The best way of taxing the rich is producing luxury goods. The fact that you can buy food, transport, housing, clothing at a magnitude or two (or more) higher cost is a sort of volontary tax. When you buy a $1000 bottle of champagne instead of drinking water, a large part of that money takes a pretty short path to pay the wages of people that never would buy the same bottle themselves. And would maybe be out of a job if they didn't take a small part in producing that bottle of champagne. So the fact that luxury goods exist is a sort of tax that spreads the wealth of the people that choose to afford it.
It follows that whenever you see someone in driving a car you couldn't afford or eating in a restaurant that you would consider too expensive, don't think "ahole", think "thanks for distributing your wealth".
Yes, luxury goods amount to a tax on the status-conscious who can afford them--but the problem is that they send a price signal that more luxury goods are needed, when what we really need is investment in infrastructure, basic and applied research, etc.
