Capital gains are classified as long-term or short-term. Long-term capital gains are the profits an individual makes from selling assets, such as stock, a business, a house, or land, that were held for more than a year. Short-term capital gains are profits from the sale of assets held for less than a year.
Although this topic is not without βpaidβcontroversy, the general idea is, if you are selling something youβve owned for a long time, you can be taxed at a lower rate.
All these rates have evolved over time based on economic and political factors,* so you can be confident they will change again in the future.
βnewβ In 2017, Congress passed the Tax Cuts and Jobs Act (TCJA), which made many changes to tax rates for the 2018 tax year. Long-term capital gains taxes did not change significantly.