Brian Domitrovic for Forbes discusses how capital went on strike in the 1970s because of a clutch of onerous tax increases starting in 1969, and was diverted instead to a bunch of "inert stuff" like gold, oil and land, causing unemployment to rise:
The rich spent the 1970s trying to figure out how to hide their money. ...
The 1970s were the first heyday of “alternative investments.” Gold, oil, land, straddles, these exotica had been the preserve of a small group of specialists before 1969, when high earners got hit with a triple tax increase. The top capital gains rate got upped to an effective 49%, there was an income-tax surcharge, and the millionaire’s minimum tax (the AMT monster of today) began. This is not to mention “bracket creep,” whereby real tax rates go up with every increase in the price level. For the record, inflation was 200% from 1969 to 1982.
In this environment, the rich simply stopped what they were doing and focused all attention on preserving capital and avoiding confiscatory rates. ...
Read the whole thing here.
