Funny how this article starts out with "like Mitt Romney" and doesn't start out with "like Barrack Obama." Wonder why? It would actually make sense to do so.
President Obama’s budget, to be released next week, will limit how much wealthy individuals – like Mitt Romney – can keep in IRAs and other retirement accounts.
The proposal would save around $9 billion over a decade, a senior administration official said, while also bringing more fairness to the tax code.
Read more:
Obama budget to take aim at wealthy IRAs - The Hill's On The Money
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I really don’t have too much of a problem with this. Despite the hand wringing over class warfare (which on many levels I agree with), here the only way to amass more than $3 million is really to outsmart the system. For this year the maximum contribution to a 401K plan is $17,500; $22,000 if you’re over 50. Your employer can match some portion of that, so let’s take a nice round number of $30,000 as a possible average total contribution. Now, if you assume -0- returns, it will take 100 years to accumulate that $3,000,000; at 30 yrs, you would need to average around 7.25% (certainly not impossible but far from assured over that length of time); over 40 years you would need about 4.5%. So how do you get more than $3 million in your retirement account? You buy stock in companies you know are grossly undervalued but that you know will be big winners, as it is reputed that Romney had done. He was in the business of buying failing companies and turning them into winners; he just was smart enough to know when he acquired the company for next to nothing, he could buy the shares through his retirement fund. Then when they took off and he made millions on the sale of the stock, the profits were safely tucked away in a tax deferred retirement vehicle. Genius!
Since the purpose of individual retirement tax deferrals is to provide an incentive for people to save for the future so that they will not become wards of the state, it seems allowing $3 million is more than adequate. No one is suggesting (at least in the OP’s link) taking away their profits, just capping the amount that can be sheltered from ordinary taxation.
This is the way the system is supposed to work; it’s a battle between the wealthy, who seek ways to avoid paying any more taxes than absolutely necessary, and the taxing authorities, trying to keep up and change tax laws that the wealthy have legally found their way around. Otherwise, thousands of tax accountants would be at street corners with signs offering to add columns of numbers for food.