Olin wrote:
>> It's a different kind of tax Olin....and the average "wage slave" as
>> you call them is only a wage slave because they are paying taxes in the
>> first place.
>>
>
> When stock options are used in lieu of actual salary, it's not only "the
> same," it's a blatant use of lobbying efforts and the will of Congress to
> circumvent the payment of taxes according to the codes. I'm certainly no
> economist, but income deferred to stock options sure looks like income to
> me.
So do you actually know anything about stock options? Seriously,
there are two types, ISO and NQ. Either type has no value until
exercised. In the case of ISOs, the difference between what one pays
and what one sells them for is considered a capital gain, either long
or short term. The other type, the NQ which seems more common nowadays
considers the price one pays subtracted from fair market value on the
day they are sold and considers the result as ordinary income, taxable
at ones tax rate for that year. My stock options from Tandem/Compaq
days were ISOs but got mostly converted to NQ with the HP merger. They
are mostly worthless now, especially the largest block that I was given
after working many extra hours on a project for almost a year. My cost
basis would be $79/share....with HP not even coming close for the
duration. In any case, the Incentive Stock Options (ISOs) were intended
to reward performance at a time when that was preferred to political
correctness and back stabbing as a means of advancing through the
corporate ranks. So, stock options only have meaning if the company
increases the stock price. Say, Mark Hurd gets a signon stock option
@ $25 a share for 10,000 shares. The $25 price is the price on the
day that the options were granted. If Mark Hurd increases the price to
$50 a share, or it somehow increases during his period for exercise,
then IF he exercises he will make a pile of money that will be taxed
either at normal income rates or at 15%% if he gets ISOs. This gives
Hurd an incentive to increase the stock price. And further, the income
does not accrue until Hurd sells. He may buy up his shares and not
sell until years later.
>
>>> Seeing as how both conservatives and more than a few libertarians have
>>> argued for flat taxes over the years at different times, it would surely
>>> seem the tables have turned entirely, with lower income folks paying a
>>> significantly higher percentage of their income to taxes.
>> Well, the trouble with the label libertarian is that anybody can call
>> themselves one and then go off making claims that a "flat tax" is fair.
>> By that definition Neil Boortz is a libertarian....even claims the
>> label. It makes about as much sense as calling Bush a conservative.
>>
>
> Hey, I'm just telling you the arguments that have been made to me by folks
> who claim to be various things.
Yeah, there's a lot of that going around. That's one reason why I
ask people to explain what they really mean when they use the labels
liberal and conservative. People have referred to Bush as a conservative
and Clinton a liberal and to me those labels don't fit at all.
>
> Bush, of course, calls himself a "compassionate conservative," something
> Goldberg took issue with... not so much Bush, but the "compassionate" part.
> This conservative pundit called that, "compassionate conservativism" about
> the scariest thing he'd ever heard of.
Who is Goldberg? Whoopie or Jonah? Somebody else?? It's worth noting
that if you are referring to Jonah Goldberg, he's one of the staunchest
of the neo-cons (think PNAC from the AEI) around.
>> The inheritance tax is absolutely totally unethical, even by the
>> standards of the collectivists running this show. A person pays taxes
>> on his assets his entire life and then when he dies, the ferals claim
>> to own rights to what he had left over. Sort of flies in the face of
>> the approach of saving and taking responsibility for one's economic
>> actions.
>>
>
> Of course it is. And, that's precisely why Texas made the FLOOR for
> inheritance taxes something on the order of a million bucks several years
> ago. It's the same in several other states, and has gone up some since then
> in some places.
Should be $1000 trillion. Besides, what Texas does is
irrelevant...the inheritance tax is a federal tax.
>> It's not a minor issue...it's another example of the outright theft
>> by government that so many collectivists feel is justified.
>>
>
> Joseph, when my mother passed away a few years back, she left a small
> estate... probably about a hundred grand en toto. That was divided up
> between my son and myself. Neither of us even drew the slightest interest
> whatsoever from the State of Texas, the State of Tennessee OR Uncle Sugar.
> No tax due on that inheritance at all. Not one single penny.
When my mother passed away, we had to write a check for $165K to the
ferals. At the time, anything beyond $650 was taxed at a 65%% rate. Do
the math. My mother worked her ass off being in her late teens when the
depression started and by her death had accumulated significant assets
by her own hard work and savings. So what exactly did the "collective"
do to deserve that money (which was in 1989 dollars). She knew the value
of saving, not getting into debt, investing wisely and so forth. So
again, why is it that was rewarded by a theft of assets????
>
> You seem so busy calling all who disagree with you "collectivists," that I'm
> not sure you're paying attention to the issue at hand. When Shrub pushed
> that that through, it was at the significant insistence of the Walton family
> with an even more significant amount of lobbying money spent, so they could
> have more than seventy five billion dollars left over after inheritance
> taxes. When Shrub brought it up, it might, and I stress might, have affected
> somewhere between two and five percent of Americans.
The principle is the same if it's $1 or $79 billion. There is no
ethical defense for the principle of stealing that money, regardless
of amount upon an individual's death. The reason this is correctly
labeled collectivist is that people who believe that "the people" have
some right to an individual's money upon his or her death do so on the
basis of the collective whole somehow deserving the wealth of others.
Argue the point...now that I have explained why this is a collectivist
action, you can refute that if you can.
>
> Now, if you want to argue that inheritance taxes should be done away with
> entirely, I'm all right there with you, but that was NOT what Shrub was
> arguing. He was arguing that the puny (by comparison) estate of us all was
> in jeopardy from the tax man, when simply put, that was not and is not the
> case.
Bush aside, I am arguing principle. Bush does not count. His
justifications for his actions are pathetic. It seems that you agree
that death taxes should be abolished, but because Bush did it
specifically to the benefit of Sam Walton's heirs, does that somehow
change the principle???
>> But that's a totally different issue, Olin. In the case of CEOs being
>> rewarded, it is done with assets of a "private" company, not by stealing
>> dollars from citizens. And while you keep making the point that these
>> CEOs are making many times what ordinary employees make, that too has
>> little relevance to the issue. Each individual employee has made a
>> decision to work for the agreed upon salary....and he or she is free
>> to quit. The owners of the company, e.g. the shareholders, are the only
>> ones who have a legitimate say in stopping such abuses.
>>
>
> And more than a few shareholders are arguing that very thing. And no, it's
> NOT the same thing. If it were, then bonuses would also be taxed as capital
> gains, seeing as how they're not a normal part of your compensation? Ever
> get one? Ever see it taxed at anything other than the going rate.
Bonuses are considered ordinary income. Taxed at the normal rate. The
NQ stock options are also considered ordinary income. ISOs are taxed as
capital gains.
>
> Sorry, but income is income is income is income, ad infinitum.
So, in effect you are saying that any money made through investments
regardless of who makes it should be taxed as ordinary income? Should
people also be paying SS and Medicare on it as well? (by the way, for
NQ stock options, SS and Medicare ARE deducted).
>
> If I'm making $100 K, and you're the CEO, knocking down a million a year in
> stock options, you damned well be paying something other than fifteen
> percent to my thirty two percent withholding.
Unless things have changed since I retired in 2005, you will not be
paying 32%% in FIT on $100K. However, between SS and Medicare you and
your employer will be ponying up over 15%%......
>
> Again, we well might be in agreement on doing away with all taxes. I'd sure
> like it a lot, but until I see some realistic hope of that ever happening, I
> prefer to argue the rules we currently all allegedly live under.
>
>>> Never mind what one thinks of taxes, in general, as none of us
>>> particularly loves 'em, but when a billionaire steps up and says this
>>> ain't fair, it just might be time to take a listen.
>> Why does Buffett's theory of what's "right" carry any more weight
>> than any other nominally free individual. I suppose that the next
>> proposition is to advocate banning abortion because the pope is
>> an expert? The fact is that income tax is a form of slavery, which
>> many people seem to oppose when applied to individuals owned by
>> other individuals, but not when it's asserted as a legitimate
>> role of a government.
>>
>
> It doesn't. It simply means that when somebody at the top publically claims
> the system is unfair and shows how, that it merits something other than a
> casual dismissal. That's all.
Well, it's unfair because everybody is getting screwed. It's also
unsustainable so arguing about it may just be so much dust in the wind.
Perhaps what Mr. Buffett should argue is that EVERYBODY not have to pay
an income tax. But, having read some of his opinions, that is not going
to happen.
>
>
