August 31, 2015
The NYT had a piece on the proposals that various candidates have proposed to rein in Wall Street. The piece reports that former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton has proposed applying the normal income tax rate of 39.6 percent to capital gains on assets held less than six years rather than the 20 percent tax rate. (In both cases, capital gains for high income taxpayers are also subject to a 3.8 percent surtax connected with with Affordable Care Act.) It would have been helpful to point out that the lower capital gains tax currently only applies on assets held at least one year, so very short-term gains already do not qualify for the lower tax rate. Also, Secretary Clinton’s proposal would phase down the tax rate to 36 percent for assets held between 2–3 years, 32 percent for 3–4 years, on down to 20 percent for assets held more than six years.
It also would have been worth more discussion of the proposals for financial transactions tax. According to an analysis by the Tax Policy Center of the Urban Institute and the Brookings Institution, a tax like the one proposed by Senator Bernie Sanders would reduce Wall Street’s income from trading by more than $75 billion a year. This dwarfs the impact of all the other measures discussed in this article, including the Dodd-Frank financial reform act.
Note: An earlier version of this post had said that Clinton’s proposal would have the 20 percent rate on assets held for more than two years. Thanks to Robert Salzberg for correcting this error.
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