U.S. billionaires would pay tax on unrealized gains from their assets to help finance President Joe Biden's emerging social-policy and climate-change legislation, according to a proposal unveiled on Wednesday by the top Senate Democrat for tax policy.

Semi-based, shame it will die somewhere in a committee

  • Bernies3trlnKielbasa [he/him]
    ·
    3 years ago

    Except that those values are just bullshit until the property is actually sold, hence "unrealized." Individual taxpayers are assessed on cash-basis accounting for a reason!

    • FloridaBoi [he/him]
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      3 years ago

      Hate to break it to you but all of accounting is made up bullshit. All of the market values are nonsense too.

      You don’t need to carry water for the wealthy by saying they shouldn’t pay taxes on unrealized gains. Like I said homeowners pay taxes on unrealized gains via property taxes so why not other assets?

      • Bernies3trlnKielbasa [he/him]
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        edit-2
        3 years ago

        My car---without which i can't get to work from the parts of town that i can afford to live---is worth more than when I bought it, thanks to the chip shortage. Why the fuck should I pay cash to the state because of that?

        BTW cash-basis is the least fictitious, so yeah. ___

        • FloridaBoi [he/him]
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          3 years ago

          By the same token a $50 million Ferrari 250 GTO that’s been in storage for forever also doesn’t pay gains taxes even though it appreciated 300% within a decade. Taxation on gains is only a bandaid to a wider problem.

          There could also be a 100% inheritance tax but someone will come out of the woodwork saying “so if I die and have $5 to my name, the state takes it?”

          Don’t individualize a structural problem. I am not attacking you I’m attacking the idea that arbitrary things have arbitrary rules that only benefit the wealthy. Any crumbs normal people get is nothing in the grand scheme of things.

          • Bernies3trlnKielbasa [he/him]
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            edit-2
            3 years ago

            This particular rule isn't arbitrary and my individual example is simply one example of the reason why this particular rule exists.

            We're discussing income taxes. Taxing "income" that hasn't actually come in yet is bad.