There’s a lot of details left unclear in your question, but based on what I think I understand, the answer is that there is no capital gains tax OR income tax due on assets in the account, UNTIL you actually take the distribution.
At that point, the assets distributed out of the account are taxed at your ordinary marginal tax rate, which - if not working - is probably pretty low.
As long as the assets are held in the IRA though, the distinction between short term and long term cap gains is meaningless.
> At that point, the assets distributed out of the account are taxed at your ordinary marginal tax rate, which - if not working - is probably pretty low.
actually, consulting, ordinary income is still rather high.
so imho this brings up a new issue, whether i cross a tax bracket boundary if i withdraw from the rollover ira. my instinct says yes, so i’ll dig out my last year tax form and see what bracket i am in (iirc high but not the highest).
thanks for reminding me of this consideration! as a possible tax reduction strategy i might stage withdrawals into next year so as to flatten the curve (lol) and avoid the higher tax impact of getting unintentionally pushed into a higher bracket if withdraw all at once. if i stage it into next calendar year, i might be able to avoid getting that unwelcome push.