{"id":12142,"date":"2026-07-27T16:31:10","date_gmt":"2026-07-27T16:31:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/stock999.top\/?p=12142"},"modified":"2026-07-27T16:31:10","modified_gmt":"2026-07-27T16:31:10","slug":"why-did-a-154-billion-ceo-just-endorse-stripping-most-americans-of-voting-rights","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/stock999.top\/?p=12142","title":{"rendered":"Why did a $154 billion CEO just endorse stripping most Americans of voting rights?"},"content":{"rendered":"

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Shopify CEO Tobias L\u00fctke, whose company commands a market capitalization near $154 billion, told his social media followers this week that a tax-tiered voting system\u2014one that would strip voting rights from anyone who pays no income tax\u2014would be a \u201cgood system.\u201d<\/p>\n

That two-word endorsement, dropped into a viral thread, has reignited a debate over wealth, power, and democracy that most Americans thought was settled more than a century ago.<\/p>\n

The proposal would invert the founding American principle of \u201cno taxation without representation\u201d into something closer to \u201cno representation without taxation\u201d\u2014and specifically, high taxation. Reactions online split sharply: some framed it as a provocative thought experiment about aligning fiscal responsibility with political voice, while others called it a naked attempt to legitimize plutocracy by giving billionaires and multimillionaires a formal, multiplied vote over the laws that govern everyone else.<\/p>\n

But it also revealed that America is grappling with a political economy debate, as a frozen housing market and an entrenched wealthy Baby Boomer demographic have many, not just L\u00fctke, arguing that something big needs to change.<\/p>\n

How the thread started<\/p>\n

The exchange began with a provocation from L\u00fctke: pension recipients should have their financial futures \u201clocked in and guaranteed,\u201d but in return would be reclassified as \u201cdependents\u201d and lose the right to vote\u2014the same way minors can\u2019t vote. A reply from \u201cEric Thor,\u201d who claimed to be a retired banking executive as well as \u201carmchair economist and policy wonk,\u201d proposed a sliding scale: zero votes for anyone who pays no income tax, one vote for those earning $1\u2013100k, two votes for $100\u2013200k, scaling up in that pattern to a hard cap of five votes for anyone earning $500k or more. The pitch was framed as fairness\u2014reward \u201crepresentation\u201d for those who \u201cfoot the bill\u201d through taxation.<\/p>\n

That was the good system that L\u00fctke endorsed.<\/p>\n

To be clear, under this proposed system, the disenfranchised bloc would be enormous. It would encompass all retirees living on Social Security and pension income, students, caregivers, disabled Americans, and millions of low-wage workers who owe no net federal income tax after deductions and credits. Meanwhile, a small population of high earners would receive up to five votes each\u2014a fivefold multiplier on political power concentrated in the hands of people already holding disproportionate economic power.<\/p>\n

This is not a new idea\u2014it\u2019s an old, discredited one<\/p>\n

Tying the right to vote to wealth or tax contribution has a name: \u201ccensus suffrage,\u201d or property-qualified voting and in fact, it was the dominant system for the majority of early modern history. Across much of 19th-century Europe and in parts of the early United States, only property owners or taxpayers above a certain threshold could cast a ballot. The earliest democracies in history, in ancient Greece and ancient Rome, likewise limited voting to property owners. <\/p>\n

The dawning of the 20th century, though, coincided with several universal suffrage movements that spent decades dismantling those systems precisely because they entrenched the political power of the already-wealthy and locked out workers, women, and minorities from any say in the laws governing them. Jessica Lautz, deputy chief economist of the National Association of Realtors, told Fortune recently that the housing market showed signs of returning to an \u201cearly 1900s\u201d status quo, but this surely was not what she meant. <\/p>\n

Perhaps ironically, L\u00fctke\u2019s tweetstorm began as a response to Jordan Grimes bemoaning the current crisis conditions in the housing market. The San Francisco Chronicle\u2018s Laura Waxmann had reported on classic NIMBY (not in my backyard) activism as hundreds of San Francisco Marina residents swamped a town hall to protest what for them was an \u201cuncomfortably tall, 22 & 18 story project at the low-slung neighborhood\u2019s waterfront.\u201d The excessive influence of old homeowners has been dubbed an \u201coldigarchy\u201d by Yale professor Samuel Moyn, who advocated in his recent book Gerontocracy in America for something like the reverse of L\u00fctke\u2019s policy: extending the voting age down to an ever-younger population to counterbalance the tyranny of NIMBY boomers.<\/p>\n

The irony critics can\u2019t ignore<\/p>\n

L\u00fctke\u2019s own track record with voting rights makes the endorsement especially pointed. In 2022, Shopify shareholders approved a \u201cFounder Share\u201d structure that guarantees L\u00fctke at least 40% of the company\u2019s voting power regardless of how much equity he actually owns\u2014a mechanism governance watchdogs criticized as an entrenchment device that decouples voting power from ownership stake. Glass Lewis, a proxy advisory firm, publicly flagged the structure as controversial when it went to a shareholder vote.<\/p>\n

In other words, L\u00fctke secured himself outsized, guaranteed control over his own company\u2019s decisions\u2014then publicly praised a system that would strip voting power from the majority of ordinary Americans in the political sphere.<\/p>\n

Shopify did not immediately respond to Fortune\u2018s request for comment.<\/p>\n

#billion #CEO #endorse #stripping #Americans #voting #rights<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

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