Tax Law Commons^™

What Are Capital Gain And Capital Loss Anyway, Yoseph M. Edrey Prof.

Yoseph M. Edrey

I will try to offer a more analytical definition for capital gains and losses. Such definition, which relies on the economic process that creates the gain or loss, is based on a distinction between what I call “actual/genuine capital gain” and “disguised capital gain.” Such suggested analysis might change the traditional discussion and enable us to appreciate that the actual (genuine) capital gain component is much smaller than what we are normally accustomed to and, hence, the lock-in and risk-taking problems on the one hand, and the possibilities of “cherry-picking” losses on the other hand, are almost nonexistent. Furthermore, the …