Michael Hiltzik: America is falling out of love with billionaires, and it's about time
Our emerging political debate over taxing the rich seems to be getting bogged down in details - how high a tax rate, should we tax income or wealth, etc., etc. But this fixation on nuts and bolts is obscuring what may be the most important aspect of the discussion: America is becoming fed up with its billionaires.
That sentiment is long overdue. It has begun to surface in the suggestion by Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez that the top marginal rate on high incomes shift back to what it was in the 1950s or 1960s, and in Sen. Elizabeth Warren's proposal for a wealth tax on those with high net worth.
Since the Reagan administration, the political establishment has strived to convince Americans that extreme wealth in the hands of a small number of plutocrats is good for everyone. We've had the "trickle-down" theory, the rechristening of the wealthy as "job creators" and
