The rent-versus-own distinction exempts mortgage interest from the personal expense rule

Evidence

Since our modern progressive income tax system was created with the Revenue Act of 1913, the government has always subsidized homeownership by offering tax subsidies for owning, but not for renting. Why? Because rent is a nondeductible “personal, living, or family” expense. Remember in chapter 1, when we discussed how personal choices like my designer Celine bag aren’t deductible (but a personal choice like marriage is)? Well, the government will not give me a tax break if I rent an apartment in a fancy building with a doorman, but I do get a tax break if I buy an apartment in a fancy building with a doorman. The permitted deduction for mortgage interest is a huge exception to the general rule about personal choice. — Dorothy A. Brown, The Whiteness of Wealth, 179

Categorization

• DEFINE: Establishes the baseline principle: nondeductible personal expenses versus the mortgage-interest exception, key framing for the whole argument.
• XREF: connects to: The 1986 Tax Reform Act made mortgage interest the main deductible personal interest — Dorothy A. Brown, The Whiteness of Wealth: How the Tax…, 182; Universal interest deductibility in 1913 predated targeted mortgage subsidies — Dorothy A. Brown, Getting to Reparations: How Building a…, 1236; Tax outcomes should not depend on personal decisions like marrying or staying home (+2 more)
• yield-rescued: below the book’s yield-target cutoff, included anyway for connecting to: The 1986 Tax Reform Act made mortgage interest the main deductible personal interest — Dorothy A. Brown, The Whiteness of Wealth: How the Tax…, 182; Universal interest deductibility in 1913 predated targeted mortgage subsidies — Dorothy A. Brown, Getting to Reparations: How Building a…, 1236; Tax outcomes should not depend on personal decisions like marrying or staying home (+2 more)