There may be good arguments for permanently repealing the estate tax, but needing to help family farmers isn’t one of them.
A Congressional Budget Office study determined that with the current exemption level of $1.5 million, only 300 farm estates in 2000 would have owed any taxes, The Washington Post reported. And at the $3.5 million exemption level that takes effect in 2009, only 65 farm estates would have owed any taxes.
Posted by Phillip Brownlee
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17 Comments
Oops, you’re confusing conservatives with facts again. They so want to believe that family farms will be hurt, when in fact, it helps re-distribute the wealth of filthy rich billionaires to the betterment of society.
The conservatives would have us believe that we’d all be better off if Paris Hilton got more money.
“Trickle down” economics is like feeding the sparrows by running the oats through a Budweiser Clydsdale first.
I beleive the estate tax is pretty bad, but Family Farms are far from being poor. Especially out in Western Kansas. You will be surprised many of them make over $20,000 a month.
I don’t know any family farms who make $20,000/month. Only the huge corporate farms that have taken over the small family farms would fit into that category.
The repeal of the Estate tax must be repealed. The arguement that it saves “family farms ” is fallacious. My Grandfather had a 100 acre farm. There were no estate taxes on it when he died. In fact, the estate or ( as Republicans deceitfully call it, the “death tax”) assessed taxes only on estates exceeding 5 million dollars in value. Hardly the province of small farms or buisiness.The repeal of the estate tax only continues to support the growing disparity between the very wealthy few, and everyone else.
And giving that money to the government solves that disparity?
Go back to reading your communist manifesto.
Estate taxes keep all the money and property from being concentrated in the hands of a few. Estate taxes didn’t develop in a vacuum, there was a reason, a threat, that caused them to come about in the first place.We can thank the Republicans for unleashing the Robber Barons on us again.
No! It has nothing to do with distrubting wealth from the hands of a very few. It has everything to do with envy! People envy successful wealthy people, and therefore it is easy to tax them because they deserve it and they want some of it.
If Liberals really had their way, there wouldn’t be a millionaire in America.
The threat is, that envyous people hate wealthy people. I believe if you make a lot of money you should keep it and pass it down to your hiers if you want to.
Anyways! I believe the death tax will be phased out by 2010 or something like that. That’s a good thing.
Gentle people,
It’s not just ‘family farms’ that are effected by the estate tax. I know of several small businesses that because of various assets that have appreciated over the years had to be sold by the heirs to pay the estate taxes when the parents died.
It’s not uncommon for a business that has a paper (taxable) value to be quite a bit more than what can actually be recieve for that property in a sale brought on by the requirement to pay the estate taxes.
Its a shame that somebody that has worked all of his life to build up a business doesn’t have the ability to pass it on to his heirs just because of the estate tax.
In many cases the government is killing the goose that lays the golden egg. When a business is broke up and sold for estate taxes, all of the income taxes that would have been paid by that business over the following years is lost. Employees lose their jobs and that has a detrimental effect on the whole economy.There are many economists that think the estate tax actually costs the government revenues in the long run. So why have it? Its nothing more than the liberals using class envy to get votes.
Hank
I will post again that the estate tax was only assessed on estates exceeding 5 million dollars in value. If the heirs (or their easily hired lawyers and financial consultants) of such an estate claim they cannot manage assets in excess of 5 million dollars without “closing business” “firing people” or “selling the farm” then such folks are either dishonest or incompetent.The result of laisez-faire capitlaism, when made generational, is feudalism.
5 million is real easy to get to when you have a business and a farm. It is a real low number as far as value of estates are concerned.
Yeah! It might not effect a Beauty Salon or a Pedicure Salon, but a small machine shop that is family owned will be in the $5 million + range easy.
OMG! I own a small machine shop. I’m doomed!
And again I say that if the heirs of any estate in excess of 5 million dollars cannot manage the taxes and survive then they are either foolish or greedy.
And again I say that if the heirs of any estate in excess of 5 million dollars cannot manage the taxes and survive then they are either foolish or greedy.
JR You have to understand business and estates
Lets say you have a machine shop business and a nice home with total assets worth $6 million dollars. The business after expenses makes about $15,000 a year in profit. Lets say after a accumulation of so many years, the person who owns the business manages to have around $200,000 in cash savings.
That person dies. Estate taxes are around 50%. So they assess the value of his estate at $6 million, minus deductions, $10,000 gift contributions, and etc. Finally arriving at $5 millions. $2.5 million is owed to the government. But the person only left $200,000. So the family has to sell the machine shop in order to pay for the taxes.
It happens all the time. It is not a rare occurance or happens to less than 1% of the population. Go ask an Estate Lawyer how many estates, business, and etc.. Had to be sold because of the death tax.
It’s just another liberal tax to keep people poor and to punish somebody success, sweat and tears in life.
That is why it is being phased out by 2010.
Joe, you are better spoken then most of the cons in here. I have noticed you take issue with them on more than a few occasions.There may be a bit of truth in what you post. But I maintain that without an estate tax and a progressive income tax, the wealth of this nation (already concentrated among less than 5 % of the population) will continue to accumulate to those who have itat the expense of those who do not. One need look no further than the growing numbers faced with the alternative minimum tax to see this.I think we agree on one thing Joe. Wealth tends to accumulate. You argue it accumulates to those who work hard. I argue it accumulates to those who work others hard and exploit them. In any case wealth accumulates. And the accumulation of the wealth to the few is not healthy for democracy ( those who have the gold make the rules) economy (”I must pay my workers enough that they can afford to buy my product”…. Henry Ford) or freedom.
JR you are right. You cannot get rid of the middle class, it will colaspe the economy.
Smart business men, smart governments, and smart large corporations know this. More than 90% of products and services that are produced, distributed, and provides are all geared towards middle class consumption and use. Without the middle class, all of it goes away. No more tv’s, magazine, newspapers, restaraunts, automobiles, cell phones, books, and anything else you can think about if majority of people become too poor to afford discrecanary consumption.
But Joe we ARE getting rid of the middle class.Manufacturing and union jobs are being eliminated and outsourced, not because they are not economical; but because they are not economical to the bottomline of the CEO and the INVESTOR class! The long term health of the economy and the nation is being sacrificed for the short term gain of the few.