor. If you grow up in a house where you got a whole bunch of money in the house, you know what I mean? You got everything you could ever ask for and then some. You are the rich friend. In fact, you're not even the rich friend because you go to the rich school where it's nothing but rich people and you better be rich or you don't fit in, Of course, that plays a part. But even if putting the money aside, let's say you are in the lower class and you just have a more relaxed approach about money. I feel like even that well where it's not always such a stress.

23:02It's like I got to get money like you know what I mean? It's more like hey money is out there. It will come. It'll go. I don't know. Again, I've never been my definition of rich. or probably anybody's definition. No, anybody that is actually like actually knows about money because maybe like a little 5-year-old be like, "Oh, I'll be rich." And but basically, nobody's definition of rich have I ever achieved tax the rich. the rich. them. It just doesn't make sense. It doesn't make sense. The the rich typically have businesses or they have properties.

24:03So where do 99enters since it's us versus them, where the we going to live there, Where are we going to work? It's like, oh yeah, there's rich people. there's like other companies who work for every single company like originally was a person that was just like, "Oh," or a group of people that was like, "Wow, let's let's come up with whatever business you want to fill in the blank with." But then you have people like Steve Jobs or Elon Musk or Bill Gates or these people that are rich and they kind of they're so rich or I guess they step more into the limelight that we kind of fixate and focus more on them. But there's a lot of a lot of rich people. 1% is still a lot of people. Everything that you probably own stems from somebody having the ambition to create a company, create a product, create whatever.

25:14Create the TV shows you like to watch, the music you like to listen to. We're quick to, and by we, I mean people, cuz I ain't I ain't with y'all I might be temporarily my status, you feel me? Like if you look just going to switch some things in my bank account and maybe eventually if I squint and it could look a little better. But we as people, we love to notice what's fair, what's not fair. Of course, there's winners, there's losers, there's the halves, there's the have nots. And the ones that are losing, the ones that don't have, the ones that on the short end of the stick, we just have a tendency to be like, it's not fair and just like point the finger and them.

26:09And it's it's like either violence or like, you know what I mean? I'm we're going to try to take your all these like negative things where it's like you're just becoming an even lesser version of yourself where it's like of course of course you're in the bottom parts of society. That's how you're acting right now. And it's up to you if you want to embody that as a uh as a person like that's who you are, you know. And there are little sayings that you can you can have like where if you were to look at the different taxes that people get taxed where you only worry about what what happens in your tax bracket.

27:04You don't even really look at what happens afterwards. It's like, oh, you know, they make they make a billion dollars and they have to give 500 million basically. Who cares? them. the rich. Tax the rich. Attack the rich. They can suck a dick. I don't care. But anyways, what what do I have to do? What are what what are my taxes? You know, I'm only worried about what's happening in this lower percentage. I don't know. I think you I think you get my drift. You hopefully you catch my drift because this this is the type of feel that keeps you poor. Type of that it's like I swear if there was let's say let me let me just humor you. Let's say that there's a 1% that wants to make sure that the 1% stay the 1% and everybody else basically can stay down in the lower parts.

28:01The dirt, the mud people. them. What if they're saying the same thing? Y'all saying, "Fuck the rich." What if they're saying, "Fuck the poor. the poverty people. peasants." Poor poverty peasants. That's a lot of peace. Poor poverty peasant people. There you go. It's a tongue twister for you. Maybe they're saying the same thing. Maybe if I were to try and keep the bottom mud people, poverty people down there. I'm going to make them band together. They love to virtue signal. They love to be a part of a team. Anyways, these tribal monkeys, it's going to be evil to be us.

29:03It's going to be bad. You're probably a piece of Don't be us. Don't be us. The 1%. The ones who make money, the rich. them. Tax the rich. Tax us. Go ahead. Just don't be us. Just stay down there. Stay down there. And by the way, we are hiring. We have a thousand employees coming uh soon in our new location in uh every city near you. Yeah. So, buckle up. We got all your jobs. Stay down there. talk about us and band together. I want you to link arms. Anybody that says anything different, you better boot them out. They just they don't understand the program.

29:58We We're evil. Rich people are evil. They should be taxed. They should be looked at as anything but human. Dehumanizing them is the utmost priority when looking at the 1%. the rich. I don't know, man. It's kind of like some evil genius Some reverse psychology type You don't want to be us, you know? And let's let's bring it down to like a lower level. Think if you worked at an office or something and you have a manager that comes around and anytime the manager comes around, everybody stops like joking around.

30:57Everybody just comes. It's the manager. Oh, hey. boss man, boss lady, whatever. All right. Bye, Clark. Okay. always riding my ass about clocking in on time after my lunch break. Even little things like that, just just a little bit of a difference. You're not us. It's like, wow. Imagine working at that job. How likely are you to want to aspire to be the manager that all of your co-workers have trashed? like, "God, the authority, the man. the system." Right? And in this case, that's the manager. How likely are you to actually want to be that same type of position in that in that uh office might feel a little weird, might feel a little awkward, might feel a little ostracized, like, "Hey guys, got this promotion, but I'm still one of you."

32:04All right. And then you notice that they start doing the same thing that y'all used to do. You walk into the scene, everybody gets kind of quiet. So, hey, good afternoon everybody. It's like, oh, hey, hey Amy. Soon as you leave Amy, Why did I do this to myself? We do it to ourselves, man. And maybe there are some evil rich people at play that are like, "Yeah, band together. Make it some sort of virtue signal to be in the middle class or the lower class. Don't even aspire to be rich. But even if that is the case, what does it have to do with the people that are actually down there that are like tax the rich?

33:03Like you're kind of just it should be bucking. the man. the system. It's like don't tax. I'm going to become rich. I'm going to I guess that's just me though. Like I I don't know if if we playing football, the other team just starts scoring a whole bunch of touchdowns, I want to we going to start we got to play harder. You feel me? But this isn't a game like that. That's what's cool about this This is a game, but it's not a game like that where there's two teams, winners and losers. You know that whole team, you guys all won. The other team, you guys all lost. Sorry, there could only be one. It's not like that. It's not one of those where there's only a certain amount. Why can't the 1% become 3%. 4%. You know what I mean? And yes, I get it.

34:09It's easy for some people and it's super hard for others. You don't get this suffering all around the world. People that have all the odds against them. They're just backed into a corner. They really have no chance against society. Society is winning. Life is winning. this game that you're talking about. this game. This game is cynical. It's sinister. It's actually sentencing people to death. People are dying, man. They're dying. Yeah, you're right. Do you think taxing the rich is going to fix that? Do you think pointing at the people that aren't under these circumstances is going to fix that?

35:09To try and make it the responsibility of the successful to pay for the ones who are not is crazy. To pay for what we demand out of society. We want our roads paved. We want school systems updated. We want all of these things. say, but when it comes down to how we're going to pay for it, these same people that are so evil that should be attacked, that should be taxed, those are the ones that should have to pay for it all. God forbid you win the lottery. I mean, God forbid for you You know what I'm saying? Like money might just instantly turn into like a demon or something. evil ass. Don't let your business idea take off. Don't let those ideas in the back of your head where honestly if you're trying to create a business or you're putting out there, you're probably hopefully not thinking I don't even know, maybe I'm wrong, but hopefully if you're trying to be successful in any venture, you're not at the same time simultaneously being like, "Fuck the rich, tax the rich.

36:24Again. It's just kind of like, bro, I will never make it in this. I'm never going to have to worry about the rich because I ain't never going to be the rich. That's a sad way to live life. At least be optimistic, man. And even if, again, success is what you make it, right? What if, like, I don't care about being rich. I just want to be around my family, blah blah blah. Like, being rich isn't a priority for me. I get my happiness and all of that from other things. And as long as I have enough to get by and all of those nice nice things like that. Yeah. Okay, cool. It doesn't have to be, well, it'll one day be me. That was just me trying to help you become empathetic. Like, damn, what if this was me? What if I was rich? Actually, I would love to be rich, man. What if I did come up with like some sort of business or product or I had a podcast or music career or a comedy career or I was an actor or I was a famous chef or whatever your dream is.

37:30And I actually did become in this top 1% even if I just have a regular career and I did some investing on the side and then that ended up leaving leading me to the the high life, the rich life. What if that was me? I said all of that to hopefully get your empathy gears turning like okay maybe that's not what's right maybe that's not fair even though I was talking about oh it's not fair in the beginning but yeah let's say hypothetically money isn't money blah blah blah all the things I said and the like I just want to be with my parent I'm not just like I love my So it's but damn I want to I want to be rich too like I don't know that's and it's not just like oh because I want to provide for my family and they so they could have that life man I'd be lying if I said that's that's like the only driver for me that's a part of it yeah of course but this was there before like for for myself as well for my kids kids and honestly even before I was even thinking about kids kids that's what I was thinking at first it's like to prove it to myself.

38:45I don't know. We get one life. I just want to go for it. I just want to swing. I might miss. But I ain't going to get no home run if I don't swing. And that was a baseball reference. Miracle. But um if that is your northstar where honestly I could be lower middle class just enough to get by where I'm not really sweating about bills and and my kids have everything they need. I just want to live my best life and that's happiness for me. Even if you're not looking at this like what if I was rich? Can't you look at this as these are other people? Can't you still just be objective and be like, "Hey, that honestly doesn't seem fair. It doesn't seem fair that like these people are paying more in taxes than everybody else combined."

39:43It's I don't know. Maybe that's that's not right since there are like literally millions of us. And basically, you say tax the rich, it's more like tax success, tax the successful. It was kind of up. Um, and it incentivized people to stop playing the game on this board because again, there are other countries, there are other places that they can relocate to and still live a very nice, luxurious life outside of America. Imagine that. Yeah, man. We just do all these things. We basically brainwash oursel to stay a loser. We do it with everything. Like if like let's say it's any sport and then you see somebody that's winning, it's like, "Oh, it's just because oh, they're taller than me and they they actually they just have the better better cleats and I don't know."

40:42You come up with all these excuses like they just had it better. It's just like I'm just the victim. It's like gh. That's what you want to just be like a whiny your entire life. That's cool. At least acknowledge that that's what you're you're doing. That's what you're being a whiny little No judgment. Little judgment. A lot of judgment cuz we could be better. Again, we could instead of trying to take the money from the 1% and spread it to the the rest and tax them and them and all that. Wouldn't it be nice to just get more people to aspire to become the 1% where one becomes two becomes three becomes four and then hey actually what was 1% is like 10% of our population were living really well because we worked on our mindset. Um, we we brainwash our selves, man.

41:44With with everything like with my music, it could be it could be really easy to compare myself to basically every other artist. And yeah, before uh social media and all that, artists could always compare themselves to like the top tier people, but now it's how how easy is it to actually compare yourself to other people or other artists that are around the same level? Like, damn, they became an artist after me. They only dropped a couple songs. They popped off. All these things you can compare. And then your mind could also start going to, oh, it's probably just because where they live. They probably just get more opportunities, man. They just get lucky. It's all about luck. Luck, man. I'm just an unlucky person. I'll just never be that. Like all these uh pessimistic that we like to say. And then we can we can attack the people that are succeeding once we've given up. I don't know. Maybe that's just my own observation.