[mars4rp]

what is not normal is he is not paying much taxes compare to his wealth! He is selling around a $1B of Amazon shares each year and if he doesn't deduct anything he is paying 15% capital gain on it. That's 1/1000 of his net worth, I am pretty sure we all are paying way more than that. How is that fair? And also the taxes supposed to be progressive, rich supposed to pay more, our dream here is to have the rich pay as much as a teacher!

[saxonww]

First: I think the tax situation with capital gains is not fair or warranted, and that we should tax long-term capital gains like regular income instead of having a separate 15% rate for it.

That said, your assertion is not true. 15% is higher than the effective tax rate of 10.5% paid by the average single teacher in the US:

Average salary: $60477 [0]

Standard Deduction for single filers: $12400.

10% bracket for $0 through $9,875 == $988 tax. 12% bracket for $9876 through $40125 == $3630 tax. 22% bracket for $40126 through ($60477 - $12400 - $40125) == $1749 tax.

This totals $6367, which is 10.5% of $60477. Less than 15%.

The numbers are different if the teacher is married, has children, interest, etc.

We can discuss whether it's fair. I said above, I think it's not; there's a "minimum overhead" to living in the US that takes up a much larger fraction of $60477 than $1B, regardless of lifestyle. But people act like Bezos et al are just not paying as much as regular people, and it's just not true. $150M is more in absolute terms, and in many cases relative terms as well.

[0] http://www.nea.org/home/74876.htm

[mars4rp]

"Bezos et al are just not paying as much as regular people" they are not! they might pay more at the $ value, but not more of their net worth. If you are making $100k and pay at least $20k in taxes, your net worth should be $20M to be in the same bracket as Bezos!

[tosers4]

Why does even capital gains have a different tax rate from dividend. I would fix that first.

[rukittenme]

You've just discovered the problem with income taxes. A tax on labor favors capital. Good luck convincing any of your political allies that the income tax should be replaced with something more progressive.

[mars4rp]

Bernie/Warren wealth tax was a good idea in my opinion. It would increase Bezos's effective tax rate from 0.1% to 3%. Bezos's net worth still would increase every year, as the normal capital gain is 8% per year and it is much higher in Amazon.

[tosers4]

What's the issue? amazon pays taxes in multiple ways, what's left it goes into amazon stock value.

I think it's perfectly fine to only pay the tax once you sell, why should you keep paying a tax just for owning? With his portfolio, his salary wouldn't be able to cover a a simple 1% annual tax.

Now the issue is USA capital gain tax being lower than dividend tax, that's completely bonkers and encourages ridiculous uses of buybacks (which amazon has never done).

The capital gain tax should be the same as dividend tax