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We are publishing the tax secrets of the .001%

propublica.org

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Re: We are publishing the tax secrets of the .001%

#91

Post by mrkurt »

dataangel wrote: post #88
jvanderbot wrote: post #86

What I don't understand is: If I (a wage slave) find a football sized diamond in my back yard, I'm suddenly very "wealthy". Should I be forced to pay taxes on that find because my wealth has increased? What if I want to keep that diamond but cannot afford to because of the taxes? Isn't that how business owners gain wealth: By the valuation defined by others to the thing they "found". Should we force Bezos et al to se…

You don't pay capital gains taxes until you sell the stock. The IRS only taxes you when you cash out. Presumably the articles will show the wealthy "cashing out" via loopholes that evade the tax.

The trick is to cash out by dying. You can do this by living off loans against your unrealized capital gains. These then get paid off at your death, and there are all kinds of "simple" ways to keep estate untaxed.

Re: We are publishing the tax secrets of the .001%

#92

Post by whiddershins »

Every time someone tries to make a tax targeting the ultra rich, it ends up hurting the moderately wealthy instead.

Every. Single. Time.

The worse tax situation is always the person who makes 500k in a good year, or sells a house they held for 25 years which went up a bunch in value.

I suspect this is a significant factor in social mobility. Our tax system is punitive to people who try to leave the working class.

Re: We are publishing the tax secrets of the .001%

#93

Post by bennysomething »

mlac wrote: post #23
bwestergard wrote: post #7

In Finland, everyone's taxable income is a matter of public record. One theoretical benefit of such a policy is that it eliminates information asymmetries between workers and employers in wage bargaining.

I would also think that this makes neighborhoods less financially diverse. I can’t see someone with a higher than average income moving into a neighborhood knowing that their neighbors might make 1/4th as much. It puts a target on them.

I think "Diverse" is beginning to be the most over used and applied word of all time.

Re: We are publishing the tax secrets of the .001%

#94

Post by tengbretson »

pmoriarty wrote: post #60
Cthulhu_ wrote: post #48

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You become a kidnapping target by being rich, whether that's a matter of public record or just someone cruising the wealthier neighbourhoods is arbitrary. I mean over here you can't look up who makes how much, but the rough value of houses and neighbourhoods, which is used to determine property taxes, is public record. I'm sure there's some rich people / families living in otherwise underwhelming houses, but they're…

The solution to this is to eliminate wealth disparity.

Why stop at eliminating wealth disparity when you can eliminate wealth?

Re: We are publishing the tax secrets of the .001%

#95

Post by mjmahone17 »

jvanderbot wrote: post #86

What I don't understand is: If I (a wage slave) find a football sized diamond in my back yard, I'm suddenly very "wealthy". Should I be forced to pay taxes on that find because my wealth has increased? What if I want to keep that diamond but cannot afford to because of the taxes? Isn't that how business owners gain wealth: By the valuation defined by others to the thing they "found". Should we force Bezos et al to se…

> What if I want to keep that diamond but cannot afford to because of the taxes?

Then you have to sell it. This is no different from game show awards, where the “car” you ein is taxed at the car’s value, so unless you have enough savings, you have to sell the car to pay the taxes.

I don’t really see any problem with this though? Absolutely we should force Bezos to sell some of his stock to pay taxes: employees already have to do this when they’re given stock grants, why should it be any different for owners?

Re: We are publishing the tax secrets of the .001%

#96

Post by wsc981 »

pmoriarty wrote: post #75
naasking wrote: post #43

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Flat tax is too regressive. What seems justified is a basic S-curve indexed by income, and where the left hand side dips below zero so those below a certain line effectively get a negative income tax to maintain a certain standard of living.

Many of the ultra-wealthy have little or no income. What needs to be taxed is wealth, not income.

I agree as well. Also, luxury goods (yacht, private airplane, (maybe) jewellery, etc...) should be taxed much heavier than bare necessities (food, clothing).

I believe some basic amount of wealth should be tax free (e.g. x-amount of square meter living space per person in a household, a car with value up to 25.000 USD perhaps, etc...).

I also believe many ultra-wealthy people setup foundations to control their wealth after their deaths, avoid paying inheritance tax and keep wealth inside the family by being able to decide who is on the board of such foundations. Foundations are also used to peddle influence. I believe for these reasons that donations to foundations should not be tax exempt.

Re: We are publishing the tax secrets of the .001%

#97

Post by scott_w »

jvanderbot wrote: post #86

What I don't understand is: If I (a wage slave) find a football sized diamond in my back yard, I'm suddenly very "wealthy". Should I be forced to pay taxes on that find because my wealth has increased? What if I want to keep that diamond but cannot afford to because of the taxes? Isn't that how business owners gain wealth: By the valuation defined by others to the thing they "found". Should we force Bezos et al to se…

This is a strawman argument.

Bezos did not stumble across Amazon while digging weeds in his back garden. He built a successful business through a mixture of hard work, risk, his contacts, laws and infrastructure that we collectively paid for.

It’s not downplaying his efforts to point out that he now contributes proportionally less to the country than he benefits from. This isn’t an accident, either. Bezos pays smart and connected people to push for lower taxes and then avoid as many of those as possible.

Re: We are publishing the tax secrets of the .001%

#98

Post by zepto »

dougmwne wrote: post #51
zepto wrote: post #44

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> we do not know for certain that is true. We have considered the possibility that information we have received could have come from a state actor hostile to American interests If they have no way to verify or at least assure themselves that it isn’t this, then they have no business publishing it. Also, many of their statements are just lies in that context: E.g. We are disclosing the tax details of the richest Ameri…

They also state: "We have gone to considerable lengths to confirm that the information sent to us is accurate. We compared the tax data in our possession to other sources of the same information wherever we could find them, some of which were public (a tax return for a candidate for national office), others of which were private. In every instance we were able to check — involving tax filings by more than 50 separate…

Sure, but it’s likely that a state actor had this information too.

Any credible attempt at deception would use as much corroboratable data as possible.

Re: We are publishing the tax secrets of the .001%

#99

Post by bidirectional »

whiddershins wrote: post #92

Every time someone tries to make a tax targeting the ultra rich, it ends up hurting the moderately wealthy instead. Every. Single. Time. The worse tax situation is always the person who makes 500k in a good year, or sells a house they held for 25 years which went up a bunch in value. I suspect this is a significant factor in social mobility. Our tax system is punitive to people who try to leave the working class.

How does this effect social mobility? I agree the tax system is unfair towards those in the 1% but not 0.001%, but I don't see how it is so punitive that those earning 500k or owning appreciating assets are taxed back down to a lower social class. And no one reaches those upper echelons by saving their 500k/year or holding their house for a really long time.

Re: We are publishing the tax secrets of the .001%

#100

Post by pmoriarty »

silicon2401 wrote: post #82
pmoriarty wrote: post #75

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Many of the ultra-wealthy have little or no income. What needs to be taxed is wealth, not income.

I disagree, at least not with so simple an implementation. I don't want to live in a world where we're unable to escape working by constant taxes. There should be at least a minimum threshold where wealth is completely untaxed so that people can live freely and not have to work until they die. Enough for a house, some property and land, and a retirement fund. I'd consider it more justifiable to tax someone like Bill…

"I don't want to live in a world where we're unable to escape working by constant taxes."

I am against a system in which some escape work while others do not.

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