Debate Watch: A Harris Stock Market Slaughter or Trump Stagflation

What to expect from tomorrow’s debate [The Freeport Navigator logo]( [The Freeport Navigator logo]( September 9, 2024 [More Articles]( | [Free Reports]( | [Premium Services]( [Debate Watch: A Harris Stock Market Slaughter or Trump Stagflation]( Well, fellow Navigator, tomorrow is the big day: The first and likely only presidential debate between Kamala Harris and Donald Trump. Will Harris be able to put together sentences without a teleprompter and without descending into a James Bond villain laugh? Will Trump step into the role of the old and senile candidate that Joe Biden vacated in July? Should we plan to play another round of our [presidential debate drinking game]( Time will tell (and YES! to that last question). It’s unlikely that the interviewers will ask the right questions… the ones we really need answers to ([like those I suggested last week](. And no matter what questions are asked, we likely won’t get honest or even plausibly believable answers. But it’s important we watch because we’ll see signs that confirm the [election shock I expect lies ahead](. And because we may well get insights into how we should be protecting and growing our wealth as we travel down this home stretch to Election Day. After all, either candidate might elaborate on the two worst policy plans in our country’s history. Let’s start with Harris… SPONSORED [DRASTIC Update to My Election Forecast.]( “If you’ve read any of my firm’s 2024 election forecasts, please listen to this statement immediately. I’m making a BIG confession about my firm’s forecast back in December of 2023 that Biden would drop out of the race… And issuing a radical new prediction.” – Charles Sizemore [Click here to see the outcome of the 2024 Presidential Race.]( Stock Market Murder Harris has a plan to overhaul our taxes. We’re not talking about that little game where Republican presidents lower marginal tax brackets by a couple percent and Democrat presidents raise marginal rates by a couple percent. Harris is going big. She’s proposed a minimum 25% tax on total income for any taxpayer with a net worth over $100 million. Most of us don’t fit that bill, but it will affect us all because her proposal includes taxing unrealized capital gains as part of total income. Let’s just stop and consider how incredibly shortsighted a policy like that would be. It would effectively force large stockholders to sell their appreciated stock every year. I know, I know. Let’s all cry crocodile tears for those poor billionaires forced to sell their precious Magnificent Seven stocks… But seriously, this is exactly the sort of thing that would lead to a massive stock market slaughter. Think about it. Many – if not most – wealthy people are actually cash poor. They keep their money working for them, and they don’t usually have millions or tens of millions of dollars sitting in cash. So, if Harris gets her way, she’d be creating a situation in which virtually all large stockholders became forced sellers every tax season. The wealthiest 10% of Americans own 93% of all stock. The wealthiest 1% owns 54%. It’s hard to imagine a sustained bull market being possible when that small core of people who own virtually everything are forced to sell every time prices rise. If Harris’s tax plan were implemented, it would effectively murder the stock market. Great! What about Trump? SPONSORED [Tech Melt Up to Begin This Month?]( After last month’s big correction… Many popular AI stocks like Google (GOOG), Nvidia (NVDA), and Microsoft (MSFT) have been recovering. Luke Lango, who was ranked #1 stock picker by TipRanks in 2020… Believes this is just the beginning of what he calls [The Great Tech Reversal of 2024](. [Click here to see the details.]( Mercantilist Economics Trump lives in a zero-sum world in which every transaction has a winner and loser. The idea of mutually beneficial free trade seems foreign to him. If you were going to classify Trump’s views on trade, the technical term would be “mercantilist.” Now… most of the great Adam Smith’s work – and the focus of his classic The Wealth of Nations – was dedicated to debunking mercantilist ideas and embracing free trade. America’s last real experiment with mercantilist lunacy was the Smoot-Hawley tariffs in 1930, which played a major role in turning a garden-variety recession into what we know today as the Great Depression. ([I wrote about this]( a few months ago here in the Navigator.) And yet two and a half centuries after Smith put pen to paper, this bad idea just keeps coming back like an undead zombie. It’s as if every generation has to relearn the lesson that mercantilist economics makes us all poorer. Trump has pledged to raise tariffs by 10% across the board and by 60% on China. In the Trumpian dichotomy of winners and losers, this makes America a winner… and our trading partners losers. But let’s be clear: The only loser here is the American consumer who would face higher costs and fewer choices. And let’s not forget that those 10% tariffs would be reciprocated by the “losers.” So American exporters would find themselves having a harder time competing overseas as well. For a man who claims to be all about growth and opportunity, Trump seems to have a remarkably poor grasp of how trade works. Yes, the Japanese, Koreans, and Germans make better cars than us. But our technology companies absolutely dominate theirs. That’s how comparative advantage works. We do what we’re good at. They do what they’re good at. We trade… and we all win. That’s competition. That’s capitalism. That’s American. The Tax Foundation – an organization that I’d hardly classify as hostile to Republican economic policies – estimates that Trump’s tariffs would shrink the economy by nearly 1% and kill over 600,000 jobs. I think that’s being generous. And it also says nothing about the inflation – or more accurately stagflation – that the tariff hike would create. So, pick your poison: Harris or Trump. Tax lunacy or trade lunacy. Either way, we must take steps now to protect our wealth… and find ways to grow it, despite these two shysters duking it out for the White House. Keep reading. That’s what we’re here to help you do. To life, liberty, and the pursuit of wealth, [Charles Sizemore's signature] [Charles Sizemore's signature] Charles Sizemore Chief Investment Strategist, The Freeport Society P.S. If either Kamala Harris or Donald Trump mentions “no tax on tips” again, I may be writing the next issue of The Freeport Navigator from the psychiatric ward, assuming they let me out of the straightjacket long enough to type it out. This one’s as bad as their respective tax and trade plans I just talked about. With every day, I grow more convinced we face a major election shock. [I explain why in this video presentation.]( Manage your account We hope this timely investment research is valuable to you. As you know the markets move fast and conditions change frequently. So please check the current issue for the most recent advice. Please note that we cannot be liable for any missed bulletins caused by overzealous filters. To ensure that you continue to receive this valuable part of your service please take a moment to add support@thefreeportsociety.com to your address book. You can reach us at support@thefreeportsociety.com or by calling 1-800-539-8213. Have a question about your bill? 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