Mist
Eeyore Enthusiast
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Apple's security and privacy are top-notch. Best-in-class. Their business model is not built around selling you ads, or selling your data either.
I would still never buy one.
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Investing General Discussion
- Thread starter Furious
- Start date
I would still never buy one.
Kiroy
Marine Biologist
- 34,620
- 99,917
Nothing wrong with buying physical silver/gold as a hedge. Pretty much any other option is wrong.
I know someone in a video game who is slowly building up silver/gold buying with cash at trusted local shops with the main goal of hedging against future tax implications of transferring some of this wealth to their child. Not a large percentage or anything, but some, as a hedge.
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But if you're looking for physical value stores there are several that don't start you off 15% behind and are also less than easily taxed when passed along. Hell, buy rare collectable guitars, books, etc.
The estate tax exemption is 13.6M this year. If you secretly buy 200 gold bars and then secretly transfer them you could totally scam the irs to double your exemption.. i would be kinda worried about getting robbed with 200 bars in my house though.
Buying a little bit is probably worth it. It's kinda like extra food though where it's really only a good idea in the event of a major collapse or like war in the continental US. But I imagine all of us would feel pretty dumb for not buying a few thousand dollars of gold or a bit of extra food when it costs like 3 grand for 3 years of food right now.
It makes me wonder at what point should all of us have those kind of hedges, historically those kind of risks weren't that rare.. 1 in 100 years minimum had a major upheaval and even in the modern era outside of the US that's still true. Is it worth 1-2% of your wealth in basically dead money to hedge against that?
Buying a little bit is probably worth it. It's kinda like extra food though where it's really only a good idea in the event of a major collapse or like war in the continental US. But I imagine all of us would feel pretty dumb for not buying a few thousand dollars of gold or a bit of extra food when it costs like 3 grand for 3 years of food right now.
It makes me wonder at what point should all of us have those kind of hedges, historically those kind of risks weren't that rare.. 1 in 100 years minimum had a major upheaval and even in the modern era outside of the US that's still true. Is it worth 1-2% of your wealth in basically dead money to hedge against that?
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Kiroy
Marine Biologist
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Tax code is subject to change and I think those changes are going to assfuck the upper middle class in the next few decades
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Good news is if you're hiding 13M in gold to keep the other 13M of your estate tax-free, you're not middle class.
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Kiroy
Marine Biologist
- 34,620
- 99,917
Gold is tiny and more stable? I don’t know I have extra money and don’t want to fuck around with guitars or art or some shit.
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Kiroy
Marine Biologist
- 34,620
- 99,917
Future changes you inbred dumbfuck, i’m well aware of where we’re at now. Plenty of leftists / commies want to get ride of inheritance entirely and they seem to be pretty good at getting what they want.
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Gold isn't as horrible an idea as silver. For it to break even you only have to go up 5% in value rather than 15%+ for silver if you're buying 1oz rounds.
You still won't be middle class when they lower the exemption threshold, and I'm sure will be able to use trusts to get around inheritance tax like the rich have been doing forever. Hell, I have a trust set up for my wife and kids. Everyone should.
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- 11,043
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They also want a confiscatory wealth tax... Which assets outside the normal banking sphere could potentially inoculate you from to a degree.
Kiroy
Marine Biologist
- 34,620
- 99,917
You’re currently allowed to use trusts this way. Not guaranteed in the future.
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Kiroy
Marine Biologist
- 34,620
- 99,917
I wouldn’t even worry about that. Just think that your buying a small thing that will hopefully keep up with inflation and have the same purchasing power (for those inflated dollars) in the future.
I don't know, seems more like they are really good at getting stupid quotas passed and speech restricted but really bad at actually doing anything that really negatively impacts the wealthy.. funny that.
I like the idea of gold as a hedge against an extreme edge case of war and partial collapse of government, I think gold as a hedge against a functioning government taxing you slightly more is laughable. Grats you avoided a 40% tax by buying a metal that increased in value at less than half the rate of a real investment.
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Despite fears of communism, estate taxes are about the lowest they've been in 100 years and half of what they were 1940-70. The exemption threshold is up 20x since the 90's. Leftist noises aside, the functional trend is in the opposite direction. I'll start worrying about my wealth when it isn't painfully obvious the rules are written by the rich and corporate.
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Furry
WoW Office
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I remember watching an interview long ago with a politician from one of those socialist countries like norway where they asked if they tax the rich. He responded no, the rich know how to leave an area. We focus on taxing the poor, they are too poor to flee high taxes.
Lambourne
Ahn'Qiraj Raider
- 2,714
- 6,524
If a billionaire tax would work, they'd have done it already. The US already makes it nearly impossible to flee the IRS's grasp through FATCA. Even if you move to another country and only work there, you still need to file with the IRS. One of only two countries in the world that does this.
I know some Americans that moved to Europe and they had a hard time finding a bank willing to let them open an account because if you are a "US Person" (i.e. in any way of interest to the IRS because of citizenship or even the possibility of a claim to citizenship), there's a bunch of extra reporting that the bank needs to do on you. Even people that have never been to the US but happened to have one American parent can be hit by this.
americansoverseas.org
Don't let the title fool you, you can't just renounce citizenship and be done with it either, they want money for that too.
I know some Americans that moved to Europe and they had a hard time finding a bank willing to let them open an account because if you are a "US Person" (i.e. in any way of interest to the IRS because of citizenship or even the possibility of a claim to citizenship), there's a bunch of extra reporting that the bank needs to do on you. Even people that have never been to the US but happened to have one American parent can be hit by this.
Americans Abroad Renounce Citizenship to Avoid FATCA Tax Law
According to Bloomberg : American law FATCA is harming unintentional Americans abroad who are unable to open bank accounts. Read more
americansoverseas.org
Don't let the title fool you, you can't just renounce citizenship and be done with it either, they want money for that too.
The_Black_Log Foler
Stock Pals Senior Vice President
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Yeah I dunno, apple is a bit of an enigma to me. If this was Steve Jobs days I’d disagree with you. I switched over to apple in 2015 with an intel mbp. The hardware which was their biggest sell had issues with failing logic boards. Had them replaced twice. Switched to iPhone 3 years ago - in my opinion it’s WAY more unintuitive than android especially with all these swipe gestures they try to sell you as being forward thinking or some shit instead of virtual buttons and tabs. The software is way more buggy than android. iCloud is awful. I don’t really consider apple a software company. More of a hardware company that sells software to support it.
I will say the new in house ARM silicone they’ve been putting in their MacBooks is solid. Maybe I’m imagining it but I think they’ve also may some better price point options for MacBook pros too instead of locking people into spending 2k+ on them.
All that being said I’m not sure how far you can really go with a solid hardware product and just keep iterating on it. It really goes back to that Steve Jobs video I linked earlier. Where’s the innovation? Apple vision? I doubt it but we will see.
The_Black_Log Foler
Stock Pals Senior Vice President
- 43,759
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+1. This was one of my reasons to switch. I actually do trust apple the most compared to other options.
Loser Araysar
Chief Russia Correspondent / Stock Pals CEO
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