In just a few years in existence, online mag Quillette has become a haven for bad faith takes, revanchist social stances, and a safe space for men accused of sexual assault to defend themselves.
So it’s no surprise that its founding editor is taking up the latest cause célèbre of conservatism: being against an increased marginal tax rate on people who make over $10 million.
It’s an idea pushed by the emerging Democratic left. But it’s a bad idea says Claire Lehmann, who thinks the problem with poverty has nothing to do with people having a lack of money. As she argued late Wednesday on Twitter, poor people will blow their money on drugs and get arrested, so rich people should get to keep their obscene amount of wealth.
Find it hard to believe that most Americans would support a 70% top marginal tax rate considering they're a nation founded on saying 'stuff you' to the tax man. But happy to be proven otherwise if there's compelling data https://t.co/v5oAw2xETC
— Claire Lehmann (@clairlemon) February 21, 2019
I would say that most of the time, inequality and poverty in advanced economies cannot be solved via the simple redistribution of wealth. If you've ever worked, lived or spent actual time with people trapped in the underclass, the problem is not *lack of money*.
— Claire Lehmann (@clairlemon) February 21, 2019
Although the polls she’s quote tweeting say 45 percent of Americans support a 70 percent tax versus just 32 percent who oppose it, which would be a plurality of Americans, her insulting argument is that money is not a solution to “lack of money.”
“If you’ve ever worked, lived or spent actual time with people trapped in the underclass, the problem is not *lack of money*,” Lehmann says, going on to explain how poor people have money, they just spend it frivolously on “a 3 day bender.”
I've known people who have held down jobs and who are generally fine until the fortnightly paycheck comes, then it's a 3 day bender until they end up passed out somewhere or arrested. The cycle continues. This is not a problem caused by a lack of money.
— Claire Lehmann (@clairlemon) February 21, 2019
It’s not just an insulting take. It’s an idiotic one as well.
Not only do a great majority of Americans live paycheck to paycheck, but studies also show 40 percent of Americans couldn’t handle an emergency payment of just $400 if the need arose. Not having money is a huge problem.
And money raised by implementing a high marginal tax rate wouldn’t just be handing money to poor people to buy drugs. It would be used to expand a social safety net so that a family living near the poverty line wouldn’t be crippled because a child got sick.
Naturally, that absurd lack of both empathy and understanding didn’t go over well.
it literally and empirically is a lack of money
— Doug Brinbury (@dirgeoverdrive) February 21, 2019
jesus christ
— darren has a dog (@tai_nugget) February 21, 2019
https://twitter.com/hypeauthor/status/1098583372811644930
oh damn this made up anecdotal evidence has convinced me that the poor deserve to be poor thank you so much
— 🅱️roccoli🥦🅱️oi 🦜 (@thejman222) February 21, 2019
okay but the people who fund you go on multiday benders all the time but somehow rich people doing ayahuasca in the amazon is “self-exploration” while poor people taking opioids because their support networks have collapsed is a pathology https://t.co/7NnANMe1VK
— Dan Walden (@dwaldenwrites) February 21, 2019
https://twitter.com/UmmAlDunya/status/1098459885388394497
Love too spend mine entire fortnightly-bequeathed fortune indulging in the devil’s brew. Alas! https://t.co/ao6qyBUZK7
— Carrie Alyson (@carrie_alyson) February 21, 2019
Amazingly, Lahmann—who fashions herself a leader in the intellectual dark web, the movement of conservative brainiacs being driven undergrown by the “intolerant” left—didn’t even know the history of American tax rates.
https://twitter.com/rgcooke/status/1098412106330734592
She tried to walk it back a bit, saying not all poor people were not going on benders with their money, but her argument remains that rich people deserve their spoils, and poor people deserve their pain, regardless of how the system is set up to ensure people stay locked in their class structure for generations.
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