I was told they have to report transactions of $10,000 or more to the IRS.
Jhart5
I’m not a great fan of Obama, but I’ve seen this too often on financial discussion boards to not attempt to address this.
Post-2010 capital gains is a return to the original tax policy that was temporarily pushed down by Congress and former President George W. Bush. Bush’s tax changes will sunset at the end of this year - they are deliberately set to return to the original policy from before 2001.
This tax policy therefore is NOT an “Obamanomics tax policy” but result of tax laws Bush signed and intended. I see many people calling it an “Obamanomics tax policy” making it sound like it’s all Obama’s fault and somehow a special brand of economics that isn’t. Personally, I think this is a distortion of the truth.
I didn’t like the Bush tax cuts in the sense that it was deliberately set to only be temporary, thus causing any later President after Bush who didn’t act to continue these cuts to be blamed for “raising taxes” when it’s actually leaving alone a pre-planned end to a temporary tax reduction. While I don’t agree with some Democrats who say that the Bush tax cuts cost the Federal government some $1.5 trillion in tax revenue, I think there was some significant effect, likely closer to $500 billion - though although all of that potential lost revenue is moot since we ended up with the costs of two wars still ongoing and a Medicare prescription coverage sinkhole that will cost us trillions anyway.
Poet
Dr. Martenson:
Thank you so much for sharing your thoughts and analysis on this issue. I never thought of gold that way before, but it just makes so much sense after reading. I appreciate and am moved by your generosity in sharing this with all of us, including those of us of limited means.
Sincerely,
Poet
And something to keep in mind: with all this talk of gold bubbles, CNBS (hat tip to Davos) et alia keep talking about “gold near it’s all-time highs”… Which of course is a crock. In inflation-adjusted US$, the all-time high was hit about 30 years ago and is a little north of US$2100.
Very good point Sager… I can’t find the link, but I saw something recently overlaying the recent 10 yr run up in Gold vs. the 1980 spike run up… they were on different time scales to overlay, but it was clear that in % terms, we have not entered the parabolic blow off phase of this run in Gold. In fact, this rise has been surprisingly contained in my opinion… and you may ask why? I become more sure by the day that GLD must be soaking up a good portion of the demand for Gold without putting stress on the spot price (this has been discussed at length on ZH).
I believe that this is the wild card factor for Gold. When and if paper Gold like GLD is shown to be fraudulent… there will be a huge step function change in the price for real Gold. Personally, I have started easing my IRA into PHYS.
Travlin,
I mistyped, but meant that gold coins can move freely through borders in contrast to gold bullion, which has to undergo a more bureaucratic process. Unfortunately, I cannot find a reference.
It seems that since gold coins are legal tender, their face value must be considered through the US customs, not the value of their gold contents (http://www.offshore-world.org/countries/buy-gold-mexican-centenario-coins.html). For instance, at http://www.cbp.gov/xp/cgov/newsroom/news_releases/archives/may_2010/05312010_2.xml you see no gold coins.
FDR confiscated gold through an executive order based on a law enacted in 1917, the Trading with the Enemy Act, which, according to Ron Paul, is still in the books. It said in article 5(b):
"That the President may investigate, regulate or prohibit, under such rules and regulations as he may prescribe, by means of licenses or otherwise, any transactions in foreign exchange for the export, hoarding melting, or earmarking of gold or silver coins or bullion or currency." (http://www.reformation.org/roosevelt_confiscates_gold.html)
Since foreign gold coins are foreign currency, I wonder if the US government could seize them though.I’d like to see more talk on this though. When times get tough, laws go out the window, even constitutional limits. Argentina seized the people’s IRA funds, FDR confiscated private gold, there are no limits to what governments can do with their monopoly of violence. And to me gold provides this double benefit of being in my control and fairly easy to carry around, if needs be.
Thanks.
I stand corrected and will have to apologize to Obama for accusing him of raising taxes in 2011. Thanks for the input
Jhart5
If you have an inside line to Obama, I’d love to pass on some accusations of my own. 
Poet
Hello Augustine
You have presented some very interesting information that is new to me. Thank you. Regarding your last paragraph, I have recently composed a personal principle to guide my decisions.
You can always trust your government – to do anything necessary to preserve its self.
Hello jhart5
There’s a slight error in a few of your equations. Take a look. Do you see it now?
$160,000 x .50% = $80,000. $100,000 profit x .40% = $40,000. $400,000 x .40% tax = $160,000
Those are not equal. Either take out the decimal point or the percentage sign for the left side of the equations to equal the product.
But your point is well taken. The hidden tax of inflation is one of the strategies used by the Federal Reserve System to steal money from the tax payers and drain wealth upwards, especially away from the middle class, to the super rich upper class. Is it too late to End the Fed? Maybe not. But it probably is.
After one hundred years, 5 or so generations of the people living under this system, go about thinking this is 'NORMAL" not having known anything else by which to judge it. Only now are a handful of enlightened individuals working towards that end. It is sad to say that most of the political activists that I know (and I know hundreds) whom have come to realize and understand so many hidden truths still don’t get the most important lesson, that central banking systems are cabals with all of their trappings and are detrimental to free and fair markets, and thus the common person.
Peace,
Broadspectrum
Broadspectrum
It took me a while to figure out what was wrong with those equations - You’re absolutely right - There are too many decimal points and how I managed to do that I’ll never know. Recommend removing all decimal points and leaving the % sign. $160,000 x 50% = $80,000. $100,000 profit x 40% = $40,000. $400,000 x 40% tax = $160,000 etc.
Hopefully the Federal Reserve can be abolished sometime before the country is financially and economically destroyed. Congress will have to accomplish this one way or another but they have already managed to strip most of heave duty reform from the Financial Reform Bill. This not a good sign. The average middle class American is just starting to become enlightened to fact that the Federal Reserve, Financial Institutions, Wall Street, & IMF have been methodically stripping them of their wealth for the past century. The more people that find out about this the greater chance that there may be some kind of financial revolution to look forward to.
The Federal Reserve is not going to give up their vast power and control over the US Government and the US Financial System easily or the 2.5+ Trillion Dollars they have managed to siphon out of the economy over the years. Whenever it is that the US economy collapses the Federal Reserve will probably crash along with it and a new indestructible incorruptible monetary system will be required as a replacement. What kind of system that will end up being I really have no idea at this time?
Many Thanks - For correcting the erroneous math and the additional clarification on the hidden inflation tax.
jhart5
In an environment in which there is money chasing value, there is speculative bubble in all commodities.
As the uses of gold are few, and the primary basis of gold’s value is the perception that it has value, it is uniquely a speculative (bubble) commodity.
Gold is valuable because people agree that it is valuable. Is it valuable in fact?
The characteristic of relative uselessness, with common acceptance of value, used to define it as a good basis of money. I think those objective conditions about gold are past.
The unique feature of gold, and diamonds for example, is the permanent existence of gold. “Put your treasures where moth and dust do not corrupt”.
But, a bushel of wheat is substantive, if not also subject to spoilage. A future’s contract on a bushel of wheat is subject to spoilage and to broken promises in bankruptcy.
Maybe we should use a ton of properly stored wood pellets as currency, something of stable use value, a predictable output of calories.
A caloric basis of money, at least is substantiated by physics.