Once, at a Q&A at Cap Cities, Buffett was asked how he would rewrite the tax code. “If I really could do it, it would shock you,” he said. He’d tax the hell out of personal consumption—at progressively higher rates—and impose an “enormous” inheritance tax. If I want to run around in a jet, which I do, fine, I have the claim checks to pay for it, but that should be taxed heavily, because I am withdrawing people, fuel and so on—resources—from society.
