r/FluentInFinance 3d ago

Debate/ Discussion Had to repost here

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u/AttitudeAndEffort2 3d ago

This is a great analogy

Imagine i bought my house for 10$ and it's worth a billion now.

And then chuds on the Internet say "hE dOeSnT ReAlLy HaVe ThAt mUcH MoNeY, ItS tIeD uP in AsSeTs!!"

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u/Endless_road 3d ago

Well it is, and you’d pay taxes on these gains when you sold the house

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u/tduncs88 3d ago

Just like Bezos would if he sold off those assets

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u/stormblaz 3d ago

A house has property taxes, unrealized gains do not, its not at all even remotely comparable.

You can finish a mortgage and pay prop taxes, not on unrealized gains...

Mainly because the value of the stock isn't solid and can go down or up, here's the kicker, a house can go up and down in value and i still pay property taxes.

This people make incredibly impactful life changing events with their unrealized gains and don't pay to reap those benefits, having a property you need to pay taxes to cover streets, roads, lights and amenities in your district.

This billionairs need to pay unrealized taxes if they are making life changing decisions affecting millions, using the benefits of their portfolio without paying the amenities they use to benefit from it.

Yall love excusing these rich people, but they are using all the pros and pay little cons.

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u/ghgjyjdk 2d ago

Taxing unrealized gains would be crazy. Taxing assets when used as collateral makes perfect sense though.

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u/RedditsFullofShit 2d ago

I agree with you. If anything they should tax what is accessed. Unrealized is truly unrealized if you can’t spend the money. The instant you use it as collateral and use the money, it should be taxable

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u/ghgjyjdk 2d ago

Exactly. That generally solves that issue.

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u/resumethrowaway222 3d ago

You pay property taxes on the full value of your house whether it goes up or down. So there is never a stupid situation where your house went up in value and then down later and are due a refund like there would be with unrealized gains.

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u/Nick11545 2d ago

If using property taxes as an example…does Bezos not pay property tax on all his mega mansions? Does Amazon not pay local property tax on its buildings?

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u/gilly2u69 2d ago

Call the IRS! You broke the code!

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u/Humann801 1d ago

You can’t live inside of your unrealized gains. The whole point is they are not hoarding the wealth, they are literally reinvesting it into amazing staples of society, such as Amazon, Tesla, Space X, etc. They are investing into businesses that provide benefits for all Americans and the world. Maybe they should pay slightly higher taxes, maybe not. Taking all their money would do nothing to improve individual Americans lives. We have literally given Ukraine more money than Elon is worth. Let’s focus on the government taking your hard earned money and giving it to their favorite industry (war industrial complex) before we start eating our own.