I meant the difference from the point of a small investor. You don’t have any say, you just want to buy and hold. So if the company does not pay dividend then good. If it pays dividend, then you will reinvest it (and pay income tax). It all depends on the company, if it decides to pay dividend or not. That’s why I find it silly for someone to take the moral high ground when someone looks for a way to not pay income tax for dividends.
By the way, it looks to me like a company should only pay dividend if they are swimming in cash and have no ideas for further growth? A dividend looks to me like a signal: dear investor, take your money elsewhere. Even a stock buyback sends a better message: we got a lot of cash, nothing to invest in, but we believe in our company, so we will buy back our own stock from the market.
Of course, there are many people who believe in the magic of steady dividend income, they like getting paid. There are even people who looks for high dividend paying stock as a strategy…