How Much Money Is Enough?

"A lack of money is the root of all evil." ...... Mark Twain

I think Twain meant this in the sense that poverty drives people to commit crimes. But the co-author of "The Gilded Age" made it clear that the pursuit of riches at all costs was a particularly evil, and predominantly American, disease.
So how much money is enough? I have a strong belief that if you can’t get by on half a million dollars a year there’s something wrong with you. Anything more than that starts to look like greed.

Some people (mostly Republicans) say that if we don’t pay corporate executives ridiculously large salaries they will not be interested in working. This is absurd. Once a person has set away his first one or two million, he starts working for the power, the fame, and the personal prestige. The money is just a way of keeping score. This is even more true of athletes. Whether they make $25,000 a year playing Soccer or $15,000,000 a year playing baseball they play for the love of the sport and the competition.

My solution? Let them make any salary they like, to keep the scorekeepers happy, but tax the daylights out of any amount over $500,000 net. Of course, as is the case now, the costs of making that half-million should be deductible. In the 1950s there was a 90% marginal tax bracket. Almost nobody was subject to it, but I like the idea. The government needs money, and as Willie Sutton was reported to have said when asked why he robbed banks, "That’s where the money is."