Did I say mandatory? I meant optional! You’re “free” to die in a cardboard box under a freeway as a market capitalist scarecrow warning to the other ants so they keep showing up to make us more!
Ultra net worth individuals, especially ones like Jeff Bezos with a lot of his net worth tied up in one company, can take a personal loan using his stock as collateral to keep up his lifestyle without needing to sell (and be taxed on) anything. It’s only really available for the 1%
I’ve never made 6 figures before, but was asked to show my investment portfolio value when applying for a mortgage as it was part of my assets. Assets the bank could seize if I didn’t pay my bill.
TIL I’m the 1%.
That’s strange. I’ve had a few mortgages now and have never been asked to show my investment portfolio. Where are you and what bank asked for the info?
Anyone can buy stocks in a margin account and then borrow against it as margin, and use that margin to make more money. If you can open a brokerage account, you can do this.
Shit can turn on you real fast though and you can lose a lot of money since you’re borrowing against the value of a fluctuating asset.
E.g $1000 stocks let’s you buy $400 on margin, but if that $1000 becomes worth less than $700 you gotta pay back that $400, but now you gotta sell at $700 or pony up more cash and that $400 you bought is also only worth $200, so you sell $200 of your $700 and suddenly you’ve lost 50% of the value
They can be used as collateral because they are assets that have value. You can use your car or house as collateral too, and neither requires payment of federal income tax.
There isn’t a federal tax on most assets. It’s income that’s taxed. If your assets gain value they can be sold, at which point you pay taxes on that income, though often at a reduced rate (e.g. Capital Gains Tax for selling stock at a profit).
Except most state/local governments do have property taxes on houses, land, and cars. Not unrealistic to apply the same towards other assets. Specially since taxing homes and cars is counterintuitive because you’re taxing necessities, while taxing monetary/investment assets like stocks would make more sense to encourage more spending instead of just hoarding the money.
And you can do the same thing. He got a loan using his stock as collateral. The stock has value. The bank can use that value to issue the loan as they see fit within federal regulations. They can do the same with your less than $100m portfolio.
How about we just make things fair so that the ultra rich pay their share? This is not the way. It literally makes no sense.