The Clintons & The Estate Tax

[Zam-Zam]

Via CBS News:


Estate tax champions Bill and Hillary Clinton are doing just about everything in their power to stave off hefty estate taxes on their own personal fortune, according to Bloomberg News.

The report out Tuesday shows that the two heads of the political dynasty have been seizing on legal but slippery loopholes to minimize taxes on inherited wealth - maneuvers not atypical of multimillionaires but which will inevitably drum up cries of hypocrisy based on the Clintons' active support for the estate tax in the past.

Bloomberg cites county property records that show the Clintons divided ownership of their New York home into separate 50 percent shares, then placed those shares into trusts. The moves ensure that any growth in the house's value will occur outside their estate and that they can claim a discounted value for the home, which could save the Clintons hundreds of thousands in estate tax avoidance.

http://www.cbsnews.com/news/after-touting-estate-tax-bill-and-hillary-clinton-seize-on-loopholes/


"Do as I say, not as I do".......Well, the Clintons certainly aren't the only politicians who behave this way. This may dampen the spirits of the few who think their particular heroes are somehow above it all, but I think most people won't be the least bit surprised by this.

 

[ITALIA]

Via CBS News:

Estate tax champions Bill and Hillary Clinton are doing just about everything in their power to stave off hefty estate taxes on their own personal fortune, according to Bloomberg News.

The report out Tuesday shows that the two heads of the political dynasty have been seizing on legal but slippery loopholes to minimize taxes on inherited wealth - maneuvers not atypical of multimillionaires but which will inevitably drum up cries of hypocrisy based on the Clintons' active support for the estate tax in the past.

Bloomberg cites county property records that show the Clintons divided ownership of their New York home into separate 50 percent shares, then placed those shares into trusts. The moves ensure that any growth in the house's value will occur outside their estate and that they can claim a discounted value for the home, which could save the Clintons hundreds of thousands in estate tax avoidance.

http://www.cbsnews.com/news/after-touting-estate-tax-bill-and-hillary-clinton-seize-on-loopholes/


"Do as I say, not as I do".......Well, the Clintons certainly aren't the only politicians who behave this way. This may dampen the spirits of the few who think their particular heroes are somehow above it all, but I think most people won't be the least bit surprised by this.

Note the word legal. It is not unusual to be for or against a particular law or rule but that is no reason for a person to not use the rules or laws in force at the time as their lawyers advice them. We are a country of laws after all aren't we?

 

[Craig]

Via CBS News:

Estate tax champions Bill and Hillary Clinton are doing just about everything in their power to stave off hefty estate taxes on their own personal fortune, according to Bloomberg News.

The report out Tuesday shows that the two heads of the political dynasty have been seizing on legal but slippery loopholes to minimize taxes on inherited wealth - maneuvers not atypical of multimillionaires but which will inevitably drum up cries of hypocrisy based on the Clintons' active support for the estate tax in the past.

Bloomberg cites county property records that show the Clintons divided ownership of their New York home into separate 50 percent shares, then placed those shares into trusts. The moves ensure that any growth in the house's value will occur outside their estate and that they can claim a discounted value for the home, which could save the Clintons hundreds of thousands in estate tax avoidance.

http://www.cbsnews.com/news/after-touting-estate-tax-bill-and-hillary-clinton-seize-on-loopholes/


"Do as I say, not as I do".......Well, the Clintons certainly aren't the only politicians who behave this way. This may dampen the spirits of the few who think their particular heroes are somehow above it all, but I think most people won't be the least bit surprised by this.

I'm not surprised.

I have always argued that the folks who got "screwed" by the estate tax were squabbling families who couldn't get along. There are so many ways to avoid the estate tax, only those who fail to get legal counsel lose any appreciable pass along wealth.

They are both lawyers, so why wouldn't they apply the law to the best of their advantage?

I will say, that is too many trusts. That's a bad law they are taking advantage of.

 

[Dawg]

I'm not surprised.

I have always argued that the folks who got "screwed" by the estate tax were squabbling families who couldn't get along. There are so many ways to avoid the estate tax, only those who fail to get legal counsel lose any appreciable pass along wealth.

They are both lawyers, so why wouldn't they apply the law to the best of their advantage?

I will say, that is too many trusts. That's a bad law they are taking advantage of.

seems you libs cried a different tone when Romney ran for POTUS
typical liberal hypocrisy at it's finest...........

 

[Craig]

seems you libs cried a different tone when Romney ran for POTUS
typical liberal hypocrisy at it's finest...........

I don't know about other "libs".

I have always made the same argument. The estate tax doesn't affect many people. Business and farms do not get eaten up by it...unless there is a family squabble and the folks involved fail to take advantage of all the loopholes and legal action possible.

 

[Arkady]

Via CBS News:

Estate tax champions Bill and Hillary Clinton are doing just about everything in their power to stave off hefty estate taxes on their own personal fortune, according to Bloomberg News.

The report out Tuesday shows that the two heads of the political dynasty have been seizing on legal but slippery loopholes to minimize taxes on inherited wealth - maneuvers not atypical of multimillionaires but which will inevitably drum up cries of hypocrisy based on the Clintons' active support for the estate tax in the past.

Bloomberg cites county property records that show the Clintons divided ownership of their New York home into separate 50 percent shares, then placed those shares into trusts. The moves ensure that any growth in the house's value will occur outside their estate and that they can claim a discounted value for the home, which could save the Clintons hundreds of thousands in estate tax avoidance.

http://www.cbsnews.com/news/after-touting-estate-tax-bill-and-hillary-clinton-seize-on-loopholes/


"Do as I say, not as I do".......Well, the Clintons certainly aren't the only politicians who behave this way. This may dampen the spirits of the few who think their particular heroes are somehow above it all, but I think most people won't be the least bit surprised by this.

When I play half-court basketball, I like to play with "losers out" rules. After you make a shot, the other team gets the ball. I find that this rewards more balanced play than "winners out" rules (i.e., "make it, take it"), which allow someone who plays crap defense to get on a roll that keeps that weakness from getting tested. But, when I play a game with "winners out" rules, I do not hand the ball over after I score. It may not be the way I wanted the rules set up, but I'm not going to volunteer, unilaterally, to hand the ball over when I don't have to, out of some fear that a failure to do so will get some halfwit to consider my conduct hypocritical. Regardless of what you think the rules should be, you play by the rules you have, to the best of your ability.

Like pretty much everyone else, I take the same view when it comes to taxes. I favor all sorts of tax changes, like eliminating the cap on Social Security taxes. But that doesn't mean I refuse to take advantage of the rules as they currently stand. I don't "hand the ball over" unless the current rules require me to. I can advocate a reform while continuing to take advantage of the rule I disapprove of until such time as the rule is changed for everyone. And the Clintons are no different. If they fought to keep rules in place that lower the effective estate tax, I'd fault them for that. But I don't fault them for declining to "hand the ball over" when the rules don't require them to do so.

 

[resident_evil]

Note the word legal. It is not unusual to be for or against a particular law or rule but that is no reason for a person to not use the rules or laws in force at the time as their lawyers advice them. We are a country of laws after all aren't we?

And you didn't mock Tea Partiers who didn't want their Social Security or Medicare touched while they were claiming spending was out of control? lol

 

[resident_evil]

When I play half-court basketball, I like to play with "losers out" rules. After you make a shot, the other team gets the ball. I find that this rewards more balanced play than "winners out" rules (i.e., "make it, take it"), which allow someone who plays crap defense to get on a roll that keeps that weakness from getting tested. But, when I play a game with "winners out" rules, I do not hand the ball over after I score. It may not be the way I wanted the rules set up, but I'm not going to volunteer, unilaterally, to hand the ball over when I don't have to, out of some fear that a failure to do so will get some halfwit to consider my conduct hypocritical. Regardless of what you think the rules should be, you play by the rules you have, to the best of your ability.

Like pretty much everyone else, I take the same view when it comes to taxes. I favor all sorts of tax changes, like eliminating the cap on Social Security taxes. But that doesn't mean I refuse to take advantage of the rules as they currently stand. I don't "hand the ball over" unless the current rules require me to. I can advocate a reform while continuing to take advantage of the rule I disapprove of until such time as the rule is changed for everyone. And the Clintons are no different. If they fought to keep rules in place that lower the effective estate tax, I'd fault them for that. But I don't fault them for declining to "hand the ball over" when the rules don't require them to do so.

There is no moral equivalency between "make it, take it" and wanting to expropriate other people's money to your communist ends. But if there were it would be the lesson to hustle found in "make it, take it" Of course you don't like that.

Fairness is in a flat tax for all as is what is right.

 

[Arkady]

There is no moral equivalency between "make it, take it" and wanting to expropriate other people's money to your communist ends. But if there were it would be the lesson to hustle found in "make it, take it" Of course you don't like that.

Fairness is in a flat tax for all as is what is right.

You've failed to understand. Badly. I'll change the analogy up a bit, to see if that helps. Some people play Monopoly with a slight variation of the rules that says that fees go into a pot, and when you land on Free Parking, you win that pot. I don't like that rule, because the game can go on forever that way. But, when I'm playing a game where it's been decided that's the rule, if I land on Free Parking, I'm going to take that pot, not leave it there for the next guy to take. That has nothing to do with hustle. It's just a recognition that you play by the rules as they stand, whether or not you like those rules, and in the meantime you try to get the rules changed (a fight you'd be less likely to win if you were to unilaterally follow a personally disadvantageous second set of rules).

As for a flat tax, do the math. Any flat tax you can come up with will either vastly expand the deficit, or crush the middle and working classes, or both.

 

[resident_evil]

As for a flat tax, do the math. Any flat tax you can come up with will either vastly expand the deficit, or crush the middle and working classes, or both.

The current tax system is doing the same and gets worse with time.

 

[ITALIA]

And you didn't mock Tea Partiers who didn't want their Social Security or Medicare touched while they were claiming spending was out of control? lol

Don't know what you ever saw about SS but I remember seeing signs like "keep government out of my Medicare". Don't know what your point was supposed to be but that isn't unusual.

 

[Zam-Zam]

Note the word legal. It is not unusual to be for or against a particular law or rule but that is no reason for a person to not use the rules or laws in force at the time as their lawyers advice them. We are a country of laws after all aren't we?

That's correct. Next time a corporation or a wealthy Republican takes advantage of a loophole, you should feel the same way. To not do so would be hypocritical.

 

[Arkady]

The current tax system is doing the same and gets worse with time.

The current tax system is too flat. As such, the middle and working class aren't doing as well as when we had a more progressive system. But they're doing better than they would under a true flat tax.

 

[resident_evil]

The current tax system is too flat. As such, the middle and working class aren't doing as well as when we had a more progressive system. But they're doing better than they would under a true flat tax.

A low flat tax rate would encourage unbridled freedom and self-empowerment. Low income people would make more money from employers simply because they had to pay the taxes they did not have before. Essentially what taxes the lower income people would have to pay would come from their employers. But given that everybody had skin the game government would be more responsive and judicious in the spending of the revenues they received or be answerable to a whole new class of the ownership society.

A low flat tax rate is needed so that government that wants to spend money has to increase the pie with its policies and not redistribute a smaller pie as it sees fit for political power retention.

 

[Zam-Zam]

WASHINGTON — Democratic vice presidential candidate Joe Biden said Thursday that paying more in taxes is the patriotic thing to do for wealthier Americans.....

........"We want to take money and put it back in the pocket of middle-class people," Biden said in an interview on ABC's "Good Morning America."


Noting that wealthier Americans would indeed pay more, Biden said: "It's time to be patriotic ... time to jump in, time to be part of the deal, time to help get America out of the rut."

http://www.nbcnews.com/id/26771716/...ying-higher-taxes-patriotic-act/#.U6Icu7EgvFI


Does this means the Clintons aren't being patriotic?

How about this guy?:

BOSTON (AP) -- Massachusetts Sen. John Kerry is docking his family's new $7 million yacht in neighboring Rhode Island, allowing him to avoid paying roughly $500,000 in taxes to the cash-strapped Bay State.


If the "Isabel" were kept at the 2004 Democratic presidential nominee's summer vacation home on Nantucket, or in Boston Harbor near his city residence, he would be liable for $437,500 in one-time sales tax. He would also have to pay $70,000 in annual excise taxes.

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2010/07/23/john-kerry-saves-500000-b_n_656985.html


Either those wealthier Americans are not being very patriotic, or Joe is wrong.

You all can decide for yourselves.

 

[Arkady]

A low flat tax rate would encourage unbridled freedom and self-empowerment. Low income people would make more money from employers simply because they had to pay the taxes they did not have before. Essentially what taxes the lower income people would have to pay would come from their employers. But given that everybody had skin the game government would be more responsive and judicious in the spending of the revenues they received or be answerable to a whole new class of the ownership society.

A low flat tax rate is needed so that government that wants to spend money has to increase the pie with its policies and not redistribute a smaller pie as it sees fit for political power retention.

First, you're assuming that 100% of the increased tax "cost" would be born on the employer end, and there's no reason to think that. Yes, faced with higher taxes, workers would probably demand higher wages, and since they'd be doing so collectively, wages would probably rise. But, if other examples are any guide, such as the rising cost of private health insurance, employers wouldn't eat the whole thing. It would cut into employees, too. So, people who were already struggling just to get by would face considerably higher costs... and some would face unemployment, if their jobs were no longer worth it to the employer at the new higher cost (if employers took on some of the cost of those tax hikes in the form of having to pay higher wages). You'd push up the poverty rate, and unemployment, and the sociological problems associated with poverty and with high levels of income inequality, along with the deficit. And for what? So some rich people who were already getting richer so fast they were leaving the country behind could get richer even faster than that. What's the point?

As you may or may not be aware, in our nation's economic golden era, we had spectacular GDP growth, massive declines in poverty, sky rocketing median incomes.... and far more progressive tax structure. Back then, the top bracket paid anywhere between 70% and 92% in federal income taxes alone (not even counting payroll taxes and state and local taxes). Why move even farther from what works?

 

[Arkady]

WASHINGTON — Democratic vice presidential candidate Joe Biden said Thursday that paying more in taxes is the patriotic thing to do for wealthier Americans.....
........"We want to take money and put it back in the pocket of middle-class people," Biden said in an interview on ABC's "Good Morning America."

Noting that wealthier Americans would indeed pay more, Biden said: "It's time to be patriotic ... time to jump in, time to be part of the deal, time to help get America out of the rut."

http://www.nbcnews.com/id/26771716/...ying-higher-taxes-patriotic-act/#.U6Icu7EgvFI


Does this means the Clintons aren't being patriotic?

How about this guy?:

BOSTON (AP) -- Massachusetts Sen. John Kerry is docking his family's new $7 million yacht in neighboring Rhode Island, allowing him to avoid paying roughly $500,000 in taxes to the cash-strapped Bay State.

If the "Isabel" were kept at the 2004 Democratic presidential nominee's summer vacation home on Nantucket, or in Boston Harbor near his city residence, he would be liable for $437,500 in one-time sales tax. He would also have to pay $70,000 in annual excise taxes.

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2010/07/23/john-kerry-saves-500000-b_n_656985.html


Either those wealthier Americans are not being very patriotic, or Joe is wrong.

You all can decide for yourselves.

If they oppose tax hikes on the rich, then yes, I would question their patriotism. If, on the other hand, they support improving "the rules of the game," but are merely playing well by the current rules, in the meantime, that's perfectly appropriate.

In fact, you could argue that if you want systematic change, unilateral change is actually counterproductive, in some cases. To go back to an earlier analogy, imagine you're playing Monopoly, and you believe that having "Free Parking" associated with a pot of money is a crappy rule. If you want that rule changed, the last thing you'd do is leave that money in the pot when you land on Free Parking. That just creates a bigger incentive for the other players to preserve the rule you don't like, since it sometimes helps them and never hurts them (since when you land on it, you don't take advantage of it, so the pot just gets bigger for them). You play your best by the current rules, even as you work to change them. To do otherwise just makes the change you want less likely.

It's similar with taxes. If rich liberals pay more than their obligated share of taxes, under the current rules, it merely reduces the political pressure for a systematic change that would cause all rich people to pay more -- rich conservatives get to have their cake and eat it, too (they get the diminished deficits made possible by voluntary overpayment by the liberals, but without having to pay higher taxes themselves). If you want a change to the rules, the last thing you'd do is pay as if the rule had already changed, even as others continue to pay less.

 

[resident_evil]

What's the point?

I repeat:

A low flat tax rate would encourage unbridled freedom and self-empowerment. Low income people would make more money from employers simply because they had to pay the taxes they did not have before. Essentially what taxes the lower income people would have to pay would come from their employers. But given that everybody had skin the game government would be more responsive and judicious in the spending of the revenues they received or be answerable to a whole new class of the ownership society.

A low flat tax rate is needed so that government that wants to spend money has to increase the pie with its policies and not redistribute a smaller pie as it sees fit for political power retention.

You just want the system as it exists so that you can use other people's money to coerce their behavior. In the modern day, with today's technologies, a progressive tax should be a remnant of a bygone era destined for the dust bin of history.

 

[Zam-Zam]

If they oppose tax hikes on the rich, then yes, I would question their patriotism. If, on the other hand, they support improving "the rules of the game," but are merely playing well by the current rules, in the meantime, that's perfectly appropriate.

In fact, you could argue that if you want systematic change, unilateral change is actually counterproductive, in some cases. To go back to an earlier analogy, imagine you're playing Monopoly, and you believe that having "Free Parking" associated with a pot of money is a crappy rule. If you want that rule changed, the last thing you'd do is leave that money in the pot when you land on Free Parking. That just creates a bigger incentive for the other players to preserve the rule you don't like, since it sometimes helps them and never hurts them (since when you land on it, you don't take advantage of it, so the pot just gets bigger for them). You play your best by the current rules, even as you work to change them. To do otherwise just makes the change you want less likely.

It's similar with taxes. If rich liberals pay more than their obligated share of taxes, under the current rules, it merely reduces the political pressure for a systematic change that would cause all rich people to pay more -- rich conservatives get to have their cake and eat it, too (they get the diminished deficits made possible by voluntary overpayment by the liberals, but without having to pay higher taxes themselves). If you want a change to the rules, the last thing you'd do is pay as if the rule had already changed, even as others continue to pay less.

Do as I say, not as I do.

Some people will fall for it.

 

[Arkady]

I repeat:




You just want the system as it exists so that you can use other people's money to coerce their behavior. In the modern day, with today's technologies, a progressive tax should be a remnant of a bygone era destined for the dust bin of history.

I most certainly don't want the system as it exists. As I've said already, our tax system is much too flat. It should be made considerably more progressive, so that it more closely resembles the system we had in our economic golden age.

As for the idea that the government would be more responsive and judicious, I think it would be more responsive and judicious if we had a more progressive tax system, to somewhat equalize after-tax income. Right now the very wealthy have such vast amounts of after-tax income that they can throw around enough to distort government obscenely in their favor, making Washington responsive almost exclusively to their needs. The more wealth gets redistributed up, the worse that will get. Bring us back to something more like the wealth distribution of our economic Golden Age and Washington may again occasionally pay attention to the interests of the masses, not just the oligarchs.