Raising the Capital Gains Tax Hurts Every Working Person

For all you “Soak the Rich” types, one thing that should be explained is that everybody has something in the stock market. There are millions of small investors when compared to the super rich we keep hearing about. There are municipalities across this nation that have money in the stock market whether it be in floating bonds to pay for school systems and local infrastructure or town and city pension plans. They’re in there. And the small investors, people who have under $100,000.00 in scattered across different stocks like Verizon and Columbia Gas, aren’t exactly what you call wheeler-dealers in the stock market. For most people it has taken a working career to accumulate this sum.

Utilities are highly regulated and their stocks don’t swing far up or down but remain a steady source of income for retired people who have worked their whole lives to build up a nest egg. Many retired people have at least part of their savings in the stock market and it’s not particularly big money but along with a 401k and their Social Security, retired folks can live the way they were living prior to stopping working.

I want to add that these were also the people who the government stiffed out of their savings by taking over General Motors and royally screwing the small investor while practically handing the GM Union the company. Not rich people by any stretch of the imagination and actually many retired GM employees to boot!

It is the middle class investors who are the people most hurt by taxes on dividends and capital gains taxes, not the super-rich or the just plain rich who can either afford to pay the tax or more likely avoid them altogether. It’s Ma and Pa that are afraid to sell when capital gains rates go up or get whacked when they have to pay the higher rates on their dividends.

If you’re working and contributing to a 401k, you are going to see higher administration costs and fees. If you’re a small stock holder, you’re going to see a tax increase bite into your investment.

What’s that you’re saying? You don’t own any stocks in rich Wall Street traded companies so screw all the people who do? Here’s news for you:  Stock investment has been very easy for people for quite a while now. With an initial $250.00 a person can buy a big or small company’s stock direct without a broker and reinvest the dividends to purchase more stock so when it comes time to retire, they can then start to draw dividends to subsidize their other retirement savings. Many millions of people, regular middle-class people with jobs, have taken advantage of this savings option. If you have a bank account, you can have a stock account.

Plus, your private 401k as well as your teacher’s pension, your DPW pension, your Police and Firefighter’s pensions are in the stock market.

Now the government is going after this too to fund their unwieldy and on the verge of collapse welfare state.

But even if they do, it won’t be enough. Once the government gets their tax hikes, it won’t do anything to bring down the massive debt it has accumulated in just the last year, never mind the last 8 years. Even if the government declares everybody with a job “rich”, it won’t be enough. There just aren’t enough rich folks to take care of everybody else.

So when you hear people in government talking about raising the capital gains tax rates, they’re really talking about YOU.

Who did you vote for again?

Vote for Obama, Get a Phone

Although NPR and other media outlets on the political left manage to trot out the “young single mother of two holding down two jobs but just can’t seem to make ends meet” type person to represent the 47% of the population that are on public assistance programs, we all have seen the other 46.975% that are not only gaming the system but are the decedents of people who have gamed the system.

And let’s be fair, it’s not just a black thing, a white thing, an immigrant thing or a Hispanic thing. People from all walks of life are receiving government giveaways. And it’s not like it used to be either, it’s just not that hard a game to play anymore .

It’s a lot like going on a TV game show and winning a TV. It’s just the Government perpetuating itself.  Now that it’s all Federal dollars doled out by the nameless and faceless, all one has to do is apply. Or, using what just happened to me this week as an example, one doesn’t even have to apply. I received from the State two cards that ENTITLE me to discounts on prescription drugs up to $150.00 per year. They don’t even have my name on them and the letter says they are fully transferable. I can just give ‘em to somebody else and they can use them too.

And how did I manage to weedle this perk out of the State? I requested a list of medical plans that the State offers people who don’t have a medical plan through their work. I got the list last week very well and then the discount cards show up out of the blue. What a country!

Perhaps you’re saying that $150.00 isn’t that much money to give away per year but imagine how many cards the State must give out. Add this to all the other giveaways, the EBT cards, the MassHealth cards the Section 8 housing subsidie and whatever else is offered that we never hear about.

Makes me wonder why they don’t advertise this discount like they do Food Stamps. I’ll guess that the State will need to be getting this money from somewhere to cover the increase in use of these programs. That means either increased health premiums for people who do pay or higher taxes. 

But with the current tax burden putting pressure on small business and big business alike, how will they respond to increases? They’ll have to lay people off which leads to a downward spiral of State dependency. This has become one hell of a voting bloc and it will be hard to overcome for a candidate that wishes to do something about the staggering deficits and the coming inflation. It’s a hard sell to say we’re going to cut your Welfare. Of course, this is what the current regime desires.

People will vote for their benefits. Heck, people will march and destroy to keep their benefits. Just look at Greece and Spain! These people either don’t believe or don’t care if their economy crashes and burns just as long as they get their check. Their political leaders are as much to blame or more so since they’re the ones who voted to give pensions to people retiring at 50 years old without thought to the economic consequences. How responsible does it look to join a new consolidated currency and immediately give it all away? I mean, that's what government does, right?

But look no further than the United States. With the Federal Reserve now buying mortgage debt with borrowed and printed money, can our bureaucrats manage to keep our economic house of cards up much past the 2012 election?  An ambitious idea, buying debt with debt but will it work? It is apparent that the only goal of all this economic 3 card is to make it past the election. After that, who knows. 

Wonder what excuses we’ll hear then.