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Old 06-06-2013, 05:05 PM   #41
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If you have the liquidity to do so, couldn't you buy a position in the stock that you have the capital loss in and then sell the first lot, which crystallizes the loss but doesn't change your overall investment position (assuming SID method)?
That's a wash sale, unless he wants to double up on the stock for more than 30 days.
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Old 06-06-2013, 05:10 PM   #42
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Originally Posted by pb4uski View Post
10% is very unusual in my experience - in fact, virtually unheard of. Congratulations on your generosity.

See Charitable Giving Statistics | NPTrust
You've never heard of "tithing?" That explains it. It is well known among Judeo-Christians but practiced by many others.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tithe

Please do not congratulate me. Publicly disclosing how much I personally donate is not something I do (only on tax forms).

I didn't know the OP donated so little until it was shared. I was shaking my head about a fictitious person in the OP and not intending to criticize any particular person here. I guess I stepped on some toes!
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Old 06-06-2013, 06:11 PM   #43
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That's a wash sale, unless he wants to double up on the stock for more than 30 days.
You're right, I forgot about that, but he could buy a call, wait 31 days, sell the long position and then exercise the call. Same as doubling up but less initial investment.
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Old 06-06-2013, 06:20 PM   #44
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Of course I have heard of tithing. Only 5-7% of the US population does so. I just don't appreciate your holier-than-thou attitude.

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You've never heard of "tithing?" That explains it. It is well known among Judeo-Christians but practiced by many others. .....
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Old 06-06-2013, 06:41 PM   #45
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This scenario has a person hauling in $200,000 and only gives $5000 in donations? People I know who earn $50K donate at least that. This stingy person can learn from the likes of Buffet, Gates (who was rightfully criticized for being ungenerous years ago), and Winfrey, IMO.

(Shaking my head at selfishness.)
That's pretty good @ 2.5% compared to some people that many would look towards to set a good example. I'll skip specifics to avoid taking this political, but a well know high level person donated the following to charity:

Quote:
... $995 in charitable donations last year — about 0.3% of their income and the highest amount in the past decade. The low was $120 in 1999, about 0.1% of yearly income.

Over the decade, .... reported a total of $3,690 in charitable donations, or 0.2% of their income.
But it's of no concern to me, it's a free country they can do as they please. But knowing their info will be made public, I'm surprised.

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Old 06-06-2013, 07:30 PM   #46
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Since you shared...

Some people don't want tax dollars to be used to help unfortunate people and expect charities to handle it. It concerns me when people who donate little (comparatively speaking) to charities AND don't want to pay taxes.

I respect people who strive to pay 10% of their gain in money and time to help others. If you never heard the parable of the "widow's mite", it is addressed reasonably well on Wiki.

Everyone has their own moral compass and fortunately, we have the ability to get our compasses re-calibrated as long as we are on the earth.

Be well.
Thank you for your thoughts and feedback. Feedback is a gift. I guess everyone has their own views and I strive to respect them even when I disagree. I will be very unpopular for sharing my thoughts on this and sorry if I am going off topic. I will write no more about this topic in this thread but simply put, helping people is not important to me, regardless if it is done by the government or private entities. My views are closely aligned with Ann Rynd's Rational self-interest. My "donations" are of a very utilitarian nature to achieve other goals which I will not get into so to set the record straight my donations toward helping others in the true sense of the word is zero and has been zero my entire life and I expect it to be zero for the rest of my life.
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Old 06-06-2013, 07:45 PM   #47
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I will be very unpopular for sharing my thoughts on this...
I don't know how unpopular you will be, but I'm sure you'll be moving up in the standings on the list of Most Ignored Members.
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Old 06-06-2013, 08:40 PM   #48
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I'm speechless. Doesn't happen very often.
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Old 06-06-2013, 08:48 PM   #49
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Tax returns do not reflect contributions of time many people put in to help others. They also do not reflect contributions that are not tax deductible, such as those bags of groceries you may provide once a month to the struggling single mother down the street.
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Old 06-06-2013, 10:14 PM   #50
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I don't know how unpopular you will be, but I'm sure you'll be moving up in the standings on the list of Most Ignored Members.
Not so sure about that. At least we know he says what he thinks, which is not the obvious default.

And he is not trying to prove how truly good he is.

Ha
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Old 06-06-2013, 10:32 PM   #51
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Of course I have heard of tithing.
My bad. I must have misunderstood when you stated this.
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10% is very unusual in my experience - in fact, virtually unheard of.
Too bad I rubbed you the wrong way but like I previously stated, I never attacked anyone PERSONALLY.

At the risk of Porky coming out, I appreciated that both of our POTUS candidates donated well above 10% of their earnings to charity. I also think it set a good example that they both also donated their time to help others. IMO, that is what real Americans are about.
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Old 06-06-2013, 10:59 PM   #52
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My bad. I must have misunderstood when you stated this.

Too bad I rubbed you the wrong way but like I previously stated, I never attacked anyone PERSONALLY.

At the risk of Porky coming out, I appreciated that both of our POTUS candidates donated well above 10% of their earnings to charity. I also think it set a good example that they both also donated their time to help others. IMO, that is what real Americans are about.
Darn. I didn't know I was a fake American...

However, it would make an interesting poll, assuming that it's anonymous.
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Old 06-06-2013, 11:24 PM   #53
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As a soon to be retired person who expects to pay MUCH lower taxes I will share the following point about my anticipation of lower taxes. Because I ALREADY will have paid them when I was working. PLENTY OF TAXES. I have about 2/3 of my money in after tax investments. If I structure things properly I should be able to pay myself out of these investments a nice income and pay single digit (or lower) Federal taxes. I have substantial carryover Capital losses from the various stupid investments I have made. I also will simply be taking the return of my principle which is not taxable.

I would also like to weigh in on the "head shaking" and general discussion on charitable giving. I am not comfortable telling others how they SHOULD be spending their money. I can make suggestions of ways that might be better to achieve a particular goal, but that requires evidence. Head shaking implies knowing what "should be done.". If you donate 0% or 50%, whatever it is, the other percent is saved or spent on other things. You might like a new car every three years. Another might prefer saving on car expenses and splurging on vacations or grandchildren or charity, or any number of other expenditures. I don't tell others how they should divide their spending and do not want someone telling me how I should be dividing up my spending -no matter what "tradition" they claim supports a certain practice. If that tradition works for you, great, traditions are nothing more than another personal choice each individual makes as well. Seems so much of what goes wrong starts with some people assuming they know best how other people should be living their lives.
Here's an idea about money: You spend yours as you see fit, I will spend mine as I see fit. If that is not a "tradition," maybe it SHOULD be.
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Old 06-06-2013, 11:38 PM   #54
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Assuming filing single (widow case):

In this case, taxes will be paid on part of the capital gains since the threshold is $36.25K for cap gains plus taxable income. So whatever combined after deductions exceeds that.

This is not high enough SS to push into AMT - as long as the muni bonds owned aren't subject to AMT, and some are.

Note that muni income does count against your taxable threshold for social security income, but as long as the SS income is below ~17K, 50% of it taxable should have you in the 0% tax bracket as far as I can determine. Something like that anyway.

Once LTCG/QDIV income crosses $51.9K, you'll probably start paying AMT rates on part of the ordinary income (half the SS in this case). And by then any cap gains income above $36.25K less ordinary taxable income is already subject to 15% cap gains tax.
audrey.......I have no intuitive feel about how AMT works esp. if conditions are different from my normal conditions. However, assuming that this calculator does, Tax Calculator - Federal Income Tax Calculator & Free Tax Tips from H&R Block - H&R BlockŪ
it is interesting to do what ifs........Unfortunately, there is no input for muni interest so instead of inputting 10K as SS, I input 8.5K as interest (taxation of SS saturates at 85% when the income, including muni interest is high). I then input varying amounts of LTCG.....40K, 140K, 240K. I saw no sign of AMT.......you can get details of the tax by clicking on the "+" sign on the left side of the "tax" line to expand the display to show the amount of AMT as well as the regular tax.

I did confirm that the AMT part works by putting in a ridiculously high state tax deduction.
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Old 06-07-2013, 04:54 AM   #55
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Here is a better online tax calculator. Seems to produce reasonable output.
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Old 06-07-2013, 05:13 AM   #56
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I agree donations should be what one feels comfortable with. My income is much less than yours but my donations are higher. I am not feeling better or worse than anyone else. Just pleased with the way I use my money.

Once retired, I plan to use a CPA firm.


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Well donations should be what one feels conformtable with and not some mandated amount or else what is the difference between that and a tax. Our income is around $1 million and our donations is around $9K so I guess we are far worse than this person using your standards.
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Old 06-07-2013, 06:34 AM   #57
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audrey.......I have no intuitive feel about how AMT works esp. if conditions are different from my normal conditions. However, assuming that this calculator does, Tax Calculator - Federal Income Tax Calculator & Free Tax Tips from H&R Block - H&R BlockŪ
it is interesting to do what ifs........Unfortunately, there is no input for muni interest so instead of inputting 10K as SS, I input 8.5K as interest (taxation of SS saturates at 85% when the income, including muni interest is high). I then input varying amounts of LTCG.....40K, 140K, 240K. I saw no sign of AMT.......you can get details of the tax by clicking on the "+" sign on the left side of the "tax" line to expand the display to show the amount of AMT as well as the regular tax.

I did confirm that the AMT part works by putting in a ridiculously high state tax deduction.
Not sure why not, but as one who has paid AMT some years because my cap gain income was much higher than my ordinary income, I know that you can start paying it when cap gains/qual divs crosses that $80.8K threshold. It doesn't actually "show up" until it exceeds the ordinary income tax. So unless your ordinary income tax is super low, you might not see it. It really depends on your income mix.
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Old 06-07-2013, 07:14 AM   #58
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I went back to my 2008 income tax spreadsheet and played with the LTCG from the huge sale of my company stock leading to my ER. I had a LTCG (from NUA) of about $286k and that triggered the AMT on the rest of my rather small income. I lowered the LTCG on the company stock sale to see when the AMT got triggered. The AMT got triggered at about $115k. The rest of my (ordinary) income was about $45k.
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Old 06-07-2013, 07:29 AM   #59
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.... IMO, that is what real Americans are about.
You just can't help yourself from being judgmental, can you? But one thing I think we might agree on is that, as a society, Americans are very generous compared to the rest of the world.
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Old 06-07-2013, 07:54 AM   #60
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Here is a better online tax calculator. Seems to produce reasonable output.
Thanks.......had not seen that one. Why do you think it is better?
I didn't see an input for muni interest on this one either and I didn't see a way to break out the AMT to see if it was zero or non.
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