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发帖数: 332 | 1 http://thecaucus.blogs.nytimes.com/2012/01/24/inside-the-romney
January 24, 2012, 8:42 am
Inside the Romney Tax Returns
By FLOYD NORRIS, NICHOLAS CONFESSORE and STEPHANIE STROM
Mitt Romney’s campaign released details of his federal tax returns on
Tuesday morning, providing the most detailed view yet of his wealthy family
’s finances.
Times reporters are looking into the specifics of the returns. Follow along
for analysis, and view the individual returns.
# Mitt and Ann Romney’s tax returns: 2010 | 2011
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1:14 P.M. |For the Romneys, Much of Their Philanthropy Was in Cash
Charitable-giving experts were buzzing over the large portion of the Romneys
charitable gifts that were made in cash, which is not the most tax-
efficient way of donating.
While the Romneys made contributions to their foundation in stock, they made
an additional $1.5 million in gifts to the Mormon Church in cash in 2010.
- Stephanie Strom
1:04 P.M. |In 2010 Returns, a Hint of What Romney Paid in 2009
While he did not release his 2009 tax returns, there is a hint of what Mr.
Romney and his wife paid in taxes that year.
The 2010 return shows the Romney's made estimated tax payments that year of
$1,369,095. (He then paid a lot more when he sought an extension of the
April 15 filing deadline.)
To avoid penalties, estimated tax payments must be at least 110 percent of
the taxes owed the prior year. Assuming that is what he paid, his tax bill
for 2009 would have been $1,244,632.
There is no easy way to estimate his reported income from that figure. The
2009 income presumably included large amounts of dividends, taxed at a 15
percent rate, and of interest income, taxed at full marginal rates. And of
course we have no way of knowing how large other deductions, like those for
charitable contributions, were in that year.
- Floyd Norris
12:26 P.M. |Goldman Sachs I.P.O. Shares in Blind Trust
Many of the assets in the Romneys' blind trust were managed by Goldman Sachs
, which invested the Romneys' wealth in the stocks of companies like Apple,
Research in Motion and Comcast.
One notable sale Goldman made on the Romneys' behalf in 2010 was 7,000
original initial public offering shares of Goldman Sachs, which were
originally purchased in May 1999, when Goldman went public. Ordinary
investors would not have been able to snag Goldman's I.P.O. shares, which
were reserved for the firm's most important clients.
The trust held onto them for more than a decade, missing the 2007 high of
more than $250 per share, and through the financial crisis, when the share
price briefly dipped below $50, before they were sold in December 2010,
after they recovered, $161.45 apiece, or $1,130,123.87.
- Kevin Roose
11:21 A.M. |On Interest Income and Municipal Bonds
Municipal bond salesmen need not call Mitt Romney. He is not interested.
A primary selling point of munis is that interest on them is exempt from
federal income taxes. But Mr. Romney is able to pay a relatively low overall
tax rate without buying munis.
In 2010, he and his wife reported $3,295,727 of interest income. Of that, $
557 came from munis, the bonds that finance state and local governments.
In 2011, the interest income was up to $4,099,156. None of that came from
munis.
- Floyd Norris
10:13 A.M. |Taxes on Household Help
A failure to pay Social Security taxes on household help has gotten
politicians in trouble in the past. The Romneys seem to be careful about
that.
Ann Romney, the filing says it was she, not her husband, reports paying $20,
600 in wages for such help in 2010. There appears to be no similar
disclosure in the incomplete 2011 returns released Tuesday.
The $20,603 in wages went to four separate women, whose income from Mrs.
Romney ranged from $2,238 to $8,667.
- Floyd Norris
9:59 A.M. |Details on Speaking Fees
Running for president cut down on Mr. Romney's speaking income, but the
amount was still in six figures in 2011.
His return shows that in 2010, he had $528,871 in such fees listed as "
author/speaking fees" on his tax return. Out of that, he paid $9,000 for
advertising and $39,756 in commissions and fees.
In 2011, he had $110,500 in such income, but reported no fees or commissions.
Mr. Romney drew criticism last week when he sought to downplay the amount of
money he received from speaking fees.
"And then I get speaker's fees from time to time, but not very much," he
said at the time.
- Floyd Norris
9:40 A.M. |In Top 0.006 Percent, and More
In a year of talk about the 1 percent, it was no surprise that Mr. Romney's
returns put him well into those ranks. But just how far up among the 1
percent is he?
According to the Internal Revenue Service's most recent available statistics
of income, for 2009, there were 8,274 taxpayers with an adjusted gross
income of $10 million or more, out of more than 140 million total returns
filed. So anyone who makes more than $10 million would be in the top 0.006
percent of taxpayers.
With an adjusted income of more than twice that - $21 million - in 2010, Mr.
Romney would be even higher in the income strata.
But as Floyd Norris notes, in 2009 a lot of investment income - including Mr
. Romney's - was held down by the financial crisis. He was almost certainly
well under that level in that year.
- Kevin McKenna
9:37 A.M. |Tax Savings From a Loss
Mr. Romney's 2010 income was actually higher than the front of the return
indicates. He was able to deduct $4.84 million in capital losses carried
forward from 2009, the year of the financial crisis. His actual capital
gains for 2010 were $16.75 million, but that $4.84 million in losses cut the
amount he had to report to $12.12 million.
The fact there was a capital loss carryforward meant that in 2009 - a year
for which returns were not released - he had no net capital gains. Since
more than half his income in 2010 and 2011 came from capital gains, that
means his income in 2009 was almost certainly much less. He presumably still
had substantial income from interest received and from dividends, but his
taxable income - and tax payments - were no doubt far lower that year.
Under the tax law, capital losses can be deducted from capital gains, but
only $3,000 a year in capital losses can be deducted from ordinary income.
So the fact there was a capital loss carryforward indicates he had a large
net capital loss in 2009.
In 2011, he realized capital gains of $10.7 million, down from the $12.1
million he realized in 2010.
- Floyd Norris
9:16 A.M. |Gifts to Bush Library
The Romneys' Tyler Charitable Foundation made gifts to markedly more
organizations in 2010 than it had previously.
While the largest amount paid out of the foundation that year, $145,000,
went to the Mormon Church, as in the past, the George Bush Library received
the second largest grant, $100,000.
Perhaps in a nod to Mr. Romney's political aspirations, the foundation for
the first time made a grant to a veterans' group, giving $20,000 to Homes
For Our Troops, and bestowed $10,000 on Harvard Business School, whose
alumni include many of the country's biggest political donors.
The foundation made gifts to a variety of well-known Boston charities like
the Dana-Farber Cancer Institute and City Year, as well as Brigham Young
University, which is affiliated with the Mormon Church and received $25,000.
For 2010, the foundation made a total of $647,500 in grants, compared to
grants totaling $631,000 the prior year.
The Romneys' blind trust donated 95,284 shares of Domino's Pizza to the
foundation, which recorded the value at roughly $1.5 million at the time it
filed its tax form, bolstering its asset to about $10 million from about $8
million in 2009.
Most of its assets are invested in various types of funds managed by Goldman
Sachs, which was paid $48,582 in management fees.
While foundations are tax-exempt, the Tyler Foundation paid $3,048 in
foreign taxes on its international investments.
- Stephanie Strom
9:05 A.M. |Advantages of Carried Interest
One of the advantages of carried interest is that it does not count as
income for Medicare and Social Security tax purposes. People normally pay a
tax of 6.2 percent of their earnings for Social Security up to a certain
income level (a rate reduced under the payroll tax cut) and 1.45 percent on
all their earnings.
In 2010 and 2011 Mitt and Ann Romney reported no W-2 income. But they did
report some "self employment" income that effectively is the same as
Medicare and Social Security.
In 2010, they reported $593,996 in such income, out of $21.6 million in
total income. That produced self-employment tax of $29,151.
In 2011, total income came to $20.9 million, but just $110,500 of that was "
self employment income, with a tax of $13,572.
- Floyd Norris
8:56 A.M. |Carried Interest Revealed
In a conference call to discuss the returns, Benjamin Ginsberg, the Romney
campaign's chief counsel, disclosed one piece of information not immediately
apparent from glancing at the returns: the amount of profits from Bain
Capital, the private equity firm Mr. Romney helped found, that the candidate
continues to earn from the company under his retirement agreement.
Mr. Romney, who retired from Bain in 1999, earned $7.4 million in such
profits - known as "carried interest" - from Bain in 2010. Mr. Ginsberg said
the candidate expected to get $5.4 million in carried interest in 2011.
Private equity executives are taxed at the capital gains rate of 15 percent
on most of their earnings, a rate well below the top 35 percent tax on
ordinary income.
- Nicholas Confessore
8:55 |No Home Mortgage
Mitt Romney and Newt Gingrich have one thing in common. Neither of them
seems to have a home mortgage.
In their 2010 tax returns, neither took a deduction for mortgage interest.
Barack Obama has a mortgage, and a big one. In 2010, he took a home mortgage
interest deduction of $49,945.
- Floyd Norris
8:28 A.M. |A Blizzard of Paperwork
Tax simplification should appeal to the Romney family.
His campaign released five 2010 tax returns on Tuesday and one for 2011. The
2010 joint return from Mitt Romney and his wife came in at 203 pages, and
the 2011 in processis 104 pages. His blind trust form has 37 pages, while
Ann Romney's has 83. A family trust comes in at 81 pages, and a charitable
foundation at 39.
Total pages: 547 |
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