“No taxes to be paid with owning Berkshire”
It depends on your investment profile but basically, dividends increase your taxable income. Anyone making an income will effectively get 'lower returns' on their investments due to this effect. If you had the choice between identical shares that either give a dividend or don't, you'll find that stock that pays a dividend has a lower price, and increases in value more slowly than stock that doesn't. (all other things being equal)  There's a whole bunch of economic theory behind this but in short, the current stock price is a measure of how much the company is worth combined with an estimation of how much it will be worth in the future (NPV of all future dividends is the basic model). When the company makes profit, it can keep those profits, and invest in new projects or distribute a portion of those profits to shareholders (aka dividends). Distributing the value to shareholders reduces the value of the company somewhat, but the shareholders get the money now. If the company doesn't give dividends, it has a higher value which will be reflected in a higher stock price.  So basically, all other things being equal (which they rarely are, but I digress) the price and growth difference reflects the fact that dividends are paying out now. (In other words, if you wanted non-dividend shares you could get them by buying dividend shares and re-investing the dividend as new shares every time there was a payout, and you could get dividend-share like properties by selling a percentage of non-dividend shares periodically). Dividend income is taxable as part of your income right away, however taxes on capital gains only happen when you sell the asset in question, and also has a lower tax rate. If you buy and hold Berkshire Hatheway, you will not have to pay taxes on the gains you get until you decide to sell the shares, and even then the tax rate will be lower. If you are investing for retirement, this is great, since your income from other sources will be lower, so you can afford to be taxed then. In many jurisdictions, income from capital gains is subject to a different tax rate than the rest of your income, for example in the US for most people with money to invest it's either 15% or 20%, which will be lower than normal income tax would be (since most people with money to invest would be making enough to be in a higher bracket). Say, for example, your income now is within the 25% bracket. Any dividend you get will be taxed at that rate, so let's say that the dividend is about 2% and the growth of the stock is about 4%. So, your effective growth rate after taxation is 5.5% -- you lose 0.5% from the 25% tax on the dividend. If, instead, you had stock with the same growth but no dividend it would grow at a rate of 6%. If you never withdrew the money, after 20 years, $1 in the dividend stock would be worth ~$2.92 (1.055^20), whereas $1 in the non-dividend stock would be worth ~$3.21 (1.06^20). You're talking about a difference of 30 cents per dollar invested, which doesn't seem huge but multiply it by 100,000 and you've got yourself enough money to renovate your house purely out of money that would have gone to the government instead. The advantage here is if you are saving up for retirement, when you retire you won't have much income so the tax on the gains (even ignoring the capital gains effect above) will definitely be less then when you were working, however if you had a dividend stock you would have been paying taxes on the dividend, at a higher rate, throughout the lifetime of the investment.  So, there you go, that's what Mohnish Pabrai is talking about. There are some caveats to this. If the amount you are investing isn't large, and you are in a lower tax bracket, and the stock pays out relatively low dividends you won't really feel the difference much, even though it's there. Also, dividend vs. no dividend is hardly the highest priority when deciding what company to invest in, and you'll practically never be able to find identical companies that differ only on dividend/no dividend, so if you find a great buy you may not have a choice in the matter.  Also, there has been a trend in recent years to also make capital gains tax progressive, so people who have a higher income will also pay more in capital gains, which negates part of the benefit of non-dividend stocks (but doesn't change the growth rate effects before the sale).  There are also some theoretical arguments that dividend-paying companies should have stronger shareholders (since the company has less capital, it has to 'play nice' to get money either from new shares or from banks, which leads to less risky behavior) but it's not so cut-and-dried in real life.
Bezos is not a Billionaire because of WaPo, and neither Carlos Slim from Mexico is a Billionaire from owning NYT.  Bezos is reach from Amazon, and he acquired the failing WaPo to advance his political agenda while writing off all the loses from WaPo to reduce his tax bill.  Same with Carlos: he makes money from Telecom in Mexico and he NYT is just for political reasons and tax saving. "Trump called it ""controls"" rather than owns.  He is firmly remaining as the CEO and is the largest shareholder so that's a moot point.  That is still $85 billion in shares.  If Trump wipes off only 10% in stock price with his constant threats of taxes and breaking up a monopoly, that would cost Bezos $8.5 billion.  If Trump does break up Amazon then Bezos may lose much more.  Trump explained to Fox News, ""This is owned as a toy by Jeff Bezos who controls Amazon. Amazon is getting away with murder tax-wise. He's using the Washington Post for power so that the politicians in Washington don't tax Amazon like they should be taxed,"" Trump said. Trump added that he read somewhere that Bezos was worried Trump would go after him for anti-trust violations." But pennsylvania didnt pay anything. Not collecting taxes is not the same thing as paying somebody. The municipalities are investing in their future by offering lucrative deals to attract business in order to collect taxes later and benefit their citizens by providing jobs. If it doesnt work out, you dont actually lose anything because the factory didnt exist in the first place. Just saw him on pbs this week saying that 99% of his wealth will be sold, liquidated, within 10 years of his and his spouse's death.  He probably is getting tax breaks but I imagine the koch brothers get similar breaks while actively fighting to get rid of the estate tax to pass all of their wealth on not just most of it. "This forum is not intended to be a discussion group, but I would like to add a different perspective, especially for @MrChrister, on  @littleadv's rhetorical question  ""... estates are after-tax money, i.e.: income tax has been paid on them,    yet the government taxes them again. Why?"" For the cash in an estate, yes, that is after-tax money, but consider other assets such as stocks and real estate. Suppose a rich man bought stock in a small computer start-up company at $10 a share about 35 years ago, and that stock is now worth $500 a share. The man dies and his will bequeaths the shares to his son. According to US tax law, the son's basis in the shares is $500 per share, that is, if the son sells the shares, his capital gains are computed as if he had purchased the shares for $500 each. The son pays no taxes on the inheritance he receives. The deceased father's last income tax return (filed by the executor of the father's will) does not list the $490/share gain as a capital gain since the father did not sell the stock (the gain is what is called an unrealized gain), and so there is no income tax due from the father on the $490/share. Now, if there is no estate tax whatsoever, the father's estate  tax return pays no tax on that gain of $490 per share either. Would this be considered an equitable system? Should the government not tax the gain at all? It is worth noting that it would be possible for a government to eliminate estate taxes entirely, but instead have tax laws  that say that unrealized gains on the deceased's property would be taxed (as capital gains) on the deceased's final tax return." Just to be clear, you didn't find a flaw in the logic but you did disagree with the premise by providing a counterexample.  But I'm not sure your example is valid; Buffett is smart enough to know that his name is as important as his money.  While he mouths support for increased taxes, he goes to extraordinary lengths to avoid actually paying them.  I suppose taxes aren't as cheap as talk, huh.  &gt; If John selling Jim ten thousand cows introduces systemic risk to the economy, then yes, the rest of the market players should be compensated.  Pray tell, what angel do you trust to make the decision of whether and to what extent systemic risk is introduced? I can make that election to pay taxes now (even though they aren't vested) based on the dollar value at the time they are granted? That is correct. You must file the election with the IRS within 30 days after the grant (and then attach a copy to that year's tax return). would I not pay any taxes on the gains because I already claimed them as income? No, you claim income based on the grant value, the gains after that are your taxable capital gains. The difference is that if you don't use 83(b) election - that would not be capital gains, but rather ordinary salary income. what happens if I quit / get terminated after paying taxes on un-vested shares? Do I lose those taxes, or do I get it back in a refund next year? Or would it be a deduction next year? You lose these taxes. That's the risk you're taking. Generally 83(b) election is not very useful for RSUs of established public companies. You take a large risk of forfeited taxes to save the difference between capital gains and ordinary gains, which is not all that much. It is very useful when you're in a startup with valuations growing rapidly but stocks not yet publicly trading, which means that if you pay tax on vest you'll pay much more and won't have stocks to sell to cover for that, while the amounts you put at risk are relatively small. &gt; It's been years since my finance classes, but it seems to me the best course of action after selling the property and paying corporate taxes would be to reinvest the money at the corporate level to then pay out dividends rather than pay each of the 3 shareholders out and have us then pay personal tax on a large amount.  Full disclaimer, no one here is, or is acting in capacity as, a tax accountant or lawyer.   My understanding is as follows (assuming you're in the US):  1. The C-Corp owns the property. If you sell the property, the *corporation* will receive the proceeds of that sale. IF a capital gain is recognized, *the corporation* will pay the appropriate tax rate. That rate is, apparently, the same as normal income.   2. If you then issue a dividend with the proceeds of that sale, you are actually NOT reinvesting the proceeds, you're distributing them to shareholders. Shareholders will *then* need to pay tax on the dividends at their personal rates *as income.*  If you reinvest the cash, it will stay in the business. It will not go directly to shareholders. The cash will need to be invested somewhere else within the company. You will get hit with taxes regardless at least once. If you distribute to shareholders, those proceeds will be taxed twice.   Example:  Both Cases:  Sale Proceeds: $100  Less Corporate Tax of 35%: $35  After-Tax Proceeds: $65  _______________________________________________________________  IF DISTRIBUTED:  Distributed to Shareholders: $65  Less Income Taxes at 25%: $16.25  After-Tax Distribution to Shareholders: $48.75  ____________________________________________________________  IF RETAINED:  No distributions.  Retained Earnings: +$65  Cash: +$65  Book Value of Equity: +$65  Shareholder Wealth Increase: $65 You also may want to consider how this interacts with the stepped up basis of estates.  If you never sell the stock and it passes to your heirs with your estate, under current tax law the basis will increase from the purchase price to the market price at the time of transfer.   In a comment, you proposed:   Thinking more deeply though, I am a little skeptical that it's a free lunch: Say I buy stock A (a computer manufacturer) at $100 which I intend to hold long term. It ends up falling to $80 and the robo-advisor sells it for tax loss harvesting, buying stock B (a similar computer manufacturer) as a replacement. So I benefit from realizing those losses. HOWEVER, say both stocks then rise by 50% over 3 years. At this point, selling B gives me more capital gains tax than if I had held A through the losses, since A's rise from 80 back to 100 would have been free for me since I purchased at 100. And then later thought  Although thinking even more (sorry, thinking out loud here), I guess I still come out ahead on taxes since I was able to deduct the $20 loss on A against ordinary income, and while I pay extra capital gains on B, that's a lower tax rate. So the free lunch is $20*[number of shares]*([my tax bracket] - [capital gains rates]) That's true.  And in addition to that, if you never sell B, which continues to rise to $200 (was last at $120 after a 50% increase from $80), the basis steps up to $200 on transfer to your heirs.   Of course, your estate may have to pay a 40% tax on the $200 before transferring the shares to your heirs.  So this isn't exactly a free lunch either.  But you have to pay that 40% tax regardless of the form in which the money is held.  Cash, real estate, stocks, whatever.  Whether you have a large or small capital gain on the stock is irrelevant to the estate tax.   This type of planning may not matter to you personally, but it is another aspect of what wealth management can impact. But investing into your own company is already a tax deductible event. Expenditures like Research &amp; Development, employee compensation, and acquiring new equipment are all things that reduce taxable income.  https://www.usatoday.com/story/money/markets/2016/05/20/third-cash-owned-5-us-companies/84640704/  &gt; Apple (AAPL), Microsoft (MSFT), Alphabet (GOOGL), Cisco Systems (CSCO) and Oracle (ORCL) are sitting on $504 billion, or 30%, of the $1.7 trillion in cash and cash equivalents held by U.S. non-financial companies in 2015, according to an analysis released Friday by ratings agency Moody's Investors Service.  That's even more cash concentration than in previous years, as these five companies held 27% of cash in 2014 and 25% in 2013. Apple alone is holding more cash and investments than eight of the 10 entire industry sectors.  1/3 of all dollars created by the US Federal Reserve banking system (physically minted or otherwise) is collectively held by 5 companies. Companies exist to accumulate wealth and will seek to avoid unnecessary expenditures, which includes taxes.  The corporate income tax rate is 35%. For individuals, the top income tax bracket (for every dollar of income above $400,000) is 39.6%.  I argue that dropping the top individual income tax bracket down to 34% will not materially affect these companies (paying 35% income tax) from continuing to just sit on a ludicrous sum of wealth. "Wait, are you sure you've got that right? What you're describing is a tax credit that counts against your total owed.   In normal operations, companies get to ""write off"" all of their expenses and they only pay taxes on the net profit of the operation. So I guess you could say that if it cost me $100M to move a factory off shore, and my marginal tax rate was 35%, then I would ""save"" $35M in taxes ( it still cost me the $100M, but it only felt like it cost $65M).   This is true of any business expense. I (not Romney, apparently) don't know of any special treatment that offshoring activities get one way or the other." I would say the most important thing to consider is the quality of the company relative to the price you pay for it. No dividend also means that you will not pay taxes on dividends. It says Amazon has no profits (or very low profits) but the value of the company is very high and growing because of the high revenue. All of the returns to investors are in the form of increased share price which isn't realized or taxed until the shares are sold. This isn't a loophole. Anybody can run a business where they spend most of their revenue on operating costs and run on very slim margins with the goal of growing the revenue. He owns the majoirty of berkshire hathaway which owns a lot of big companies outright as well as fractions of other big public companies. For example, his holding company berkshire hathaway which lets say he owns 50% of, owns 10% of coca cola. This means that every can or bottle of coke sold, berkshire hathaway gets 10% of the profit so say .01 per can. Thats a lot given the millions of cans sold. Since he owns 50% of berkshire hathaway that means he is getting half a penny of every can of coke sold.   Do this with all of his companies and investment holdings and you get to billions of dollars. I don’t know specifics of the situation but one possibility would be that Buffett may have billions in various assets etc companies he owns, stocks bonds, but if he doesn’t sell any of those stocks or cash in any of those bonds, then on paper he didn’t make any money that year because he’s letting the assets appreciate. I would say net income is the amount of income you claimed that year, so if you had sold some stock, the amount of money you sold them for would be your income. As opposed to net worth being “if they wanted to” if Buffett sold all of his stocks and assets, he would be able to get billions for it. So while he technically is worth billions, on his tax returns he doesn’t claim much income.