When it comes to investing, there are two things you can control – how much you pay in fees and how much you pay in taxes. With fees, it’s pretty straightforward because fees are disclosed up front. A brokerage charges you $x per trade, a mutual fund company pulls x% in expenses, and both are required by law to make those very clear.

Taxes are slightly different. The tax code can be complicated and it doesn’t help that there are so many different “types” of investment accounts from 401(k)s to Roth IRAs to your plain vanilla brokerage account. When it comes to investing, what you buy and where can be just as important as what you buy.

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Representative Jan Schakowsky (D-Illinois) introduced new legislation, the H.R. 1124 Fairness in Taxation Act, on Wednesday, March 16th, that would introduce new tax brackets for those who earned more than $1 million dollars a year. The current top income tax rate is 35% on income starting at $373,650 and the new legislation would introduce five new brackets, starting at $1 million dollars.

The new brackets would be:

• $1 – 10 million: 45%
• $10 – 20 million: 46%
• $20 – 100 million: 47%
• $100 million – 1 billion: 45%
• $1 billion+: 45%

I don’t know what’s more stunning: the reality that there are people who make over a $1 billion a year or that there are people who make over a billion a year and pay the same tax rates as someone making a fraction of that.

In addition to adding new brackets, the bill would also tax capital gains and dividend income as ordinary income for those whose income was over $1 million. According to the Citizens for Tax Justice, these new rates and changes would raise $78 billion, though it’s unclear how that number was calculated.

As for historical precedence, the last time the top rate was over 40% was back in 1986 when the top rate was 50%. Just a few years earlier, in 1981, the top rate was 70% for incomes over $215,400 ($524,421.99 in 2011 dollars). Before you think those rates were high, the top rates have always been very high, peaking into the ninety-percents through World War 2 until the early 60′s. The Tax Foundation has a list of historical tax rates since 1913.

What do you think of these new rates? Would youl ike to see them implemented?

Remember when Warren Buffett famously declared that he paid a lower tax rate than his administrative assistant? It probably confused a lot of people who aren’t familiar with the myriad of ways our income is taxed and that confusion can lead to misplaced frustration and anger. With how charged politics can be, it’s not uncommon for people to get really passionate and fired up over things that they’ve misunderstood.

A prime example, outside of money and politics, is the issue of vaccines and autism. The link between the two was based heavily on the fraudulent work of Dr. Andrew Wakefield in what has now been declared an “elaborate fraud.” Yet autism is a very real problem, one whose cause is still unknown, and people still insist on not vaccinating their children. While I think I have a right to tell people what to do, the fact that this vehement rejection of vaccines is based mostly on a fraud is just one example of this.

So today, I hope to explain how our income is taxed and hopefully that will remove some of the existing, incorrect, ideas some people have about our tax structure.

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The Bush tax cuts were a hot topic these last few weeks between the deal making (extending cuts for all in return and estate tax relief for extended unemployment benefits) and the political dancing, but ultimately something had to be done. While much has been made of the tax brackets themselves, one of the other things that went along with it was the long term capital gains tax rate. They were set to increase from 0% and 15% to 10% and 20%, respectively.

So here’s the question at hand, what if we no longer had favorable long term capital gains rates (and dividend tax rates) and instead all investment gains were taxed as ordinary income? In other words, what if there was no such thing as long term capital gains? What if everything were taxed as short term?

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With the Bush tax cuts expiring, there have been several proposals out there suggesting what we do. We’ve looked at the three major solutions to the expiring Bush tax cuts as well as one less well known alternative, but there’s a new one on the table that seems to make a lot of common sense (just not political sense).

Representative Bill Pascrell (D-NJ) and Representative Michael Capuano (D-MA) suggest the introduction of a new tax bracket starting at $500,000, an idea (known as the Pascrell Compromise) they floated before the mid-term elections. It also includes a five year extension on current middle class tax rates (individuals < $200,000 and families < $250,000) and long term capital gains and qualified dividends. It also includes a one year extension on tax rates for filers making under $500,000 annually (effectively creating a $500,000 tax bracket).

This effective “decouples” the tax brackets at the $500,000 income level and political experts are claiming that this will not get Republican support. Once you decouple the higher tax brackets, it’d be political suicide to vote against continuing the middle class (income under $200,000 and $250,000) tax cuts. The interesting part will be to see if all the voters to voiced their opinion about the national deficit and debt will do the same about continuing huge tax cuts for everyone, including themselves.

In case you were wondering, Bargaineering readers weighed in on the subject just recently.

The key to building wealth is to build or buy an asset that can appreciate in value and/or generates passive income. The key to building or buying an asset that can do that is to convert your labor into capital (money). This is why saving for retirement, saving for a home, and saving in general is such an important piece of your personal finance plan.

This is the billionaire secret because this idea is well understood by people who are wealthy. They see that capital gains taxes are much lower than ordinary income, that’s why Warren Buffet pays lower tax rates than his secretary. Capital gains are taxed at 15% for 2010 while the 15% tax bracket is the second lowest federal tax bracket (for those earning up to $34,000). It’s a no brainer, you want to transition, as quickly as possible, from ordinary income to long term capital gains and dividend income.

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When people talk about the Bush-era tax cuts, they’re usually referring to the Economic Growth and Tax Relief Reconciliation Act of 2001 (EGTRRA) signed by President Bush in June of 2001. Many of the provisions were set to phase in over 9 years but those were accelerated when the Jobs and Growth Tax Relief Reconciliation Act of 2003 (JGTRRA) was signed just two years later. Many of those cuts are set to expire this year, the two big items being income tax rates and capital gains rates.

President Obama has publicly said that he will let the Bush-era capital gains tax cuts expire on schedule this year, so it’s important to know how they will affect your investments.
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In the December special issue of Kiplinger’s magazine, Mary Beth Franklin put together a list of tax moves that can save you big money. Normally, these tax moves are the same from year the year. Her list has a few old standbys that are also on Kay Bell’s list of year end tax moves like giving to charity and checking your tax withholding. However, there are also some 2009 specific ones such as the home energy tax credit and the first time homebuyer’s credit.

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After last week’s Thursday post on adjusting your tax withholding, I thought that we needed a full blown post on the best year end tax moves. So who better to turn to than prolific tax expert Kay Bell, author of The Truth About Paying Fewer Taxes? She was kind enough to list not one, not two, but nine tax moves you can make before the ball drops.

It’s time to make your year-end tax list and check it twice to ensure that you give yourself the gift of tax-savings. Here are 9 ways this month to help make your 2009 tax bill as small as possible.

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Have you thought about your taxes lately? Probably not, but this month is probably one of the most important months in tax planning because it’s the last time you’ll have an opportunity to effect any meaningful change to your taxes next year. Once December ends, 2008 is essentially frozen and your taxes will be what your taxes will be. So, what sorts of tax moves should you consider making?

Sell your stock losers. Any losses you realize from the stock market, that aren’t offset by gains, can be deducted from your regular income, up to a limit of $3,000 a year. If you’ve been thinking about dumping some losers, now’s the time to do it. If you have more than $3,000 in losses, you can carry those forward indefinitely (until death). More advanced traders may also consider tax loss harvesting as an option as well.

Donate to your favorite charities. Times may be tough but they’re even tougher for charities and philanthropies, who rely on generous contributions to stay in operation. Consider donating money, goods, clothes, your car, anything – to one of your favorite charities so that they can stay operating through these difficult economic times. If you itemize your deductions, you can deduct contributions from your regular income.

Delay bonuses and income. If you can swing it, try to push any additional payments until the new year. If you are paid this year, you have to pay taxes on it in a few months. If you are paid next year, you won’t have to pay taxes on it for an extra year. If your employer withholds taxes on your bonus payments, this is a less valuable strategy.

Prepay state and local taxes. This one is a little tricky, if you don’t think you’ll be subject to the AMT, consider prepaying your state and local taxes. State and local taxes are federal tax deductions so prepaying them today means you can deduct them today as well.

Accelerate other deductible expenses. If you have a mortgage, consider paying next month’s payment this month. If you pay it this month, you can deduct the interest payment against this year’s income. If you pay for it on January 1st, it’ll have to wait until you file 2009 taxes. This is true of any deductible expenses you may have from student loan debt to medical to your real estate taxes. If you want, you can make the payment with a credit card and then pay off the credit card next month and still have it be deductible for 2008.

Use up your $12,000 gift exclusion. Each year, you are allowed to give $12,000 to someone else tax-free. If you give more than $12,000, then you are subject to what is known as the gift tax. It’s a little backward but it’s a page out of the estate planning book since heirs to an estate are often taxed on that estate. Anyway, if you were planning on giving someone a very generous gift, don’t forget to to do it. Next year the limit rises to $13,000 so you can give $25,000 to someone within a week and avoid the gift tax ($12,000 on December 31st, $13,000 on January 1st). If you are married, you could give someone $50,000 ($25,000 from each spouse).

Beware buying into mutual funds with capital gains distributions. Mutual funds buy and sell stuff all year, then distribute a bit of that at the end of the year. What you won’t want to do is buy into a mutual fund that is set to make a year-end capital gains distribution because you’ll be immediately taxed on that distribution. Imagine a mutual fund that costs $100 a share. You buy it and the next day it makes a $1 per share distribution, lowering the cost per share to $99. You just bought the thing and already are on the hook for $1 per share in taxes. Boo!

Contribute to your retirement. If you aren’t maxed out on your 401(k), or similar, plan, consider doing it because each dollar contributed is entirely deductible. The 2008 contribution limit for your 401(k) is $15,500 ($20,500 if you’re 50 or greater). Another good idea is to contribute towards your IRAs but you have until April 15th to accomplish that.

Get married. Your tax filing status is based on your status as of December 31st, 11:59 PM. If you were married on December 31st, you’re considered married for the year. If that helps your tax situation, you might want to consider it.

Get everything ready. If you’re due a refund, try to get all your ducks in a row as soon as possible so the government will mail you your refund check ASAP. All you’re really waiting for is the official W-2 from your employer, which they are required to mail out by January 31st, and you should be ready to hit the e-file button.

(Photo: thetruthabout)