If you had been following the news the last couple weeks, you would have seen that offered as a reason for the “revolution”. I agree that eventually a huge imbalance will result in severe problems. Eventually the poor will fight against a huge confiscation of wealth .
Do you remember bread lines and the great depression. Are you aware there was a huge communist and socialist movement in America at that time? It is simple. When a system rewards the few at the expense of the masses, the citizens will eventually fight. They will overthrow the leadership and the owners.
America is getting more and more out of balance. The wealthy are getting their taxes cut while they decry every program that helps the needy as evil. It will not end well. The Repub house has no problems with slashing every social program while cutting taxes. The states are following suit. People are marching in Wisconsin because of the Govs. slashing and union busting. They are in the streets of an American city today. You try and figure out why they are out in the streets.
By the way, the argument that people will not accumulate large fortunes if they have to pay an inheritance tax is stupid. They live a huge life with all the toys possible but somehow in the back of their mind, they are thinking “if I can’t pass all my money along in tact, I just won’t work anymore”. I will leave my mansion , burn my Maybach ,torch my Rolls, because my kids and grandkids won’t get it all.
Of course they pass along many millions. But that just isn’t enough for them.
Like Teddy Roosevelt said, huge fortunes are different. They include an impact in politics, regulation and law creation. They are not just benign piles of money. The rich will try and run the government to make them even richer. it is working quite well.
It’s beyond stupid, it’s demonstrably untrue. Like I said previously: history, facts, logic, none of it makes any difference anymore. The conservatives live in an alternative reality where there was never a Carnegie, or Rockefeller, or Kennedy, or Gates, or Buffet who built up fortunes while facing an estate tax.
They never saw lower deficits and higher revenues with higher tax rates, or what happened when we did not have labor unions, or social security, or rural electrification. They never had Jim Crow, or lynchings, or gay bashing, or back alley abortions in their fantasy world; good manners and the market solved every problem.
ETA: And kids stayed off their lawns
Cite?
Who made that argument? Wasn’t me.
From here Caution, this link brings you to the fact based universe. Read at your own risk.
Look buddy, I simply wasn’t aware of the special rule for small businesses that gave them 15 years to pay the estate tax. And I’m sure you weren’t aware of it either until you fired up google three minutes before your post. So get off your high horse and stop accusing me of not heeding facts.
The lie that the estate tax causes family farms to be sold has been known for years now. If you didn’t know that then you shouldn’t be offering an opinion on the effect of the estate tax. Maybe you should have done a little Googling of your own before making the claim. Repeating the lies of Fox News is not fighting ignorance, it’s spreading it.
Please give some examples of privately held companies destroyed by the tax. We know that no one has found family farms destroyed by it. I suppose there could be a problem if a person was utterly stupid about estate planning.
If people were that jealous, they’d raise the rate a bit. So, you are for tax policy to give incentives to build wealth, except if the person is the child of wealth?
I think we can summarize by noting that practically speaking the estate tax does no harm in creating wealth, perhaps encourages charitable giving. It does add money to government coffers, which, since that might mean it is easier to feed some poor leech on society, drives the right crazy.
Yeah, shibu1, why should he be aware of that? Snowmobile salesmen don’t need to know about tax law.
Where did I repeat the lie that the estate tax causes family farms to be sold? You seem very convinced that I repeated that lie–let’s see a quote. Or don’t post a quote of me saying that and show yourself to be a moron, your choice.
Republicans keep looking for victims of the estate tax. They have trouble finding any, most notably ater Hurricane Katrina.
If they have a lot of kids, the property is often sold so it can be distributed among the heirs. I suppose a righty could say that is an example. But many don’t want to run a farm once they leave. They just want their share of the estate. There are lots of reasons a farm would be sold after the owner dies. Not the inheritance tax though.
That’s actually a good example of why it’s difficult to determine if there were any family farms or small businesses that were sold because of the estate tax–they may have been sold for other reasons.
How about this?
You fail. I didn’t say there what you are saying I said.
Find a few examples of people who decided they’d rather make less money than pay estate tax. Let’s say George Jefferson is the sole owner of a dry cleaning business that’s valued at $4.5 million. He calculates that, by opening a few new locations, he could raise the value of his business to $6 million. However, that would mean he’d have to pay estate tax when he passes the business on to his son, Lionel. That tax would reduce the gift from $6 million to $5.65 million, were his estate to be taxed at the top rate of 35%. Rather than pay that tax, George decides not to expand his business and stay at $4.5 million.
See if you can find a couple like that.
Also, every now and then when these threads pop up, I dig out the post I made back in 2002, when I did some calculations based on the tax as it was in 1999:
In short, the estate tax only truly affects a tiny fraction of American families, the very super-wealthiest. If you oppose it, you are simply being their tool and buying their snake oil.
The super rich are like Ghadaffy, and Mubarak. Trust them, little one, they will take good care of you. They are benign overlords who just think prosperity should flow down to the little people after the rich take their fair share. They are talented, smart people and deserve first crack. You know they love you.
In the 1970s the super rich Hunt brothers tried to corner the silver market. They came close. If they succeeded I am sure some of you believe they had the best interests of America in mind. We all would have benefited from their trickle down.
I however had money invested in silver. Once they were exposed, I lost 2/3 rds of it.
Made me smile.
On a quick skim of that article, I got the impression it referred to property (e.g. houses) vs. all assets - but I admit I may have missed something.
When we set up our wills, we were advised to use a trust structure. Let’s say the exempt amount is 1 million and I leave a total of 4 million to my spouse. That 3 million gets taxed.
My spouse also has 4 million of his own. When he dies, he’s got something like 8 million. 3 of which have already been taxed (ok, it’s 3 million less the original tax but we’re keeping things simple), so… 1 million is left to the kids free and clear, and the other 7 gets taxed.
With a trust, my spouse gets his million free and clear. Plus his own 4 million. The other 3 (less taxes) is put into a trust - which he can draw upon during his lifetime. When he dies, the trust goes to whomever we designate as the secondary beneficiary(ies). It’s already been taxed, and it isn’t re-taxed because it wasn’t owned directly by my spouse.
Then his own 5 million (the million he got from me, plus his own 4 mil) goes to the kids… 1 million free and clear, 4 million taxed.
So here, we’re taxing a total of 7 million. If we didn’t have the trust, we’d tax 3 million PLUS 7 million.