Quote: (01-24-2012 11:18 AM)P Dog Wrote:Sounds tempting and certainly fairer, but I'm not sure this is a good policy in the globalization era. Capital crosses borders much more freely and easily than labor, and why not invest where capital gets the most generous tax treatment? Sure there's exchange rate risk and the typical home flag bias, but international tax competition is a reality. And one consequence of this is less fair tax systems which privilege capital over labor.
Almost all of his income is taxed under Capital Gains where the tax rate is 15%. There ought to be a hike in the CGT after a certain threshold to close the loophole on shit like this.
It makes me uneasy, but we'd probably benefit from reducing the capital gains rate simply to increase investment.
Incidentally there IS a movement underfoot to increase the rate carried interest (how the dudes in private equity and hedge funds pay themselves) is taxed (currently at 15% and the origin of this debate) in exchange for lowering the rate at which C-corporations are taxed. Charlie Rangel was pushing this back when the Dems controlled the House and before his latest problems with ethics.