Oh, dear. This is why we need to win big in the Senate (because we need to overcome folks like Sinema and Manchin).
«…it’s genuinely unclear whether it would ultimately be ruled constitutional. The issue isn’t that Congress can’t enact a wealth tax. It’s that if a wealth tax counts as a “direct” tax, Congress would have to ensure that the amount of money coming from each state was roughly the same on a per-capita basis, as there is a provision of the Constitution that bans direct taxes unless the amount collected is drawn equally from the states based on their populations*. Given that wealth is not evenly distributed across the states, that equal distribution would be functionally impossible to ensure.»
*Article I, Section 2: “Representatives and blah blah blah shall be apportioned among the several states which may be included within this union, according to their respective numbers, which shall be determined by adding to the whole number of free persons, including those bound to service for a term of years, and excluding Indians not taxed, three fifths of all other Persons.”
There’s that infamous 3/5 clause, but the blah blah blah your eye (my eye) so easily slides over is: “direct taxes”. Whatever that is.
