heavy taxation and redistribution is not theft
It is theft to me.
Call it what you want -- it involves threats backed by guns and jails and
taking away what someone earned on their own to give it to someone else.
This is socialism... this is what the OP said he changed from.
And why should there be an arbitrary limit if you truly earned your wealth
by providing value to others?
no, that is not socialism, but yes, I think that the OP's change was not for the better.
the problem is how to measure value provided. Thanks to current freedom in markets and economy some soccer players earn millions while some firefighters putting their lifes at risk live from donations. Does this represent our values as a society?
free market capitalism founders say that when we spend money we are voting on what we want, so the most voted things are the best, so the best thrive and everything is optimized. But this is flawed: people are manipulated, and once there's a monopoly you can't really vote, you have to buy from your only provider which will only get shittier and shittier...
John Locke would have said: if a limit is decided by a majority, and the law is imposed on all members regardless of race, sex, whatever instead of imposed on arbitrary members of the society (ie have a rule where the more you have the higher your tax % instead of something like "let's take from Bill Gates and give to ...."), then it's not an arbitrary coercion, it's just part of the social contract.