Sen. Bernie Sanders (I., Vt.) on Sunday refused to discuss his support for a "maximum wage" during his early days in Vermont politics, calling the unearthing of such radical proposals not "productive."
"Early in your political career, way back in 1974, you said that it should be illegal to earn more money than someone could spend in his or her lifetime," CNN's State of the Union anchor Jake Tapper said. "You proposed a maximum wage cap on the highest earners."
Sanders dismissed the question as irrelevant to his current political views.
"Did you go back to my third grade essay when I was in P.S. 197?" Sanders asked. "We could go back to things I said in the '70s, I don’t think it’s productive."
During his early political career as a member of the Vermont Liberty Union Party, Sanders wanted to "make it illegal to amass more wealth than a human family could use in a lifetime," according to newspaper accounts from the time. Sanders promised a 100 percent tax on income above $1 million a year, saying he "would recycle this money for the public need."
The "maximum wage" proposal is far from the only far-left idea floated by the young Sanders. As the Washington Free Beacon previously reported, in 1972 Sanders called for the legalization of all drugs and said American actions in Vietnam were "almost as bad as what Hitler did."