Incompetence Tax

Great idea from The New York Times, Please Raise My Taxes

"This week, President Obama proposed imposing a $500,000 compensation cap on companies seeking a bailout. It’s a terrible idea. We all want the taxpayers’ money returned, and capping compensation at bailout recipients will just make it that much harder for those boards to hire and hold on to the executives who can lead their companies to compete and thrive.

Perhaps a starting place for “tax, not shame” would be creating a top federal marginal tax rate of 50 percent on all income above $1 million per year. Some will tell you that would reduce the incentive to earn but I don’t see that as likely. Besides, half of a giant compensation package is still pretty huge, and most of our motivation is the sheer challenge of the job anyway.

Instead of trying to shame companies and executives, the president should take advantage of our success by using our outsized earnings to pay for the needs of our nation."

Which gave me the idea for the incompetent tax. When the government needs a lot of money to bailout an industry, tax the executives in that industry to pay for the bailout, and provide for a retroactive application of the tax.

In other words, you break it, you buy it (or fix it in this case).

P.S. Sometimes a little humor helps make a point: