The concept that we want to capture in these next few pieces will be a simple question, how would the plans of each presidential candidate, including what we currently have under President Obama, affect your investments? We are going to accomplish this task by using a hypothetical scenario of investing $200,000 which we will then withdraw after a period of 20 years for the purpose of retirement income. We are going to factor in 3 major impacts. The first will be taxes that would be placed on an investment while it is growing, if they exist. The second thing we will look at it will be “withdrawal” type taxes when the money is taken out, like income taxes. The third factor we will examine will be inheritance type taxes that would come into effect when the money was transferred to our heirs. For this illustration we are going to assume a few things equal. we are going to assume that our investment achieves a 5% annual return, and we are going to assume that we fit into the 28% income tax bracket.These investments will be in a tax-deferred type account like an IRA.

The purpose of this is not to endorse any candidate in any way, it is simply to educate everyone on the impacts that policies can have on our own personal lives. We also must realize that what a candidate says they will do and what they will actually be able to do are often two very different things. Here are the comparison pages:

Obama vs. Gingrich

Obama vs. Romney

Obama vs. Perry

Obama vs. Santorum

Obama vs. Huntsman

Obama vs. Paul

Ultimately we cannot predict what the economy will do under any of these men. The real purpose here is to demonstrate the impact that federal policy does or does not have on our personal investments.