Markets eerily silent amid surprise report on capital-gains tax hikes

President Biden’s budget proposal reportedly assumes that stiff new increases in capital-gains taxes took effect in April. That’s a surprise to many policy wonks, and some say the silence that has greeted the news is unsettling.

According to a Thursday report by the Wall Street Journal, taxes on capital gains for households making more than $1 million will skyrocket to 43.4 percent from the current 23.8 percent, effective retroactively to last month. He’s also planning to change the rules on unrealized capital gains held until death. It’s the reported timing that was rocking the Beltway on Thursday. Optimists had reckoned that retroactive tax hikes are rare — as are hikes that take effect in the middle of a calendar year. (See the Clinton administration and World War I for precedents.)