For those of you who think the tax cut was only for the rich.

That's better, Refman. I don't agree with you (see below), but at least it's defensible. The poor family losing the family farm was silly. You have an argument. You don't need to resort to heartstrings. 1,400's a lot, it's a little. What's enough for it to matter? How many people have died on death row for crimes they didn't commit? Is that number good enough to abolish the death penalty? How many lost on Enron and other corporate fraud? Everyone says it's a small percentage of our workforce and investors. How many Catholic priests molest kids? It's a small percentage. How many cops are bad cops? How many bad arrests with people go to jail or to death for things they didn't do? Not VERY many, right? Yes, 1,400's a lot. But it's 1% or less. This is a rich man's problem. You can't dress it up as a poor man's problem based on 1%. Even if it's 1,400.

Now tell me where you're gonna replace the 27 million in the budget. Disallowed answers: cutting pork, cutting unspecific "wasteful" spending, and (worst of all) deficit spending's good for the economy and tax cuts increase tax revenues.

Tonight's thread reminds me of something J. Brown used to say back in 92, in defense of mandating a living wage. It went something like, we tried trickle down economics and it created a huge deficit and high unemployment. Why don't we try percolate up economics for a change?

I think it's disgraceful that someone builds a company ground up, gets taxed on and then their assets are taxed again when they die. I think it's much more disgraceful that people work hard for less than $6 an hour, or that they can't afford health care or that classes are overcrowded or that there are so many homeless or unemployed. Sorry. Rich daddy's poor little rich boy is not a priority to me. If he is to you, I ask again: where are you gonna get the 27 million?

 

Ref: better and better. I might do that trade. I doubt the Republicans would. And I know their money wouldn't. I'm guessing most of them would rather have their money while they're alive. Plus it kind of blows a hole in the fallacy about how corporate welfare reduces unemployment, raises wages and benefits and all that other voodoo. But if rebates to corporations are even to the estate tax, I don't much care either way. Trader_Jorge?

In fact, if we could save 27 mil on corporate welfare that easy, why not leave out the 1% who actually FEEL the estate tax and spend the other 25+ mil on something like health care or education or housing the homeless? Bill Hicks had a bit about smart bomb technology. He asked, "Couldn't we conceivably use this technology to shoot food at hungry people?"

You're not gonna get that first 27 from corporations, but I appreciate the reasonable response.

 

Why?

Corporate taxes are really consumption taxes.

Every dollar that business is taxed is passed on to consumers. If you really would like to see how much money we pay in taxes, then tax business ZERO.

 

See, here's what I don't get. How's it that when we tax corporations it's passed on to consumers, when we cut corporate taxes the money supposedly trickles down and yet no president has any effect on the economy? It's spin. Like it all is. Deficit spending and cutting corporate taxes is good for the economy if we have billions of "points of light" -- not "a thousand." The last time we indulged trickle down theory so intensely we had a thousand golden parachutes instead.

 

Exactly my point about trickle down economics, Refman. Curious though that you would still support protecting the full inheritance that obviously super rich contractor will leave to his progeny at the prospective expense of a better public transportation or freeway system.

 

You suggested before that he was becoming unreasonably wealthy, and would be sending his kids to Vassar forever. I just found it strange in light of the debate. There will be wasteful government spending until the public gets wise. And that will never happen. Before 9/11, many senior military personnel advocated cuts in military spending, agreeing that a good lot of it was being spent on obsolute weaponry and really only existed to maintain a military job-base (or, in certain cases, downright local pork -- again, from both parties). This kind of stuff will happen again and again until people actually pay attention to the political process. I'm not holding my breath.

 

Here's your key.

 

Ref,

One quick point - about the example I gave - it is going on now, so I do not see how the gov has sealed up the loopholes. I believe that you know more about this area than I do, but perhaps there are still ways to manipulate the system if one can hire the right lawyers?

 

I'm against the elimination of estate taxes for the following reasons:

1. It allows capital and control to accumulate based on heredity rather than hard work and ingenuity. Here's how Warren Buffet put it: "We have come closer to a true meritocracy than anywhere else in the world. You have mobility so people with talents can be put to the best use. Without the estate tax, you in effect will have an aristocracy of wealth, which means you pass down the ability to command resources of the nation based on heredity rather than merit." C'mon, we're not Britain, we're the USA! If we pushed through laws that encouraged a landed aristocracy we're betraying the ideals of our revolution and the essence of our economic and political system that have developed over the last 225 years. Thanks, but I'll pass on adding more idle rich to our society.

2. If you eliminate the estate tax, there's no reason to try to get around it. This will leave charities and educational institutions hurting, as they are the primary beneficiaries of reductions of estate wealth. In general, the wealthy will just hang on to what they have. And then there are the moral issues, as even Andrew Carnegie said, "he who dies rich dies in disgrace."

3. You may have earned the wealth and you may have paid taxes, but when you die and pass it on, the people you pass it to did not earn it. I have no problem asking inheritors to pay taxes on money that is new to them. After all, we ask lottery winners to pay taxes--is there a substantive difference other than one usually lives in a trailer and the other summers in Europe? The double taxation argument doesn't hold water.

4. Whatever problems there are can be fixed with reform, not repeal. One of the great rhetorical victories in the last half-century is large capital tying itself to "family and small business." Americans have long had an aversion to the concentration of wealth, because at some level most of us recognize that it can endanger democracy. By trotting out the family farm image, the inherent distrust of the policy is minimized. If family farms are really a problem, write in an exemption for them, don't scrap the whole thing.

 

So you'd prefer to create more idle poor to the society?


sorry. couldn't resist.

carry on.

 

I'm not rimrocker, but I would actually agree to the extent that estate tax is not "fair" in an objective sense. For me, however, (a guy with slightly socialist leanings), it is even more distasteful to have such incredibly stark allocations of wealth in this country. While it's not fair, I am all for redistributing wealth, especially in this relatively minor way that will not hurt the standard of living for the inheriting family in any appreciable way.

If a wealthy fellow purchases one fewer Jag or one fewer Rangerover after inheriting dad's millions, even if it's not fair, I say boo-freakin-hoo. I don't think it will convince you, Ref, but it's an explanation of the principle a few of us hold dear.

 

Kind of an aside issue....

Since you are required to pay taxes on the home you own, is it really home ownership? Seems more like a lease to me.

 

I don't think so. You pay tax on a can of coke too, but you definitely own it, as much as you own anything.

Ref, I really hear you. I'm starting to think that, if and when I have a kid, I will revisit these convictions. I'm not wealthy either, but I do stand to inherit a bit of money (NOT extra-Jaguar style cash ). And as far as that goes, I'm willing to let that be taxed, when that sad day shows up. Now that I think about it, I have to admit that my parents think it totally stinks though (the inheritance tax, not that I will inherit some money). They're with you on this issue, and their indolent, commie son is not.

 

I think we should only have to pay for what we use. As we are all protected without question by the police, fire, and military, we should all have to pay into those agencies. We all should also have to pay for the IRS, as much as most people dislike it. Pretty much everythiong else could be on a pay as you go basis, as far as I am concerned. Roads can have toll booths, schools can charge tuition, etc. A small miscellaneous tax could be levied to pay for any incidental expenses that come up. All other taxes are phased out once the debt is eliminated (that means no more buying treasury notes).