yeahhedugit
5896
418
19
Edit: If money comes into your pocket, whether it's realized or not, it's still in your pocket. The tax code treats this like Schrodinger's income. It's not really there if you don't look at it. You can even borrow it, spend it, and not pay taxes on it if you're wealthy enough.
Quickest edit ever. 11 quick quick upvotes, and then 8 billionaires downvoted this!
GrumpyMe
We don't even cross their mind!
Mrpipboy3000
17% for me!
MacAlba1314
powerrangerpl
Bezos is short for parasite to the society.
wecouldbehappywithoutcapitalism
So they get to deduct taxes for healthcare which they don’t even fully cover and foist other taxes on the worker to then lobby the government to prevent universal healthcare and no taxes by using the money they would pay to grease the pockets of congress. These are all just idiots who happen to be at the top. We would run this whole thing ourselves. We already do, just instead we let people rob us and make it harder
doctorId
I bet it would only take one or two of these cuts to make them reconsider the tax cuts
Luorric
I got a bit back in taxes this year (not much though) but overall paid about 18% of all my income in taxes, not counting sales tax. I work more hours this year than they will for the next decade. That 18% is literally over 400 hours of my life, but for them it's a couple of minutes to make the same amount.
Marv111
The constitution was amended to levy an income tax. Not a unrealized capital gain tax. If you want this kind of tax, get your congressman to introduce another amendment.
yeahhedugit
Yeah, everybody knows that. What people don't realize is how the system has been purposely rigged to be unfair.
First things first. We Don't get constitutional amendment without overwhelming sentiment.. first things first.
It's all about awareness. And every little bit of wealth tax we can sneak in, we got to do it.
Remember, real estate taxes, the most widespread tax in the country, is essentially a wealth tax.
CallMeMcGyver
But FOX News says you are a communist if you say rich people should pay taxes... a bloodthirsty woke communist! (/s)...
yeahhedugit
It's terrorism!
slack3rdav3
i am all of those things. i wish having a community was still a thing...
Hortman68
We need to tax obscene billionaire wealth not worker income.
QuitLookinAtMineAim
And now he can claim to be an associate of dear leader and then he can't be investigated. As long as he pays the associate fee. Hmm...
FrankGrenadine
The only way to get him to pay higher rate is to raise taxes on unrealized capital gains somehow. Not saying there aren’t ways of doing this (eg wealth tax)
FrankGrenadine
But there are good ( ie non pro billionaire) reasons why governments have been reluctant to do it and technical reasons why taxing unrealized gains is really complicated. I never get why these sorts of posts implicitly ignore consumption/VAT taxes which are much more effective means of redistribution with fewer unintended consequences.
SometimesOthertimesAnytime
My friend is wondering if you could explain consumption/vat tax and why it is more efficient. I know the reason, but my friend doesn't know. So, would you please explain it for them?
FrankGrenadine
One reason is that VAT is easy to calculate and self-enforcing: the tax is only paid on extra value added so whoever pays it has incentive to make sure others in supply chain are paying their fair part. Taxing unrealized gains creates definitional problems (like what assets are and are worth) and fixing those problems tend to create loopholes. It’s also logistically hard to force someone (even a billionaire) to pay tax on asset they haven’t sold as they don’t have cash on hand to pay it
ButImNoExpert
This is a horrendous and ill-informed understanding of the imications of a VAT tax. In a VAT regime, the end consumer still pays the entirety of the tax burden, and consumption taxes disproportionately harm those with the least ability to pay.
Also, is is NOT logistically difficult to institute and run a wealth tax, particularly when compared to a VAT regime. Several jurisdictions do this already,
Imadethisaccounttopost
I've heard people (idiots) try and argue that the Billionaires .98% if more than the average tax payer will pay in a decade or even life time
I call bullshit, and that Billionaires need to pay their share, period.
yeahhedugit
https://media2.giphy.com/media/v1.Y2lkPWE1NzM3M2U1OTlyenJpdnhrbzloN3lncmhicmRmNWQ3ZGx4dmM0ZDUwcHJueXh5cSZlcD12MV9naWZzX3NlYXJjaCZjdD1n/TYRDnO4KikDd0llFJ8/200w.webp
[deleted]
[deleted]
slack3rdav3
i want you to take the amount of tax you paid and divide it by money you made, then multiply by 100 for the actual effective percentage of tax you paid. Mine was around 14% if i remember correctly.
SirSmurfalot
You are probably looking at marginal tax rate. 28.5% seems unlikely for an effective tax rate.
https://www.fidelity.com/learning-center/smart-money/marginal-tax-rate
ThatSonOfaBitch
You gotta be making around $300K (AGI) for your effective tax rate to be 28.5%.
yeahhedugit
Thank you for paying for the military that protects billionaire tax cheats' yachts!
SandpaperCock
Are you for or against taxes OP? I'm confused. Your post implies you're for billionaires paying tax, but your comment just now implies you're against it. Are you implying the commenter above should commit a felony by not paying their taxes? You are giving very mixed signals.
yeahhedugit
Doh! Sarcasm! Look at anything I've posted. Geez.
ParpleBarglarAhrlm
I’m in the 24% bracket for federal. 14% isn’t near correct for the average wage of $66k in the US
https://www.irs.gov/filing/federal-income-tax-rates-and-brackets
CoalhouseWalker
Like yeah the top portion of your salary is taxed at 24%, but not the first $103k of it, just the amount over that
CoalhouseWalker
I didn't do all the math, but for someone making $66k, only $18k of it is taxed at 22%, $36k is taxed at 12%, and $12k is taxed at 10%.... 14% overall rate seems about right
CoalhouseWalker
Ok I did the math. Yeah it's 14%.
StillNotYouTube
The standard deduction for a single person is $16k. There are also often many other deductions and credits available. But even if you ignored all the deductions and credits, someone with an AGI of $66k would have a 12% overall federal tax rate according to those brackets. When you are in a certain tax bracket, not all of your income is taxed at that rate, only the amount over the threshold.
SirSmurfalot
Can someone explain marginal tax rates to this guy please?
BeckyLookAtHerButt
With all that taxes savings they can afford to pay and treat their employees well, right? Right?
VaclavUrbanek
I'm sure it will trickle down to them eventually.
yeahhedugit
https://media2.giphy.com/media/v1.Y2lkPWE1NzM3M2U1eTc4ZWw4N2NxcDFlaDUzcW4zbTZ0ZDI1dDBoNGpnZzk3MnkyYjlvZiZlcD12MV9naWZzX3NlYXJjaCZjdD1n/FoH28ucxZFJZu/200w.webp
HandoB4Javert
yeahhedugit
https://media3.giphy.com/media/v1.Y2lkPWE1NzM3M2U1bnllNml0eXZ4NG5kNGZ0NmJsYWc2NGU0dmk1aXZoNG5wdm50OG5mdSZlcD12MV9naWZzX3NlYXJjaCZjdD1n/dOl2LFw0RbTMc/200w.webp
Everyonesfavorite
America taxes earned wages, not income!
StillNotYouTube
I think what you mean to say is that it does not tax wealth, which Reich conveniently substitutes when referring to Bezos, but then switches to income when talking about the average american. A total apples to oranges comparison. Kind of dumb because you could logically argue that Bezos should pay more, but Reich just looks like an idiot with this shitty argument.
yeahhedugit
Money you take in is income. Just because the wealthy have redefined income doesn't mean It isn't income.
whiskeywonka
That is not true. It taxes both. If I sell my comic book collection for $1m, I have to pay income tax on it. If I sell my old car, for less than I paid for it, I still have to pay a income tax for that sale. I can itemize my taxes and explain I took a loss, but the IRS doesn't have to accept that and can claim it was income. The biggest issue is that the US tax code is stupidly complex. There really is no need for it to be.
yeahhedugit
Good point. If money comes into your pocket, whether it's realized or not, it's still in your pocket. The tax code treats this like Schrodinger's income. It's not really there if you don't look at it.
whiskeywonka
Loans should only get taxed if the collateral for it is not already taxed, like for a home. No need or good would come from taxing that twice, plus all the taxes paid on the income that pays off the loan. Getting a loan against stocks just shouldn't happen, sell the fkn stocks. The lender should have to buy the stocks at market rate. Clean up these kinds of things, else taxing the rich wont matter at all. Taxing based on net worth (IE wealth) is a fast way to tax the poorest ppl even more.
rolliefingers
My understanding is that they pay themselves in stock and other assets which they then borrow against, so it's just essentially an extra step in getting paid that allows them to avoid income tax.
Seems to me the solution would be to tax the loans they get.
Still wouldn't solve the much larger more serious and more difficult problem of incompetence and corruption in the spending of tax revenue, but.
onecowboytoo
Tax the stock as income at the value when given to them. Then tax it yearly just like property taxes on a house.
Theniyaal
StevenFarmer
Tax their stocks and assets, based on their value at the time of 'payment'.
CommentBot3000
This is the super easy and very obvious solution!
azgrak1
Musk leveraged his Tesla stock to buy Twitter. But according to tax law his Tesla stock isn’t taxable. But yet it had enough value to buy Twitter. The joy of tax laws written by the people who really don’t want to pay taxes.
metrognome11
Tax the collateral
whiskeywonka
Nearly all of it is already taxed in one or more ways. People keep conflating wealth and unrealized gains as 'income' and want it taxed. Itsl ike having a comic book collection that is worth $1m, and having to pay taxes on that $1m. Till it gets sold its not gains. It is wealth. Any person can do this SAME thing, pull a loan against your 401/403. You pay the loan+interest /to yourself/. More or less a wealth tax is a property tax.Imagine if everything you owned you had to pay yearly on its value
crazyspelling
So impose a property tax on their wealth. I have to pay a shitload in property taxes, and I get no income or gains from it. Leveraging it does nearly nothing - I get to credit my mortgage interest against income taxes. They could do that, too, but oh wait, they don't pay income taxes either.
whiskeywonka
Right but there is a serious slippery slope problem which is why governments have been slow to do it this way. The proof of it is easy, look at the original income tax. "top 1% only!" and now we all pay it. Once a rule is in place, politicians try to expand it, always. How would you like to have to pay property tax on everything you own? Your clothes? Your laptop? Phone? Etc. It really would expand like that.
Isorikk
Should just tax assets beyond a certain threshold. If you're a billionaire, I think you should be heavily penalized on any further gains. You beat the game of capitalism, now let someone else play...
patapof
This has been solved in other countries: tax passive assets beyond a threshold progressively + tax transfer of assets, in and out of the country, beyond a threshold progressively. So essentially, make the trickle down mandatory, not a "pretty please" cause that ain't working.
nurmich
If they can tax the unrealized value of the property that homeowners have, they can take the unrealized value of the stocks that these people get.
CommentBot3000
In this context does it even make sense to call the stocks "unrealized"? They receive the stocks in lieu of a wage, so instead of getting $1000 you are paid in something which is worth $1000 at the time of payment. It's super obvious to just tax the value of the thing they received (in this case, stocks).
battery1979
How many of those stocks come with paid dividends? If the stock pays dividends they are getting paid for owning the stock.
CommentBot3000
The dividends are taxed when they are paid out, both if they are qualified or ordinary so that scenario is covered!
rolliefingers
Seems less complicated to let the banks assess value and loan accordingly and then just tax the loans, what am I missing?
CommentBot3000
It makes no sense to tax loans, since when do you not tax a loan? You should just tax the stocks, that's the only thing that makes sense.
khora
That will just lead them to deflate the value of the stocks.
CommentBot3000
Do you not know how stocks work? You can't just deflate the value at a whim.
yeahhedugit
You forgot to factor in the corruption.
khora
Seems less complicated to prohibit banks from using stocks as collateral.
rolliefingers
Yeah actually that makes even more sense. It seems like a bad risk anyway, now that I think about it. They're speculative by nature.