Rubio wants to give each millionaire $220K by Eliminating Taxes on Stock Earnings

[pampango]

Bad tax policy ideas never die, they just get recycled. The latest retread is GOP candidate Marco Rubio’s proposal to entirely eliminate taxes on capital gains income.

A preferential tax rate on capital gains has always been a staple of GOP tax policy. But only the brazen few have proposed completely abolishing it.

As Josh Barro pointed out in The New York Times, other GOP presidential candidates have proposed reducing capital gains, but not eliminating it. He said:

The mainstream Republican position on capital gains has long been that they should be taxed at a low rate, but not zero. In 1996, Mr. Romney was supporting Bob Dole, the eventual nominee, whose campaign platform called for a 14 percent tax rate on capital gains. In 2003, President George W. Bush signed a law setting the rate at 15 percent, a policy that John McCain proposed to continue if elected in 2008. (The current maximum rate on capital gains is 23.8 percent, after tax increases that took effect in 2013.)

According to Citizens for Tax Justice, the Rubio tax play would give taxpayers in the richest 1 percent an average tax cut of more than $220,000.

http://www.juancole.com/2016/02/rubio-wants-to-give-each-millionaire-220k-by-eliminating-taxes-on-stock-earnings.html

And from Krugman:

Rubio For The Rich



Josh Barro notes that Marco Rubio’s proposal to eliminate taxes on capital gains goes well beyond anything we’ve seen from previous Republican contenders, even highly conservative candidates. It seems worth adding some numbers on just how much this would be a giveaway to the very, very rich.

The nonpartisan Tax Policy Center has the information, illustrated by the pie chart above. Half of taxes on dividends and long-term capital gains are paid, not by the 1 percent, but by the 0.1 percent — the richest 1/1000th of Americans. Another 29 percent are paid by the next 0.9 percent. Everyone else — the other 99 percent of the population — pays just 21 percent of the total.

So this is a tax cut not just for the rich, but for the very, very rich, with essentially nothing for the vast majority of Americans. And there is, as Barro says, absolutely no reason to believe that there would be large economic benefits from this giveaway.

http://krugman.blogs.nytimes.com/2016/02/04/rubio-for-the-rich/

Sounds like Marco is making a big play for GOP establishment support.

[Turbineguy]

1. Sounds like he wants

Shkreli's vote.

[B Calm]

2. When this 3rd place lazy ass jerk moves into 1st place, I'll worry about what

he is saying.

[oberliner]

3. That will be this Tuesday

Mark your calendar.

[B Calm]

4. LOL, good one!