Tax policy that benefits the select few instead of the country is a loophole.

Not if it was designed to do that.

A loophole is using a thing (a loophole) for something it is not supposed to be used for but is advantageous (entry).

This is like saying a 'backdoor' isn't a backdoor because the hacker who put it there intended it to be used for nefarious purposes.

Backdoors are, by definition, intentionally put in place surreptitiously.

In fact, you could better call this exact tax policy being discussed as a backdoor for rich people in the tax code.

I mean loophole as in an unintended side effect of tax law.

The classic double Irish with a Dutch sandwich was emergent behavior based on how US, EU, Irish, and Dutch tax codes all intertwined.

Forward carried interest is a loophole created for the express purpose of letting the wealthy occupy a lower tax bracket. It has no other public benefit.

> loophole created for the express purpose

This is an oxymoron.

While perhaps technically true, I think you are taking a word's general strict meaning, and are attempting to apply it to something where the meaning is often stretched a bit liberally.

While yes, it is true that a "loophole" is something that is unintended but allows some subset of people to benefit, when it comes to "tax loophole", that has colloquially come to mean "any means by which a special interest group gets to avoid taxes". "Tax loopholes" can be intentionally added to the tax code, even if "loophole" implies something unintentional.

Remember that English is a living language, and meanings change to suit how people use words, not how the dictionary may have once defined them.

> when it comes to "tax loophole", that has colloquially come to mean "any means by which a special interest group gets to avoid taxes". "Tax loopholes" can be intentionally added to the tax code, even if "loophole" implies something unintentional.

You're wrong. You just have been using the term wrong and listening to people who do as well. Loopholes are unintentional. The things you are referring to are intentionally placed in the tax code for people to take advantage of.

Do you consider the solar credit a tax loophole for people with solar?

>Remember that English is a living language, and meanings change to suit how people use words, not how the dictionary may have once defined them.

Great but this doesn't apply to "loophole". You're just wrong and doubling down.

>tax loophole

>A provision in the laws governing taxation that allows people to reduce their taxes. The term has the connotation of an unintentional omission or obscurity in the law that allows the reduction of tax liability to a point below that intended by the framers of the law.