Bentley–and others–have reported their best sales year… ever.
And following the 2008 REIT/CDS crash the local boat dealership couldn’t move the cheaper boats while the top of the line models sold for cash as soon as they arrived. I have for decades recognized that “market corrections” always corrected upward.
Certain industries have done exceedingly well in the pandemic. Anything involving home delivery of products or food did well. Anything involving cooking at home did spectacularly; King Arthur Flour could probably buy the Chrysler building at this point with all the baking that’s been going on - they saw a 300% spike in customers and couldn’t keep up with demand.
The people running those industries have likewise done exceedingly well. 
It also helps that the ultra-rich tend to be recession proof even if their businesses aren’t.
No one’s going to fire Gordon Ramsay even though his restaurants are doubtless doing just as poorly as any other restaurant that can’t open or has to operate on reduced capacity. And even if he loses all his businesses, he’s got tens of millions in the bank to fall back on. So he’ll keep buying his Ferraris because there’s an almost zero chance he’ll end up broke at any time in the future.
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No surprise. Rich people got richer over the last year, much richer. They make money through investments, they never have to leave the house to make big bucks. The Russell 2000 index is up about 80% in the last year. Wouldn’t you celebrate with a buying spree if your equity investments almost doubled?
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So one has to ask why the fixation on raising the minimum wage? Obviously that is not where the money is at, but even ordinary earners can do quite well over a long period of time by socking money away. One of the first things I always told a new employee was to start funding their deferred compensation plans as soon as possible no matter how small. But then class envy is still a big topic among some folks. They just don’t realize what it really took to afford that boat, car, house, or vacation.
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Because it’s where the money needs to go?
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Wouldn’t you also cash out some of that equity if you decided the next administration was going to slap a big increase on capital gains? Proposals on the table would double capital gains taxes.
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I wouldn’t buy an asset that depreciated as fast as a Bentley to “save money” by not having to pay taxes, no.
Maybe you wouldn’t but anyone in the market for a new $220,000 Bentley earning over $500K a year would save about $88,000 on that purchase. Enough for a nice new Audi Q7 to go along with the Bentley.
You only save if you were going to buy it anyway. If you buy the Bentley because you don’t want the government to get its hands on your money, then you just lost $220,000 to save $88,000.
“We had to destroy the village in order to save it.”
I did say… “in the market for”…
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Oh the unfairness of it all. Some people only got a free phone or education from the government, but others get a free Bentley. The humanity of it all. It must stop.
Perhaps some of the miserly but wealthy people out there are heeding the words of that old song “Enjoy yourself, it’s later than you think”, in the wake of covid.
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Proposed by the more liberal members of Congress. As you know, proposals have to make their way into bills, then passed by both the House and Senate, then signed by the President. That said, I was disappointed when taxes for the rich were cut in the early 2000s and since then as well. The early 2000s cuts were just when we started the second Gulf War. Doubly bad, IMO, because federal expenditures and revenues were about equal. In 2019, the shortfall was about $984 billion. Last year it was over $3 trillion, but that was an unusual year. In any case, tax cuts when there won’t be any serious effort to cut expenses are foolish. It does look more like the increase in capital gains taxes will be to about 28%, not the 35% it used to be. Still a good deal for people rich enough to live off their investments.
It seems like they found a loophole but in way it kinda backfire because they didn’t save that much money. Though, I don’t think it even made a dent to their fortune.