"imagine the shitshow if you had to pay extra every year if you owned a house outright but the property values kept going up"

Like property taxes, then. ;-)

Realistically, I understand the issue. If I had to pay taxes on the increase in price on my house (say from a $300k valuation three years ago to a $500k valuation after the market bubble), I'd be fucked to find 15% of that overnight. Of course, if they allowed that to be offset by the primary residence exemption, it would be a zero cost. Without that, it would still be a non-issue for 95% or more of US taxpayers because most people simply don't own an illiquid asset that increases in capital value (much less an international one), and if you exclude secondary real estate that non-issue number probably increases to more then 99.9%.

imagine the shitshow if you had to pay extra every year if you owned a house outright but the property values kept going up?

You mean property tax? Because almost every state already ups your taxes if your value goes up. In TX they reassess every year. In CA they had to pass a law to STOP doing it (now it only goes up by a flat rate every year if I remember correctly), but that has led to new loopholes to avoid tax.

But I do see your point. For normal people, their main or only asset is their house. They need to live there and aren't necessarily getting 10% pay raises when their value goes up 20%. If my house were taxed at its current value, I don't think I could afford to live there since I don't own it outright.

The big issue is that banks give out very low interest loans based on assets that have unrealized gains. Those loans are used as income by wealthy people but aren't taxed by the government. They are "taxed" by the banks getting some money in interest, but the government sees none of that and it's at a much lower rate than capital gains.

Oh I agree the constitutional question is clear, and I agree that this articular court is compromised and cannot be trusted to objectively uphold the law. I'm worried about the court of public opinion, though. They are making every effort to obfuscate the critical points, and make it sound like this poor couple has to sell their cat to pay for the illegal tax on an investment that didn't generate income.

I love legalese. So you’re technically correct. What did you hope to gain by pointing out an error in terminology without qualifying what these assets represent to the owners? That’s like trying to say rich people pay few taxes because their actual listed income is so small, like they have no money, so therefore them paying a pittance in tax relative to the average person is justifiable.

For anyone who doesn’t know, even if these assets aren’t earnings, they can leveraged to do things like get loans. You don’t pay taxes on loans. Loan interest rates are usually far, far less than any tax rate. So you take out a 10 million loan, pay zero tax, and maybe a few percent interest. It’s not income, but you now have 10 mil to spend on whatever you want.

One of the many ways the rich avoid taxes.

And non-binding ethical standards!