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CORPORATE STOCK BUYBACKS - SHOULD WE OUTLAW THEM?

Guestpert

Ian Winer

Category

Business and Finance

Ian Winer is an investor, philosopher, humanitarian, writer and public speaker who connects people to the truth of market places and human behavior. Ian is the author of the book, Ubiquitous Relativity: My Truth is Not the Truth. A regular contributor to CNBC, Fox Business, The Wall Street Journal, Bloomberg, and Reuters, to name just a few, he is known for seeking connections through non consensus thinking and making it relatable to everyone.

In the last 2 weeks, we have seen politicians on both sides of the political spectrum come out in favor of changing the rules for companies to buy back their own shares.  That is not the answer!  We can either raise taxes on companies or invest in our workforce.  But if we mandate how a company can spend its capital, we may as well declare Capitalism dead.

 

Just in the last 2 weeks we have seen politicians on both sides of the spectrum suggest reforming the ability of a company to buy back its own shares.

First, Chuck Schumer and Bernie Sanders wrote an op/ed taking the draconian view that restricts buybacks: https://www.cnbc.com/2019/02/04/schumer-and-sanders-swipe-at-trump-tax-cuts-with-stock-buybacks-plan.html

Then, Marco Rubio discussed changing the tax status of buybacks to dissuade companies from doing them: https://www.cnbc.com/2019/02/12/rubio-backs-new-proposal-to-tackle-stock-buybacks.html

Neither will work!  The only way we can get companies to change their capital allocation is to improve our workforce through education.  Raising taxes on companies back to a more rational 26% makes sense.

But it does not make sense to be able to dictate how a company invests its capital.

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