No my argument is even if you are a FUCKING rock star his insane tax policy will make it nearly impossible to make money via short term trading. So they will stop. Which means less taxes. Which means no free college and quite possibly decreased tax revenue.

If you pay ~4500 in taxes and fees, you walk away with 4500 for doing almost nothing. 4.5% isn't a great return, but it keeps you ahead of inflation.

Yeah and risk adjusted that return is dog shit. Markets repeatedly see 10% corrections. 1999 and 2008 saw massive crashes. So why is anyone in their right mind going to risk capital to get your profits taxed into oblivion. On 200k a 20% correction is a 40k loss if you sell. Gone. Boom. So to say I did nothing is a bit unfair. People risked money on things like Apple and Google. Microsoft was started in a garage. There was also things like enron and a host of other companies that went bust also. Radio Shack and lots of others have failed. Without the reward of a big payout people will not risk money or will invest in other places.

Why is it a bad thing if short term is curtailed? You'll likely see increased volatility. The b/a spread likely will be larger. Listen making money with stocks is not guaranteed. There was a time in 2008 where I had negative returns with index funds. It took years to recover. You cannot tax your way into prosperity.

So again why is this bad? Why would anyone risk capital if any return is going to be taxed out of existence? So what I will expect is stocks crater and dividends to increase.

My issue is simply this. I pay 35% short term cap gains. 35% of any profit I might make goes to the tax man. Don't give me any shit about paying my fair share. The argument the system is more stable isn't a viable one either. There's no evidence increased trading makes stuff less stable.