If You Can Build a Rocket, You Can Build a Road
Billionaire Tax Reform
Published: January 11, 2026 •
2 min read
How can America be great again with our nation falling apart—roads, bridges, buildings, airports, and schools crumbling around us? And yet the most successful among us aren’t asked to contribute to maintaining the country in proportion to their success, as they have been in times the past. Somehow it is unAmerican to even ask?
I’ve spent decades in business and public life, and I’ve seen firsthand how wealth at the highest levels is rarely created in isolation. It is built on public infrastructure, educated workforces, stable institutions, and yes—roads. The same highways that move goods, the same power grids that keep factories running, the same schools that train the engineers who eventually design those rockets.
And yet, we find ourselves in a weird situation. We celebrate the achievements of billionaires—and rightly so—but we hesitate to ask them to contribute proportionally to the system that made those achievements possible. That hesitation is not prudence; it’s imbalance.
Tax reform, in this context, isn’t about punishment. It’s about maintenance. A nation, like any enterprise, requires reinvestment to remain competitive. When the tax structure allows extraordinary wealth to grow without a commensurate contribution back into the system, we begin to erode the very platform that supports innovation. When a private company succeeds, it reinvests in its core operations. It upgrades equipment, trains its people, and strengthens its supply chains. A country should do no less.
Some argue that higher taxes will stifle progress. I’ve heard that argument for 40 years. In my experience, what stifles progress is neglect—crumbling infrastructure, underfunded education, and communities left behind. Those are the conditions that shrink opportunity, shrink success, and shrink the greatness of our country.
So yes, build the rockets. Reach for Mars, push the boundaries, make history. But remember: none of it happens without the groundwork. And if you have the means to build the extraordinary, you certainly have the means to sustain the essential.
So use your money to build a rocket by all means, but build a few roads as well. That's the only way America will be great again.
