Biden Admin Moves to Tax Rich Families

by Chris Black

How about you make stock buybacks illegal again? That way there isn’t as much incentive to buy stocks in the first place. We also wouldn’t get $2 trillion valuations for companies either.

Like, Apple has thousands of stores around the world that they can ship millions of phones to, and book them as sold. 

All major companies cook their books. What was illegal twenty years ago is a generally accepted accounting principle today.

President Biden’s push to ramp up taxes on the wealthy is getting diluted by his Democratic allies in Congress, undermining his chances of fully delivering on his 2020 campaign pledge to curb America’s widening inequality. t.co/FEXt3amXBR

— Bloomberg Tax (@tax) September 15, 2021

Biden’s move to tax rich families on inherited assets at the time of transfer — ending the so-called step-up in basis measure — is absent from the House plan unveiled Monday. His top capital gains tax rate of 39.6% gets weakened to 25%. There is a 3% surtax on incomes exceeding $5 million, but the principle of bringing levies on investments more into line with wage-earners’ incomes is eroded.

While Senate Finance Committee Chairman Ron Wyden hinted at addressing step-up in basis, such a gesture faces opposition from moderate Democrats in the upper chamber. Farm-state lawmakers have voiced particular concern about doing away with tax-free transfers of inherited assets, even though family farms were specifically marked out as an exception by Biden. –Bloomberg