This may sound like traditional investment advice, but it is still good advice. You should take advantage of tax shelters like a 401k or IRA. As a libertarian, I am opposed to taxation, particularly on income. Although ending the income tax is a goal of mine, that is not the world we live in right now. Therefore, you should take advantage of the tax laws that you can. If you work for an employer that has a 401k plan, you should participate, especially if your employer matches contributions. If you don’t, you are turning down extra money from your employer.

You should also take advantage of a Roth IRA, particularly if you are young. This allows you to invest your after-tax money and it will then grow (hopefully) without having to pay any more taxes (I am not counting corporate taxes). If you invest $10,000 at the age of 25 and it grows to $1 million by the age of 60, then you will not pay taxes on that one million dollars upon withdrawal. This is a great deal that you should take advantage of.

Even if you are bearish on the stock market, you can invest in virtually anything. In a 401k, your choices are limited to whatever plan your company chooses. But you can open a Roth IRA with almost any major broker now.

There is a chance that the government could change the law and later decide to tax Roth IRAs. But there are enough people that have them now that it would be politically difficult for the government to do this. Again, nothing is a guarantee, but you should take advantage of what you can. You don’t want to pay more in taxes than you have to.