What Mayor Michael Bloomberg calls "theatrics" on the part of Warren Buffett may be just that. But Buffett really does make a valid point about the different tax rates for the wealthy and working-class Americans.
The inequity that Warren Buffett expresses when he says he pays a lower tax rate than his secretary is caused by the way capital gains are taxed. Most of the income of wealthy persons comes from the sale of capital assets, while most working people pay their tax on wages at a higher rate, and then they also pay Social Security, disability and Medicare taxes on their wages.
There are ways the capital gains tax can be made more equitable. The purpose of the low capital-gains tax rate is to encourage investment in businesses to make them grow and be productive for the American economy. Therefore, we should limit capital-gains treatment to investments that go directly to the companies. We should eliminate the preferential rates for all other sales, including the sales of stocks and bonds that were purchased after the original offering.
We should also have different rates for different holding periods, to encourage investing over the long haul. And we could set a maximum capital-gains benefit, perhaps at $1 million a year, or $5 million over a lifetime. This would give a break to the sellers of small businesses or family farms, yet capture large amounts of capital sales profits.
In this way we can gain revenue to reduce the deficit, reduce tax inequities and target assistance to encourage job production -- a win all around.
Jerry Worthing, Wantagh
Everyone laments that the two political parties cannot come to a compromise on matters economic, as they did years ago. Such economic compromise was possible in the past because both parties shared a common core of beliefs on social issues.
The social issues are deeply held and very emotional. So long as the parties are divided on these, compromise on economic issues will be near impossible.
Donard Pranzo, Port Jefferson
How can it be that American business entrepreneurs can take advantage of all the benefits this country has to offer in terms of education, health services, security, transportation and more -- and then be allowed to outsource their operations to other countries for lower wages? Where stuff is manufactured at less cost and sold back to us?
Increased profits for the manufacturer are the result, but so is high unemployment here.
There should be a requirement that if a corporate headquarters is in the United States, the business must stay here. Globalization is a fact, but we shouldn't let it destroy our workforce. Our government should be protecting us.
Joe Bucci, West Islip
Regarding "2012 elections headed to the House?" [Opinion, Sept. 25], it is quite annoying to read Peter Goldmark's perpetually slanted views. He essentially states that the "extreme right" of the Republican Party is preventing us from uniting behind a strong common program of serious action.
Who are the real extremists? Here you have President Barack Obama, who hypnotized much of the country into thinking he was a centrist and a uniter, then proceeded to aggressively ram through the most extreme left-wing agenda ever foisted upon the country. Thus, the emergence of the tea party, which sees itself as the main obstacle preventing Obama from leading the country completely off the rails. Most of these people believe that the administration is either incompetent or leading the country toward lame European-type socialism. They are not interested in consensus because they believe Obama must be stopped and ousted.
Walter McCarthy, Massapequa
