Those who support abolishing the estate tax, please answer me this: Why should the government have the right to tax that for which I have worked and not that which someone has received and not earned at all? In short, why are federal income and payroll taxes MORE JUSTIFIABLE than estate tax? Of course, I'd like to pay NO taxes, but that is unreasonable. Taxes have to be paid by someone. Why not those who received assets they did not earn, leaving those who actually earned the assets able to pay less in tax?
That's the present day equivalent of "a chicken in every pot". We may find out soon whether FDR really did anything other than prolong the pain in the 30's since his current disciple is leading us down the same path to ruin only on steroids this time....
I hate to say it but good one. Bothered me too although I'd certainly prefer McCain's non-private sector experience to Obama's lack of ANY real experience.....
I will say it here as well, Obama broke the two cardinal rules last night when speaking and trying to instill confidence in the markets. First off he said "Increase regulation," second off he said "Increase taxes," I can not believe the dumb fuck writing his speeches did not see what was coming today after saying that. Today was a short squeeze, at the close, FOLLOWED BY A BOLD STATEMENT BY SELLERS we are going into lower lows. Say what you want about Bush, but when he spoke the markets went higher. All these people eating Obama up just love the fact that he is good at DELIVERING a speech, not at making one.
If he gave the markets confidence atleast we would have seen a rally today, but now since the market is down even more they will just throw another couple trillion at the problem, way better decision in my opinion. If you think a 5-6% up move today would not have made a difference you need to give your head a shake, we are at the point of no return right now. 5-6% up would have caused some short covering based on the support holding. and it might have went another 10-20% as it stands we are in free fall mode. next stop 500. What do you think was the point of all of the Bernanke and Obama talk last couple days?
Hey Synic, I don't think that we should totally abolish the death tax, but it really does need retooling. I did a fairly large report on it in college and I am trying to remember the ins and outs. (It has been a while so I could be wrong) From what I remember the tax itself gets lower and lower until 2010 when there is no tax, and then in 2011 it sunsets back to original 45 percent levels right? A simple argument that I can make is for the farmers and ranchers. A family farm or ranch requires a lot of work from everybody. So it's not as if the kids are just being handed 20 million cash. It could be very large paper wealth, but not liquid in the least. There are ways to delay the onset of this tax, through trust creation or creating joint tenants with rights of survivorship. But the ta eventually has to be paid. Financial planning is a must, one thing I have personally seen was life insurance. Imagine a 1,000,000 cash policy on an 80 year old woman. It was akin to making another house payment. Sure the estate tax does have a place, but people that often get caught up in it are people that do have a lot of physical assets and not a lot of cash. Sure they maybe should have planned better but c'est la vie. All I really gave you was anecdotal, and a very very small percentage of the population out there are farmers or ranchers. But over a lifetime making wise business decisions and working hard it certainly is doable to build up a 3500 acre ranch. That easily will put you over t he threshhold for that huge tax. Then what? Ruin your land and develop it into 5 acre parcels? Sadly that is what it comes to a lot.