The Rise and Spread of Excessive Wealth Disorder
How this so-called affliction became a rallying cry for liberal elites who want to tax the hell out of themselves
By the time it was over, I half-expected a squad of cheerleaders dressed in Eisenhower-era outfits to charge out and exhort the crowd with an old-timey call-and-response: “Gimme a T! Gimme an A! Gimme an X!”
Instead, the two-day gathering of self-described Patriotic Millionaires in Washington D.C.’s Mayflower Hotel ended with a boozy salute.
“A toast to taxes!” shouted John Cavanagh, head of the D.C.-based Institute for Policy Studies, to the hundred or so attendees who’d made it to the bar after two days of speeches, presentations, and glad-handing. “To our love of taxes!”
Wearing a “Tax Me” pin on her jacket, the woman next to me raised a glass of pinot noir from Oregon’s B-Corp A to Z Wineworks (“Aristocratic wines at democratic prices”). I would have clinked with her but I was too busy scribbling notes with the “We Love Taxes” ballpoint pen I’d picked up earlier in the day, one of several pro-tax tchotchkes handed out over the course of the event.
Aside from military contractors, it’s rare to find a group of Americans so openly besotted with the idea of taxation. What…
