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Some Rich Americans Are Getting Stimulus ‘Checks’ Averaging $1.7M

forbes.com

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Re: Some Rich Americans Are Getting Stimulus ‘Checks’ Averaging $1.7M

#81

Post by AnimalMuppet »

KarlKemp wrote: post #67
anm89 wrote: post #46

Edit for definitional clarity: My use of the term socialism here is exactly equivalent here to the term "systems that enable wealth redistribution through legislation" no more, no less. Im not commenting on anything like the ownership of the means of production in society or anything like that. It seems like the whole world is chomping at the bit to enact more socialism but do you think it's homeless people and cashi…

You’re intentionally mislabeling “not using a crisis to hand out billions in tax breaks to rich people” as “socialism” to extend people’s historic aversion to socialism to this situation. Do that often enough and you’ll find people quite willing to give this “socialism” thing a chance.

First, personal attacks are out of bounds on HN, and your "intentionally" comes pretty close.

Second, I think you're being unfair to anm89 in another way as well. His post I could just as easily take as saying that this is an illustration of how it goes when you try to reform the system (such as, say, introduce socialism).

Now, you could argue that socialism isn't relevant at all to the article. And you'd be right. Why socialism as opposed to labor reform, or UBI, or tax reform, or whatever? But the reason to pick socialism out of that list is the current relevance. Bernie Sanders was explicitly socialist, and he came rather close to the Democratic nomination.

Re: Some Rich Americans Are Getting Stimulus ‘Checks’ Averaging $1.7M

#82

Post by refurb »

anm89 wrote: post #46

Edit for definitional clarity: My use of the term socialism here is exactly equivalent here to the term "systems that enable wealth redistribution through legislation" no more, no less. Im not commenting on anything like the ownership of the means of production in society or anything like that. It seems like the whole world is chomping at the bit to enact more socialism but do you think it's homeless people and cashi…

Seems unfair this well thought out comment is getting downvoted so heavily.

At any rate, this has always been my issue as well. People decry the capitalist system and when you ask why, they point to humans behaving badly. Well, no matter what economic system we have, we'll have that problem. There is no lack of corruption and self-dealing in non-capitalist systems.

Re: Some Rich Americans Are Getting Stimulus ‘Checks’ Averaging $1.7M

#83

Post by refurb »

NotSammyHagar wrote: post #14
golergka wrote: post #2

They are not getting anything from the US government – they pay less taxes. This article tries to make a case a if it was the same thing. It is not.

If anyone pays a million less in taxes then someone gave them a million dollars back. so yes, you are giving them something. One can argue in some irrational way that taxes are theft so you never 'give' someone something if you reduce their taxes. At the end of that game, you have more money than you had before, gift or other political arguments aside. Someone who was going to pay a million in taxes and now has 1 mil…

If anyone pays a million less in taxes then someone gave them a million dollars back. so yes, you are giving them something.

So when I pay 35% tax and keep 65% of what remains, did the gov't give me that 65%?

Re: Some Rich Americans Are Getting Stimulus ‘Checks’ Averaging $1.7M

#84

Post by JamesBarney »

lend000 wrote: post #63
acomjean wrote: post #61

Earlier quoted context omitted.

My understanding is "losses" is kinda vague if you own one of these "pass through" entities you can pay yourself a salary, have the "pass through" business loose money then pass that loss off against your personal income. I'm not a accountant so I might be wrong. I know a CPA and they have noted that there have been calls from wealthy clients looking for loopholes to save money on taxes, based on the stimulus. Money…

I believe if you elect to be a pass-through LLC (eligible for this rule change), you cannot pay yourself a salary in the same way as if you were a non pass-through LLC or S-Corp. It isn't as easy to cheat the system as most people think, but there seem to be more opportunities to finagle things the more assets you own. The fundamental way our tax code is broken is not loopholes, but the actual publicly known tax brac…

S-corps are pass through entities.

Re: Some Rich Americans Are Getting Stimulus ‘Checks’ Averaging $1.7M

#85

Post by anm89 »

admiral33 wrote: post #51
anm89 wrote: post #46

Edit for definitional clarity: My use of the term socialism here is exactly equivalent here to the term "systems that enable wealth redistribution through legislation" no more, no less. Im not commenting on anything like the ownership of the means of production in society or anything like that. It seems like the whole world is chomping at the bit to enact more socialism but do you think it's homeless people and cashi…

"The people who should be the most scared of redistribution systems like this are the ones who want to look out for the interests of the little guys." - Interesting, can you elaborate?

It's a system of wealth redistribution. The problem is, when these systems are gamified by lawyers and people in the financial world, and they win, the wealth ends up being redistributed in the opposite direction as many people intended and the little guys lose.

Looking at the 10 years following the great recession it looks like this is what happened (although those redistributions were more explicitly directed towards the top of the pyramid upfront) but look at at how inequality statistics have moved since that event. It certainly doesn't seem to have favored those who are financially disenfranchised in our society.

The problem is the nature of society permanatly skews these events in the favor of the the people who have the most existing resources to figure out how to game the system.

If you want a much more in depth breakdown of how that happens structurally, read Hayeks the road to serfdom as I mentioned above.

Re: Some Rich Americans Are Getting Stimulus ‘Checks’ Averaging $1.7M

#86

Post by anm89 »

KarlKemp wrote: post #67
anm89 wrote: post #46

Edit for definitional clarity: My use of the term socialism here is exactly equivalent here to the term "systems that enable wealth redistribution through legislation" no more, no less. Im not commenting on anything like the ownership of the means of production in society or anything like that. It seems like the whole world is chomping at the bit to enact more socialism but do you think it's homeless people and cashi…

You’re intentionally mislabeling “not using a crisis to hand out billions in tax breaks to rich people” as “socialism” to extend people’s historic aversion to socialism to this situation. Do that often enough and you’ll find people quite willing to give this “socialism” thing a chance.

I'm certainly not advocating tax breaks for anyone here. In fact I'm advocating getting rid of the framework that is used to implement those tax breaks.

You're reading into my words to say things that simply aren't there.

Re: Some Rich Americans Are Getting Stimulus ‘Checks’ Averaging $1.7M

#87

Post by JamesBarney »

acomjean wrote: post #61
lend000 wrote: post #32

If I am understanding this correctly, there is no money flowing to rich Americans, but they will have additional opportunities to deduct losses on their 2020 taxes (basically paying less in taxes after a major stock market rout) that would normally need to be spread over future tax returns indefinitely. However, this will only occur if they took losses, so it is really a discount of ~35% on negative income. This woul…

My understanding is "losses" is kinda vague if you own one of these "pass through" entities you can pay yourself a salary, have the "pass through" business loose money then pass that loss off against your personal income. I'm not a accountant so I might be wrong. I know a CPA and they have noted that there have been calls from wealthy clients looking for loopholes to save money on taxes, based on the stimulus. Money…

> My understanding is "losses" is kinda vague if you own one of these "pass through" entities you can pay yourself a salary, have the "pass through" business loose money then pass that loss off against your personal income. I'm not a accountant so I might be wrong.

Say your pass-through entities has 100k in revenue. You could pay yourself 140k and mark down 40k of losses but that's financially disadvantageous because you're tax rate on the income will be higher than the tax rate on the losses. You're paying 13k in extra taxes to avoid paying 8k, donating an extra 5k to the IRS.

Most companies try to shift revenue from income to profits because it will reduce your total tax burden.

Re: Some Rich Americans Are Getting Stimulus ‘Checks’ Averaging $1.7M

#88

Post by anm89 »

a_wild_dandan wrote: post #62
anm89 wrote: post #46

Edit for definitional clarity: My use of the term socialism here is exactly equivalent here to the term "systems that enable wealth redistribution through legislation" no more, no less. Im not commenting on anything like the ownership of the means of production in society or anything like that. It seems like the whole world is chomping at the bit to enact more socialism but do you think it's homeless people and cashi…

Do any of these statements apply in particular to socialism? Seems to me you could find/replace "socialism" here with any political system and make the same argument.

A more hands off political system is less manipulatable.

The more complicated systems that are created, the more there is to gamify.

I'm advocating for more limited government. A simple clear rule set is much harder to gamify. This is an equalizer, not the reverse in my opinion.

Re: Some Rich Americans Are Getting Stimulus ‘Checks’ Averaging $1.7M

#89

Post by [deleted] »

briandear wrote: post #77
smcl wrote: post #36

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It seems they also got a reward during the tough times

It’s one thing to make a profit or a loss, it’s another thing when a government forces you to take a loss to subsidize someone else. If there was a risk that you’d be forced by the government to take huge losses then that risk should be priced into the rent — which means future rents will have to be much higher to accommodate the increased risk. Imagine if a grocery store were required to give free food to everyone a…

[deleted]

Re: Some Rich Americans Are Getting Stimulus ‘Checks’ Averaging $1.7M

#90

Post by NotSammyHagar »

refurb wrote: post #83
NotSammyHagar wrote: post #14

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If anyone pays a million less in taxes then someone gave them a million dollars back. so yes, you are giving them something. One can argue in some irrational way that taxes are theft so you never 'give' someone something if you reduce their taxes. At the end of that game, you have more money than you had before, gift or other political arguments aside. Someone who was going to pay a million in taxes and now has 1 mil…

If anyone pays a million less in taxes then someone gave them a million dollars back. so yes, you are giving them something. So when I pay 35% tax and keep 65% of what remains, did the gov't give me that 65%?

Of course not. That's a silly argument also. But if they reduce your taxes for some special reason, like you live in a state that votes a certain way or votes a certain way, then they are giving you the tax money back.
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