[Fiddlerdave]

Republicans want death tax repealed to avoid causing murder
Just when you think Republicans cannot be any more selvish or avaristic, they show even more venality!

The inheritance tax, non-existent for this one current year, will return after Jan 1, 2011 to its level of a decade ago.

Watch here as Republican Congressman Steve King says we must pass the Estate Tax repeal BEFORE the end of the year, because people will be wondering whether to continue life support on their parents!

Essentially, he says the evil Democrats, by NOT passing repeal of the inheritance tax, will be apparently FORCING the wealthy to pull the plug on mom or dad and kill them, rather than keep them alive into a year where part of their money over multi-million exemption may be taxed and thus reduce the boodle these worthless wealthy welfare children will inherit from the hard-working parent!

Dad dying Jan 1, 2011 instead of Dec. 31, 2010, could mean they only inherit maybe a measly $15 million instead of $20 million!

An unbelievable mentality of sanctioning causing a parent's death to preserve inheritance cash!

Go to minute 2:35.

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/21134540/vp/40485147#40485147

[quote=Congressman King, R-Iowa]"and I am worried about the estate tax too - there will be people on their deathbed watching at midnight wondering if they should put their loved one on life support because we didn't pass estate tax [repeal] today!"[/quote]

[Sixstrings]

[quote=Congressman, King R Iowa]"and I am worried about the estate tax too - there will be people on their deathbed watching at midnight wondering if they should put their loved one on life support because we didn't pass estate tax [repeal] today!"

He might be right. BUT.. giving rich folks their tax cut right-now-right-this-second-or-they'll-pull-the-plug-on-grandma isn't the solution.

There should be a public health warning to doctors about any pulling of plugs right before a tax hike. Oh by the way, the rich are also threatening to crash the stock market if they don't get their cut:

Delaying Tax Vote Could Crash Stock Market
http://politics.usnews.com/news/blogs/washington-whispers/2010/12/2/delaying-tax-vote-could-crash-stock-market.html

[Cog]

I see no legitimate reason for the government to tax estates. Taxes have already been paid on the money earned that constitute them and it simply amount to governmental grave-robbing.

[Fiddlerdave]

I see no legitimate reason for the government to tax estates. Taxes have already been paid on the money earned that constitute them and it simply amount to governmental grave-robbing.

:lol: Taxes have often not been paid on much of the money, the wealthy's estates often consist of unrealized capital gains that simply "poof" disappears for the newly made wealthy welfare slobs who get the loot. Taxes are NEVER paid on this money.

Why don;t Americans want to save rich kids from the moral degeneration caused by getting a free money and a free ride, in the same way that they say poorer people are! I certainly have known plenty of inherited wealth slob incompetents.

Look at this thread. My POINT was that many people, apparently yourself included, think it is hunky-dory to kill mom and dad in order to prevent the government from getting some of YOUR loot.

[Cog]

Look at this thread. My POINT was that many people, apparently yourself included, think it is hunky-dory to kill mom and dad in order to prevent the government from getting some of YOUR loot.

Care to show where I said it was ok to kill mom and dad. Strawman.

If you don't like the way tax policy is conducted in this country about protecting wealth, you are at liberty to elect those who want to confiscate said wealth. But wait, the midterms have already spoken on that issue haven't they?

[Lore]

If the rich were all more like Warren Buffet, they could say here kid, here’s your one million in advance, have a nice day. The rest will be gone when I’m dead.

[vision-master]

Essentially, he says the evil Democrats, by NOT passing repeal of the inheritance tax, will be apparently FORCING the wealthy to pull the plug on mom or dad and kill them, rather than keep them alive into a year where part of their money over multi-million exemption may be taxed and thus reduce the boodle these worthless wealthy welfare children will inherit from the hard-working parent!

ppl can now fill out a 'file of life' document. My mother filled one out awhile before her death. She was not hooked up while on her death bed.

[careinke]

<sarcasm on>
Yes, we need to reinstate the death tax! How else are we going to finish the job of eliminating those pesky inefficient family farms and businesses. I can't wait till the big box stores and industrial Agriculture are the only game in town. Since corporations don't die, (unless they are already broke), it should give those nice folks at Conagra, ADM and Walmart a nice advantage.
<Sarcasom off>

[Pretorian]

I see no legitimate reason for the government to tax estates. Taxes have already been paid on the money earned that constitute them and it simply amount to governmental grave-robbing.

I doubt you will see a legitimate reason for any taxes-- except those that are collected to pay YOU.
Don't sweat it, consider it to be an enthropy kick.

[Pretorian]

If the rich were all more like Warren Buffet, they could say here kid, here’s your one million in advance, have a nice day. The rest will be gone when I’m dead.

Gone to whom? Warren Buffet is an idiot who didnt play enough Monopoly as a kid. What good did this wealth brought to him? Virtually disowned kids, no personal passion or cause. No life. He could have played Monopoly game all his life with the same result-- a 200k house, cherry coke and a small steak on weekends. Oh wait, but he did.

[vtsnowedin]

I'm not a fan of raising tax rates past 33%. That is more then enough. But I think it is well past time to clean up the tax code to eliminate all these special deals the rich use to avoid taxes. The estate tax should be used to audit the deceased' taxes and make sure that all income is taxed at the appropriate rate one time and one time only before it is passed on to any one or any foundation/trust/ charity/ generation skipping trust fund or any other dodgy creation of congress. This would include contributions to political campaigns.

[Ludi]

In many cases it's easy to avoid estate taxes - the person can gift the estate to various relatives and friends over the course of many years, or sets up trusts, etc.

http://www.irs.gov/businesses/small/art ... 39,00.html

People who would prefer not to live in feudal states should be in favor of estate taxes as the purpose of them is to try to avoid a wealthy gentry class. But I have noticed many of the people screaming the loudest about "freedom" in the USA seem quite happy to support a small minority of outrageously wealthy people. In fact, the more conservative people are, the more they fight to preserve the wealthy against the working class and poor.

Welcome to Neo-feudalism.

http://www.lcurve.org/LCurveVideo.htm

[Sixstrings]

In many cases it's easy to avoid estate taxes - the person can gift the estate to various relatives and friends over the course of many years, or sets up trusts, etc.

Good point. I don't know why this is even an issue, since wealthy folks do estate planning anyhow, not old school inheritance.

[Ludi]

In many cases it's easy to avoid estate taxes - the person can gift the estate to various relatives and friends over the course of many years, or sets up trusts, etc.

Good point. I don't know why this is even an issue, since wealthy folks do estate planning anyhow, not old school inheritance.

It's an issue for like 1% of the population, whom we are apparently supposed to worry about more than any other percentage of the population (like, say, all those unemployed people). No matter what, apparently we're supposed to worry about and protect this tiny but super-powerful segment of the population, at least if we're patriots.

[careinke]

In many cases it's easy to avoid estate taxes - the person can gift the estate to various relatives and friends over the course of many years, or sets up trusts, etc.

Good point. I don't know why this is even an issue, since wealthy folks do estate planning anyhow, not old school inheritance.

It's an issue for like 1% of the population, whom we are apparently supposed to worry about more than any other percentage of the population (like, say, all those unemployed people). No matter what, apparently we're supposed to worry about and protect this tiny but super-powerful segment of the population, at least if we're patriots.

So what percentage of the population should a group be before they are worth caring about?

[Sixstrings]

So what percentage of the population should a group be before they are worth caring about?

Gee you're right, the top 1% are such an oppressed minority.. us lower 99% should be ashamed of ourselves.

[Fiddlerdave]

In many cases it's easy to avoid estate taxes - the person can gift the estate to various relatives and friends over the course of many years, or sets up trusts, etc.

Good point. I don't know why this is even an issue, since wealthy folks do estate planning anyhow, not old school inheritance.

It's an issue for like 1% of the population, whom we are apparently supposed to worry about more than any other percentage of the population (like, say, all those unemployed people). No matter what, apparently we're supposed to worry about and protect this tiny but super-powerful segment of the population, at least if we're patriots.

So what percentage of the population should a group be before they are worth caring about?

The issue was not one of caring about the wealthy.

The issue is that this Republican claims the wealthy are being forced into considering killing their elderly in order to enhance their inheritance because we haven't ended the taxes before the end of the year. Apparently, if we end the inheritance tax, the wealthy will not be forced into murder in order to increase their cash income.

I know I am odd, but I think there was a day that kind of an act was considered morally wrong for ANY amount of money, for any member of society.

[Oakley]

If I were being kept alive by life support, and was in such bad shape that my loved ones were considering pulling the plug, you could bet I would be cheering them along to do so before December 31 to avoid a big chunk of estate tax being taken by the federal government.

Many people have acquired wealth by honest competition and not by government rigging the economy in their favor, and own what they have accumulated. Some stranger does not have a right to take that wealth, as much as they might covet it. One man sticks a gun in your ribs and demands your money, and that is theft. A gang sticks their guns in your ribs and demands your money and that is theft. If the gang calls themselves government it makes no matter; it is still theft, and when it is government it is even more despicable because the people demanding the money be taken don't even have the guts to do the theft themselves, but rather rely upon government agents, and even come up with a attitude of moral superiority to justify their immoral demands.

[Fiddlerdave]

If I were being kept alive by life support, and was in such bad shape that my loved ones were considering pulling the plug, you could bet I would be cheering them along to do so before December 31 to avoid a big chunk of estate tax being taken by the federal government.

Many would agree.

But your example is about you pulling your OWN plug.

But the Congressman's motivational example was about you pulling your "loved one's" plug for extra money! Can any "good Christians" ethicist divine the distinction in these two different acts?

[Outcast_Searcher]

People who would prefer not to live in feudal states should be in favor of estate taxes as the purpose of them is to try to avoid a wealthy gentry class.

Ludi, this seems like the only legitimate use of the estate tax to me, considering (stupid and exemption-filled as they are), income taxes have been levied on rich persons' incomes already, all their lives.

I didn't see anything on this thread about the likely compromise many think is likely to be reached (source - recent hardcopy WSJ artices) -- roughly a $3.5 million exemption per estate, and a 45% rate (this is the most common set of numbers I see -- I saw an alternative of a $5.5 million exemption and a 35% rate on CSPAN as a possible alternative yesterday). This is what I saw Warren Buffett propose on CSPAN a couple years ago, and seems like a "reasonable" compromise to me (BUT, it lets the wealthy gentry class live on).

SO:

What I'm surprised at is that I don't see a proposed multi-rate proposal which would let people keep family farms and small businesses built over a lifetime of work, but heavily tax the deci-millionaires' and expecially billionaires' estates to keep super-rich families from passing on their (unearned) wealth for many generations. (Thus ENDING the long-term gentry class / family dynasties).

So you could have something like the $3.5 million exemption, and index that to inflation. Then you could have an initial estate tax rate of something like 30% up to say $10 million. Then you could have a moderate rate of something like 50% up to say $25 million -- or to $X million per family member, or something.
ALL of this needs to be indexed to inflation, by the way. Then you could have a really high rate to prevent the passing along of MAJOR unearned wealth -- something like say 90%.

I'm sure the entire GOP will be screaming at me for this, but IF you coupled this with a fairly low/reasonable federal income tax rate on ALL income (say no more than 25% with only a standard $40,000 or $50,000 standard deduction, indexed to inflation) -- it would make the whole system simpler, fairer, and FAR more comprehensible. It would also prevent dynasties like the Kennedy's for persisting for more than 2 (or at most 3) generations on unearned wealth.
It would make the IRS's life so simple that they could actually spend time going after the major tax cheats and complex business tax audits.

And, it would eliminate the need for giant herds of lawyers and tax preparers -- always a good thing, IMO.

I would hope this could be a compromise that most fair minded people, right or left, could live with.

But, given the political reality we live in -- let the flames begin.