Vice President Harris releases greater detail on tax proposals

Vice President and Democratic presidential nominee Kamala Harris this week provided greater details on the tax proposals she previously released. 

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September 10, 2024

Vice President and Democratic presidential nominee Kamala Harris this week provided greater details on the tax proposals she previously released. Read TaxNewsFlash

Specifically, the Harris Campaign website indicated that she supports:

  • Raising the capital gains rate from 20% to 28% for those earning a million dollars a year or more
  • Enacting an unspecified “billionaire minimum tax”
  • Quadrupling the tax on stock buybacks

Although it has been reported widely, the Harris Campaign website does not specifically note that Vice President Harris supports the revenue raising proposals in the official tax plan of the Biden-Harris Administration, the so-called Green Book. For more information on the FY2025 Green Book, read KPMG report: Tax proposals in FY 2025 budget.

The Harris Campaign website does specifically say, however, that Vice President Harris’s plan includes “rolling back Trump’s tax cuts for the wealthiest Americans,” while “ensuring no one earning less than $400,000 a year will pay more in taxes.”  Thus, it appears that Vice President Harris is committed to extending the $4 trillion of “tax cliff” cuts scheduled to expire at the end of 2025 only for individuals making $400,000 or less.

KPMG observation

The 28% capital gains rate is a break from the FY2025 Green Book plan that proposed raising the capital gains rate to 39.6% to equal the ordinary income rate for taxpayers with AGI in excess of $1,000,000 ($500,00 for married filing separate taxpayers) but only to the extent that the taxpayer’s taxable income exceeds that threshold (indexed for inflation). It is also unclear if Harris would retain the current 3.8% net investment income tax rate on capital gains (and other income) or if she would seek to raise that rate.

Harris’ support for a “billionaire minimum tax” may or may not be an embrace of the FY2025 Green Book tax on unrealized capital gains (largely dubbed a billionaires tax even though it maintains a $100 million threshold).

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