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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%

#451

Post by fvv »

kristjansson wrote: post #388

The conflation of change in mark-to-market net worth with income has got a whole lot to do with the constant breathless reporting of "Bezos/Gates/Buffet/... made/lost x BILLION dollars today" every time the market moves by more than a point. Sure, I get they want to beat the drum on wealth inequality, and perhaps that's a drum worth beating. But its a disingenuous disservice to pretend that these people are sitting o…

Lol if i have a paint which value fluctuate every year i should pay taxes or receive credits according to this article.. same for car , house.. incredibly ingenuous article ... Why stop here.. My qi could have a potential value if i do a test and get a high score i should pay taxes ? Stocks or growing company shares should not pay taxes until you sold them because you didn't benefit from those until you sell them, if you decide to give your shares to your employees when you die.. and you die poor because your annual income was low and you never sold more shares than you needed why you should pay billion in taxes if the company is worth billions (or was worth billions at certain point in time ) ? This kind of tax system proposed may cause company fail because shares owners may be forced to sell shares to pay taxes on shares just because those.. shares exists .. absurd.. when the company pay taxes and you pay taxes on what you take and also pay vat and other taxes on what you spend ? Very ingenuous article imo taxes should not be avoided and should be equal, but should be on money you receive it spend not on some assets that grown in value ( btw note that indeed something like houses and cars often have some kind of taxes already recalculated on current value ) but this is a different type of tax based on usage and owning something that require maintenance (ie: city, roads,...) But why limit at public companies if i have a company which is losing money and have 10k shares and i sell one share to you at 1k because you believe in it , this same year i should pay money on 10mil$ because iphotetical value of the company based on recent sale was 10mil ? And my net worth is now 10mil?

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

#452

Post by jonny_eh »

chrismcb wrote: post #445
HWR_14 wrote: post #419

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I never followed this chain of logic. The whole point behind the stock market is to treat any commonly traded stock as a liquid asset. Why do you think that this fails with respect to Bezos and Gates?

By definition a stock is not a liquid asset. It needs to be sold first. In order to be sold, you need a buyer. You don't always have a buyer.

And yet I had to pay tax for exercising stock options from a startup I left, stocks I was never allowed to sell since the company was private.

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

#453

Post by cletus »

nostrademons wrote: post #268
cletus wrote: post #236

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> The worse tax situation is always the person who makes 500k in a good year What's the problem here? Income tax rates are moderately progressive. They'll pay a higher marginal tax rate and a moderately higher total tax rate in this year. That seems fine to me. > or sells a house they held for 25 years which went up a bunch in value This is what I have a problem with. This house has already had plenty of favourable t…

The issue, if I'm understanding the OP right, is that income taxes are moderately progressive until you get to the levels where people make their living off wealth, not income . Someone earning a wage is going to pay a monotonically increasing percentage of their income as they move up the scale. That's fine. Someone who owns a holding company that itself owns 80% interests in a variety of LLCs that reinvest their pr…

Here's another way to put it.

Up to a certain level you are taxed on what you EARN. Income tax is relatively progressive.

Beyond a certain point you cease to be taxed on what you earn. Instead you are taxed on what you SPEND. By this I mean, you have unrealized or non-repatriated money and you only realize those gains and pay taxes on what you need to cover your expenditure.

So if you gain $100m in a year but only spend $10m then you're only taxed on $10m and the other $90m probably grows tax free until you really need it. This might mean then that you're effectively paying a 4% total tax rate (40% of 10% of your income).

But it gets worse. Because of zero interest rates, there's no point in paying tax on that 10% either. Instead you borrow $10m at 1.5% interest secured by your unrealized gains. If your unrealized gains grow at more than your interest rate you're coming out ahead. The worst case is you're deferring your taxes for years. The best case is you're effectively deferring them forever, or at least until interest rates increase to the point where realizing the gains is cheaper than borrowing.

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

#454

Post by Frondo »

failwhaleshark wrote: post #74
gota wrote: post #54

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I disagree almost completely. I understand your concerns - but they are based on weighing personal freedom above all else, and I just don't. I think there's a tradeoff there and it is favorable in favor of disclosing tax information. To your points: > gold-diggers I'm not sure if this is an idiomatic term and out of my grasp, but if you mean that people will get romantically involved with others because of their mone…

> this is a non-issue. Who are you to have the gall to claim conclusive knowledge of an unknowable without a shred of evidence? How do you think gold-diggers and con-artists work, hang-around at airports, golf-courses, and investment brokerages waiting for rappers with the most gold chains? > I think its fine in context. That's your opinion that you're deciding for other people. It's the only number that matters and…

> That's your opinion that you're deciding for other people

Others have spoken to your other points, but as for this, yeah, exactly.

We're talking about how we'd organize society (or some aspect of it), the basis of which involves making decisions for other people, in the sense of developing rules that hopefully people will abide by as participants in the society even if they disagree.

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

#455

Post by Hammershaft »

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 am in favor of such a system.

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

#456

Post by anthonygd »

doytch wrote: post #389
marcusverus wrote: post #355

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Is this really the case? Imagine you're at a masquerade ball with 25 people from random countries around the western world, 5 of whom are Americans from various states. Everyone speaks perfect, mechanical, unaccented English, and you are not permitted to discuss dead-giveaway topics like geography, political parties/candidates, specific foods, etc. How confident are you that you could pick out the Americans?

How confident are you that you'd pick out the Spaniard? Or Belgian? Or Canadian? Generally, people overestimate the variation in their own compatriots and underestimate that in foreigners.

I have zero confidence I would be able to pick out the Spaniard, Belgian, Canadian or American.

I'm having a hard time matching your generalization with my experience. When I started travelling I was surprised how similar people were regardless of where they were from.

Sure you can dig into political views and find themes but those aren't consistent or pervasive enough to make predictions on an individual basis.

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

#457

Post by stjohnswarts »

Hammershaft wrote: post #455
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 am in favor of such a system.

I'm not, it's dumb and makes classism which is already a problem in the USA an even bigger problem.

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

#458

Post by fvv »

fvv wrote: post #451
kristjansson wrote: post #388

The conflation of change in mark-to-market net worth with income has got a whole lot to do with the constant breathless reporting of "Bezos/Gates/Buffet/... made/lost x BILLION dollars today" every time the market moves by more than a point. Sure, I get they want to beat the drum on wealth inequality, and perhaps that's a drum worth beating. But its a disingenuous disservice to pretend that these people are sitting o…

Lol if i have a paint which value fluctuate every year i should pay taxes or receive credits according to this article.. same for car , house.. incredibly ingenuous article ... Why stop here.. My qi could have a potential value if i do a test and get a high score i should pay taxes ? Stocks or growing company shares should not pay taxes until you sold them because you didn't benefit from those until you sell them, if…

I will go further..let me be hypothetical.. in a closed and transparent system imho even income should not be taxed.. only spending.. if i earn 10bil and spend 0 why should I pay ? If i donate those 10b to my children and he spend 0 and grow it to 100b or leave it in bank.. all spending 0 .. what is the difference of taxation here ? We both died homeless and hungry... We are doing the equivalent of buyback\ reverse printing on dollars...decreasing liquidity ....Until i spend what is the problem ?.. btw this is not a closed and transparent system so taxing liquid assets is ok.. it's when I spend that I'm going to use or abuse the system or the ecosystem depending on what I'm buying . So let me pay 9000% taxes on a dodo steak and 1% on tofu burger this way with ethic taxing policies i would be also incentivated to spend better and improve the world ..

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

#459

Post by alex_young »

MR4D wrote: post #242
alex_young wrote: post #140

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You can also sell it and take the gains tax free in many cases.

Short of a 1031 exchange, I'm not sure how you would do that.

You can sell a house every 2 years and write off up to $500k in capital gains as long as it’s been your primary residence for 2 of the last 5 years. Doesn’t need to be consecutive.

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

#460

Post by HWR_14 »

chrismcb wrote: post #445
HWR_14 wrote: post #419

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I never followed this chain of logic. The whole point behind the stock market is to treat any commonly traded stock as a liquid asset. Why do you think that this fails with respect to Bezos and Gates?

By definition a stock is not a liquid asset. It needs to be sold first. In order to be sold, you need a buyer. You don't always have a buyer.

The stock market converts stock into a (more) liquid asset. The value of GOOG may vary day to day, but no one thinks that it's difficult to turn shares into cash.
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