Except the bulk of the taxes come from W-2 earnings. How many CEO’s have $0 salaries but are compensated with equities and deferred compensation?[/quote]
If a CEO is paid in stock, he still has to pay tax on that stock. That is, a CEO can’t get out of paying tax just because he is paid in something that is not “cash”. For example, if a CEO is paid in cows, he still has to pay taxes on the fair value of those cows. So this is a straw man.
[quote=fat_lazy_union_worker]
Also, if we were to remove the cap on social security taxes on income, who is this really hurting?
[/quote]
Under Obama’s plan, the social security tax will apply to income up to something like $95K, then there would be no social security tax on income between $95K and $250K, and then the social security tax would apply to income over $250K. Another straw man.
[quote=fat_lazy_union_worker]
I can see this already. Across the nation, CEO’s are going to (for the interest of the company) starting taking a $0 salary…(Of course the equity will be doubled, and especially at these market prices, that’s even more reward for the future).
Think about it.
[/quote]
As I stated above, the CEOs will be taxed on that equity when they receive it. Then, they will be taxed at a higher capital gains rate when they sell that equity. Another straw man.
[/quote]
So, stock gains are not taxed at income tax rates. Capital gains rates are lower. No Social security tax is taken from these gains.
So, if you consider these three items labelled as “straw man” arguments it becomes obvious that taking stock options rather than salary above 250K, becomes a way to avoid BOTH the increase in social security taxes on payroll aver 250K and any other federal income tax rate increases in this category.
Calling each of these things individually straw men, without considering their combined effect is itself a straw man.
[/quote]
FSD,
Actually, one comment about “stock options”. There is a very subtle and fine line about stock options, between the two kinds.
1)ISO (incentive stock options) are not taxed at exercise time (but subject you to AMT most likely)…Also when you sell, it gets treated at capital gains, not income.
2)NQ (non qualified) ARE taxed as income and not capital gains, and the tax is assessed at exercise time. Most companies offering NQ do not let you do an exercise and hold, because they need to collect taxes right away (unless you have money in the account to cover the tax).
In fact, if you exercise and sell NQ, it gets reported on your W-2.
So even depending on the type of the stock options,
depends on whether someone gets taxed at income (and hence pay social security or not).
Most average joe workers at a public company will get NQ stock options (ISO’s are very uncommon at publically traded companies these days for average joe).
This is why if you are holding to a lot of NQ stock options that are in the money (IE qualcomm, google,yahoo,etc employees), you might want to consider talking with your tax accountant sooner versus later. Because although as of last year and this year, there was a maximum cap on how much you would pay for Social Security taxes. If the government is gonna eliminate the cap on social security, then it’s gonna end up biting you if you sell a lot of NQ stock options.
Also side note:
If you have ESPP shares, there are tax implications as well. When you sell ESPP shares a portion of the sales counts as “income” and a portion counts as cap gains/loss. In general, the income portion is the difference between the grant price of the ESPP and the FMV of the stock the day you were granted the share. Again, if your typical spread is 20%, that portion falls into taxable income when you sell your shares. The remaining difference between sale price your base is either short or long term cap gains/loss.
Again, selling a lot of ESPP shares may push you into another tax bracket, and again, in theory if there is no cap on social security taxes you may end up paying a hell of lot of taxes in the future.
Note: this is why last year we emptied out ESPP, NQ
stock options that were in the money etc. Because, that probably was the last year that will be lowest taxes for W-2 folks. Taxman was happy last year, because that was a painful check to write. But better pain yesterday, than taxpain tomorrow.
Bottom line: W-2 folks are gonna get the shaft, even if you think it doesn’t apply to you…unless you plan very very carefully sooner versus later.
Executive compensation probably is different, in that you have both options and actual stock grants, and I think the tax ramifications are different for those situations.
