Also, while paying my property tax bill, I noticed that the government has no problem taxing me for an assessed value of my property without me actually realizing my gains.
Of course, that is a property tax and not a capital gains tax, but it just shows that they definitely don’t have to wait until you sell to tax on capital gains. Just have an official assessment of value for investments.
It provides incentive to keep your money in the market.
No it doesn’t. The vast majority of my stock has LTCG treatment. When I sell, I sell that stock because of the preferential tax treatment and let my non-qualified stock bake longer. You either have the wealth to be in the market and can play the game or you don’t and you’re not in the market. I’ve lived both lives.
Explain please? It’s about the tax rate between those two? I thought the problem with CGT is that people dodge it by taking loans secured by their capital/stock. This does not seem to fix this problem…
Most people don’t have enough capital gains to tax. If they do have capital gains it’s either in there house and unrealized or in a retirement account and deferred. Raising the capital gains tax almost exclusively targets the wealthy, not necessarily billionaires but still top quintile.
Raising this rate could discourage investing.
What else are people going to do with there money then? Keep it in cash and lose even more of it to inflation then you would with the tax?
LTCG means that I can 15% or 20% (depending on income) on selling stock even if I’m otherwise in a high tax bracket. Why should I get to have a massive tax break just because I already have a lot of income? There’s nothing special about my income from stock vs. my income from employment other than I work a hell of a lot harder for my income from employment than I do my income from stock.
The other thing to get rid of is long term capital gains taxes and just tax capital gains as regular income.
Also, while paying my property tax bill, I noticed that the government has no problem taxing me for an assessed value of my property without me actually realizing my gains.
Of course, that is a property tax and not a capital gains tax, but it just shows that they definitely don’t have to wait until you sell to tax on capital gains. Just have an official assessment of value for investments.
The point of long term capital gains tax is so people don’t just yank money out all the time. It provides incentive to keep your money in the market.
That said, making the ltcg tax just 2% less than your income tax seems better than a flat 13% or whatever it is.
No it doesn’t. The vast majority of my stock has LTCG treatment. When I sell, I sell that stock because of the preferential tax treatment and let my non-qualified stock bake longer. You either have the wealth to be in the market and can play the game or you don’t and you’re not in the market. I’ve lived both lives.
Explain please? It’s about the tax rate between those two? I thought the problem with CGT is that people dodge it by taking loans secured by their capital/stock. This does not seem to fix this problem…
“Normal” people do not avoid paying these taxes by taking loans with their accounts as collateral. That applies only to multi-billionaires.
Most people pay a lower tax rate on long-term capital gains as compared to income. Raising this rate could discourage investing.
Most people don’t have enough capital gains to tax. If they do have capital gains it’s either in there house and unrealized or in a retirement account and deferred. Raising the capital gains tax almost exclusively targets the wealthy, not necessarily billionaires but still top quintile.
What else are people going to do with there money then? Keep it in cash and lose even more of it to inflation then you would with the tax?
LTCG means that I can 15% or 20% (depending on income) on selling stock even if I’m otherwise in a high tax bracket. Why should I get to have a massive tax break just because I already have a lot of income? There’s nothing special about my income from stock vs. my income from employment other than I work a hell of a lot harder for my income from employment than I do my income from stock.
0% if your taxable income is under $96,700 as a married, filing jointly household.