Time to have a little fun with word games. "Pervert" is normally a word used to describe a sexual deviant, and the noun "perversion" means the act of perverting sex -- often with the result of grave, permanent psychological and possibly physical damage being inflicted on the victim.
Today, I am going to throw this word into the realm of tax policy. Normally, tax policy is designed to create incentives and disincentives, and to raise revenues for the functioning of government. But it is generally based on actions. Actions that have already occurred, or actions that may occur.
If you bought booze or gasoline, you paid an alcohol or gas tax. If you sell stocks for more than you paid for them, you incur the capital gains tax. Whenever you purchase non-food items at a retail establishment, you pay a sales tax. And so on.
And in the "disincentive" realm, withdrawing money early from a tax-exempt retirement fund such as a 401k or 457 will slam you with a stiff tax bill. There's an immediate tax penalty subtracted from the amount you withdraw, plus the higher income tax because your withdrawal increased your annual income. This is to prevent the abuse of tax-deferred and tax-exempt accounts that are meant to help ensure financial stability in retirement.
Well, the Bidenites have now dreamed up a harebrained scheme that is so bizarre, it makes you wonder what they've been smoking. Dubbed the “billionaire minimum income tax,” this plan would tax assets that haven't even been sold, solely on their appreciation in value. It imposes taxes (spread out in installments over several years) based on what the asset owner would have incurred had he or she chosen to sell the asset after it had appreciated.
Now granted, this proposal only applies to Americans with $100 million or more in assets whose effective tax rate in any year is less than 20 percent of their income. So it's not a huge chunk of the population, although it does involve a significant portion of overall annual revenues.
The 20 percent minimum tax rate would apply both to ordinary income and the increase in the value of assets in a given year. So unrealized capital gains will be taxed? Crazy! That's like a judge issuing arrest warrants in advance for a certain suspect. ("Well, we know he has a long track record as an incorrigible. Let's be ready and save ourselves some trouble when the time comes....") It really is Orwellian in its contortions.
The details haven't been worked out, and we don't know if this Orwellian policy would survive court challenges. But such a twisted and warped plan really begs the question: What happens if Uncle Sam rakes in mucho dinero on stocks that shot up for a short period of time, then went into precipitous decline for many months? Would the stock holder then be entitled to tax breaks as compensation? Don't hold your breath.
This latest brain fart from the delusional Bidenites speaks to the complexity and tangled morass that is the U.S. tax code (an insane cluster**** can be proposed without raising alarm bells), and also to the perverted desires of progressives to find any and every way to increase revenues so as to grow government and increase their power and control.
I'm disgusted, but not all that worried. I suspect it will go down in flames, like so much of what this colossally incompetent and uber-arrogant administration attempts. Thank heavens.
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