Ways to pay for "capitalist welfare" you WON'T hear from the investor class. (Encore!)

[TahitiNut]

(Sometimes, two weeks seems like an eternity.)

Facing a welfare tab in the HUNDREDS of BILLIONS - some say up to TWO TRILLION - you won't hear the 'leadership' promulgate

• a national sales tax of 1-2% on the sale or exchange of corporate stock EXCEPT for IPOs,
• a short-term (under 1 year) capital gains tax surcharge of 10-20%,
• an export tax/tariff on capital,
• a change to GAAP/FASB and tax law that requires executive compensation to be an AFTER-TAX expense,
• any prohibition on corporations owning corporations.

Gee... I wonder why?


Let's add ... reversal of the legislation that allows someone like Michael Bloomberg (who has little "ordinary income") to sell off assets in 2008, 2009, and 2010 and realize MILLIONS or BILLIONS in long-term capital gains and pay NOTHING IN FEDERAL INCOME TAX ON THOSE GAINS! Nothing! 0%!

http://taxes.about.com/od/capitalgains/a/CapitalGainsTa...

Still listening.

[Warpy]

1. Well, the last one's a little impractical at this point

I'd also suggest the capital gains tax kick in over a certain point, say $100,000, so that retirees and people who sell houses they've owned for more than a couple of decades don't get slaughtered. I'd also suggest a 10-20% tax surcharge on obscenely high incomes of over a million a year, the exception being people like athletes with a very limited career span who should be able to average that income over 5 years. If they're still playing at the end of that 5 years and pulling an obscene paycheck, they will pay the tax.

Were it up to me, the income tax on incomes over a million a year would be confiscatory, 90%, rising to 99% for anything over ten million a year.

Progressive taxes were a marvelous disincentive to greed. It's time to bring them back.

[Stinky The Clown]

5. Yeah! What she ^ said!!!!!

[TahitiNut]

9. Well, I sure wouldn't mind seeing the income tax structure of the Eisenhower years again.

Without the Swiss cheese loopholes, of course, and adjusted for inflation.

Even better would be the Jerry Ford years, imho. Does anyone notice the similarity between now and the years leading up to the Great Depression????

[ContinentalOp]

2. Wow, let me see if I understand that last point:

"Starting with 2008, there's a new zero percent tax rate on long-term capital gains. The zero percent rate applies to individuals who are in the 10% and 15% marginal tax brackets. The zero percent rate is scheduled to expire at the end of 2010, when capital gains rates will increase to at least 15%."

So you pay 0% on long-term capital gains if you're in the 10 or 15% bracket, which means that multi-millionaires can just make sure they don't have any income from wages and they pay nothing?

[TahitiNut]

8. That's how I read it ....

Let's remember that Michale Bloomberg only accepts $1/year salary as Mayor of New York City. Isn't that interesting? If he can keep his "ordinary income (wages and salaries, short-term capital gains, dividends) under about $33,000/year, then he's at the 15% income tax bracket on ordinary ("earned") income. There are several other strategies he can employ to accomplish this, of course, including massive charitable contributions and structuring his affairs under a corporate entity.

Another strategy is for married folks to strucutre their affairs and ensure that ordinary income is attributable to only one of them and that capital gains are on assets that're the "sole and separate property" of the other.

This tax loophole essentially REWARDS people who're so wealthy they don't have to work. Yes ... the posturing was all about retired people. (Gee ... why tax the elderly? Like McCain? Like Jack Welch?) The problem is that it's an incredible giveaway to the wealthiest people who want to cash in on the Cheney/Bush privateering years.

[Vincardog]

3. a change to GAAP/FASB and tax law that requires executive compensation to be an AFTER-TAX expense,

[Union Thug]

4. What I've learned this week....

Regardless of the details, no plan that involves forcing wall street and its investor class to bail themselves out will ever get traction.

Don't you know that this would be CLASS WAR against our poor, put-upon overlords? Don't you know that many of our poor, put-upon overlords are directly linked to our wealthy so-called representatives in DC? Good luck.

Don't expect anything to be done from the working class perspective. It's all about protecting the 'have mores.'

[PsN2Wind]

6. How about adding that bankruptcy applies to the entire holdings of a conglomerate

rather than allowing a company or corporation to declare bankruptcy on only one segment of their operation while the parent company has no liability. And we know Trump wouldn't like it which would be a bonus.

[lumberjack_jeff]

7. #4 is a particularly awesome idea. n/t

[suffragette]

10. When JP Morgan Chase took over WAMU, there was a quote from a Morgan

executive in a few articles that continues to stand out for me, ``We've coveted the franchise for a long time,'' Scharf said on the Sept. 26 call. ``We are very, very excited strategically.'' http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=20601109&sid=a3W...

That sounds more like an excited shopper who has been waiting for an item they like to be put on sale and is now snapping it up on clearance than someone who is concerned about an economic crisis.

And, as you point out, what we don't hear are conditions such as those you bring up. Instead, a tax cut is now being proposed as part of this? That makes no sense to me.