[ajross]

There are loopholes to roll all sorts of nonsense into an IRA though. There was a whole news cycle in the 2012 election about Mitt Romney's $4M "IRA" or somesuch. And IRAs are hardly the only shelter from income tax, they're just the most obvious.

The simple truth is that wealth beyond the ~$10M level in the US pays essentially zero "income tax". It just doesn't happen, no one does it. Short term gains are only taxed for small investors who don't know any better.

[WalterBright]

According to Google:

"Entrepreneur Elon Musk announced on social networks that this year he will pay 11 billion dollars, thus becoming the largest taxpayer in the history of the USA."

[sumeno]

Certainly someone we can take at his word, which is why my self driving Roadster flies me to work every day

[ajross]

That was on a sale of Tesla stock that he'd held for much longer than the long term rate threshold. He paid 20% on it, or plausibly less. I, personally pay a higher rate than that. Big numbers notwithstanding, Elon Musk shouldn't be paying less tax than I do, sorry.

[WalterBright]

If you hold stock long term, you will pay the same or less tax.

From Google: "For the 2025 tax year, individual filers won't pay any capital gains tax if their total taxable income is $48,350 or less"

If you've got a smart phone and a credit card, you can buy stock. See robinhood.com

[ajross]

You're dodging, and I know you're smart enough to know how this goes. I don't make money with long term stock, I make salary. I pay >>20% tax on that salary. Billionaries make, statistically, zero salary. All their income is on long term gains. All of it. So billionaires pay 20%, and that only if they're dumb enough not to find other shelters.

You're just saying "Well, that's the way the tax code works". I'm saying "The tax code sucks", and your point is non-responsive.

[WalterBright]

You can invest in stocks, too. Over time, it will pay more than your salary.

If you bought a house, and it goes up in value, that increase will be a capital gain taxed at capital gains rates.

[ajross]

So how "over time" do I need to wait until I start paying the same tax rate as a billionaire? Seems like your solution to "the rich pay less tax" is "well, everyone should just be rich then"?

"Let them eat cake" makes for extremely poor federal revenue policy.