Quote:
Originally Posted by Jim in CT
Wrong.
Investing in a company (whether you are hoping for dividends or capital gains) involves RISK, LOTS OF RISK. We need to encourage investors to take on that risk, and the way you do that is to make the "reward" comparable to the risk.
Capital gains are the "cost" of making money by investing. Chapter 1 of any economics text will clearly state that when you increase the cost of something, the demand for that something (no matter what it is), goes down. You don't want to stifle the demand for investment returns, particularly in a recession.
Money earned through investing is very, very different than what you earn in a bi-weekly paycheck. I don't need to risk any of my personal assets in order to earn a paycheck. There are, in my opinion, valid reasons why capital gains are taxed at a rate lower than income.
Here's what gets me about all this...John Kerry is worth 10 times what Mitt Romney is worth, and Kerry's effective tax rate is a little lower than Romney's. Where was all this outrage when Kerry ran for President? Menaing, it's OK when rich liberals do this, but when conservatives do it, they are out to screw the middle class. It's bullsh*t.
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God help me, Im on the side of the libs with this one!
Why this wasnt an issue with Kerry is because the republicans were not making the deficit a major battle cry when Kerry ran. They couldnt because Bush was key culprit in raising it
To be straight - I am for significantly lowering government spending and for lowering taxes. But we have significant loopholes that WAY overbenefit the wealthy and honestly are not fair. I've spent my career in investments, i know cap gains inside and out. I get this stuff.
But its crap that I pay $30 a day to commute to my job, make good money, take the "risk" every day of major decisions, sacrifice a shat load but due to AMT, I can barely take any deductions and NO TAX code benefits me. Yet multi millionaires can take all kinds of deductions and pay a less effective rate. The tax code needs to be changed. Loopholes need to be closed