That's because journalists don't want to educate, they want to outrage. Every one of 'em knows that it's by tax bracket.
You only pay x amount for up to x amount of dollars.
You pay a higher percentage for the next x amount of dollars.
You then pay a higher percentage for x amount of dollars.
But, you don't pay the higher percentage for all the dollars - only for the dollars after x amount.
It's not going to impact Bobby and Joan's 401k investment. It's not going to impact Jerry the guy who owns the convenience store until he's 70. It's going to impact people who are already multi-millionaires that generate large amounts of money from their investments. Then, it's only going to change short or long term capital gains.
They're probably talking about taxing short term gains higher - I don't know. Those are investments that lasted less than a year. It makes sense to tax them higher, as they're more destructive and less beneficial to the economy as a whole.
Long term investments are what make the world go 'round.
By the way, at 7.5% you're "only" making maybe $75,000 a year on a million dollars. That's it. A million dollars invested puts you barely in upper-middle class.
I could live very comfortably on 75 thousand. Just think if you had ten million invested and got the 7.5%, then you would be getting $750,000 a year and that would be enough to satisfy nearly anyone!
I've got a whole lot invested. I make more than I can reasonably spend, so it just keeps adding up.
It's absurdly easy for me to make large sums of money. It's kinda backwards, but that's the way the system works.
At the same time, there's a reason why I pay more in taxes than most people make. That's even with my favorable tax structuring.
Anyhow, it's pretty much backwards. In an ideal world (ain't never gonna exist) it'd be easier for poor people to make money than it is for people who already have money to make money.
I have enough money to be in the 'investment class'.
Yeah, that is the way it is though, those with the big piles of money, unless they are really retarded, their piles should just grow in perpetuity
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