July 28, 2026
Ballot box? More like yacht club
Why a $154B CEO just endorsed stripping most Americans of voting rights
Critics say the quiet part got posted: rich-guy politics goes fully mask-off
TLDR: Shopify CEO Tobias Lütke endorsed an idea that would give rich people more votes and leave many ordinary Americans with none. Online, critics blasted it as billionaire power fantasy, while a few treated it as a dark thought experiment about who should shape a country’s future.
The internet did not take this one calmly. Shopify boss Tobias Lütke jumped into a viral online debate and backed a plan that would give more votes to higher earners while taking voting rights away from people who pay no federal income tax. That would hit retirees, students, caregivers, disabled people, and many low-paid workers. In plain English: a wealthy CEO gave a thumbs-up to the idea that rich people should get a louder voice at the ballot box.
And the comment section instantly turned into a bonfire. The harshest reaction was basically: of course a billionaire wants billionaire-friendly democracy. One of the most-liked jabs summed it up with savage simplicity: “Why did a billionaire propose biasing the voting system towards the rich? Gee I wonder.” Others zoomed out and turned it into a bigger roast of the tech elite, saying rich founders keep drifting into more extreme politics the moment they hit a certain tax bracket. Another commenter delivered the line people kept circling back to: “Do you become a monster when you get ultra rich, or do you need to be a monster to get ultra rich?” Ouch.
Not everyone was fully in outrage mode. One commenter said they wouldn’t want this in America, but if they were building a country from scratch, they might at least consider a tax-linked voting system—if it also came with brutal estate taxes to stop dynasties. Even that “maybe” only added more fuel. The vibe across the thread was part democratic panic, part class-war meme-fest, with readers treating the post less like a policy idea and more like a jump scare from the billionaire mindset.
Key Points
- •The article reports that Shopify CEO Tobias Lütke endorsed on social media a tax-tiered voting proposal that would deny votes to people paying no income tax and give higher earners multiple votes.
- •The proposed system described in the article would scale voting power by income, from zero votes for some non-taxpayers to as many as five votes for people earning $500,000 or more.
- •The article says the plan would disenfranchise large groups, including retirees on Social Security or pensions, students, caregivers, disabled Americans, and many low-wage workers.
- •It identifies the concept as census suffrage or property-qualified voting and notes that similar systems were historically used in parts of Europe, the early United States, and ancient societies.
- •The article connects the episode to broader tensions over housing, wealth, and the political influence of older property owners, citing examples from San Francisco and commentary from housing and academic sources.