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**Imihooniump** · 03-12-2011, 04:47 PM

It is funny when I talk to my father about the 70s when the upper level tax rates were really high. He laughed and said no investment seemed silly since if it tanked it didn't really cost you much so you could do all sorts of high risk ones. And most people in his group did. All that investing helped lower unemployment which eventually led to surpluses.

I'm lost as to what this means. Maybe I'm just not understanding sarcasm over the internet.

If the personal income taxes were so high, that would have mitigated their personal investment (if that's what you're referring to as investment) return obviously since they would have had less after taxes to invest. If, on the other hand, you're referring to what Oerdin said, and it's business owners taking less out for their personal income (or I guess shareholders agreeing to lower or no dividends) and instead re-investing retained earnings, that re-investing only has value to the shareholders/owners because it is hoped it will make money (expected present value calculations here). All it is is postponing the receipt of (hopefully greater) income which will be taxed. I could be wrong but you'd have to have expectations for lower tax rates in the future for what you and Oerdin said to make sense.

03-12-2011, 04:47 PM	#30
Imihooniump Join Date Oct 2005 Posts 468 Senior Member	It is funny when I talk to my father about the 70s when the upper level tax rates were really high. He laughed and said no investment seemed silly since if it tanked it didn't really cost you much so you could do all sorts of high risk ones. And most people in his group did. All that investing helped lower unemployment which eventually led to surpluses. I'm lost as to what this means. Maybe I'm just not understanding sarcasm over the internet. If the personal income taxes were so high, that would have mitigated their personal investment (if that's what you're referring to as investment) return obviously since they would have had less after taxes to invest. If, on the other hand, you're referring to what Oerdin said, and it's business owners taking less out for their personal income (or I guess shareholders agreeing to lower or no dividends) and instead re-investing retained earnings, that re-investing only has value to the shareholders/owners because it is hoped it will make money (expected present value calculations here). All it is is postponing the receipt of (hopefully greater) income which will be taxed. I could be wrong but you'd have to have expectations for lower tax rates in the future for what you and Oerdin said to make sense.
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