ninme

The Times - The year of the Paris Hilton tax
LA Notebook: America’s estate tax will leave the rich watching their backs, by Chris Ayres

I say bizarre because this 45 per cent tax, levied against estates worth more than $2 million, will be repealed in 2010 - when President Bush’s tax-cutting legislation expires - only to be reintroduced precisely one year later with the exemption halved to $1 million and the rate increased to 55 per cent. In other words, if your parents are rich and alive, 2010 would be an excellent time to consider double murder. Indeed, your accountant might recommend it.

Of course, Uncle Hubert doesn’t seriously think his life is at risk from my wife’s cousins. But I can understand why he’s concerned. Ten years ago, having a $1 million estate made you rich. These days, having a $1 million estate means you bought a house before the property bubble. In California, for example, it is estimated that there are now almost 500,000 “millionaire households”. No wonder Obama - who opposes a permanent repeal of the estate tax, on the ground that it would benefit Hilton - lost the Democratic primary election here.

Then again, there are plenty of Americans who think that the likes of Uncle Hubert should shut up and hand over their wallets: Americans such as William H. Gates III, for example, whose $58 billion estate will be a mere $57,999,000,000 over the 2011 estate tax exemption, meaning that his children will be liable for a theoretical $31,899,450,000 tax bill, which will have to be paid in cash, as is always the case with the federal government. The Bill is theoretical because Gates… is trying extremely hard to give away his fortune before he ascends to the Great Control Panel in the Sky.

Heh.

So, I’ve managed to glean another little tidbit of information about how the world works in the past couple of months: Apparently, if you sell a house, but don’t buy a new one, or else do buy a new one but buy it in rural Wisconsin and therefore profit off of your original sale, you have to pay taxes on it. I think that’s what “Capital Gains Tax” is (pretty good of me to figure that out, huh? I’m like a detective or sumfin.) So I don’t get why no one’s suggested that the value of the home not be counted as inheritence if it isn’t sold. I mean, if someone were to inherit a home in certain parts of California that they grew up in and wanted to keep then they could keep it, but if they sold it off and spent the million or two cruising the Mediterranean and laughing at poor people, they could pay taxes on it. Which they do anyway. Therefore: no need for the inheritance tax. Since, really, anyone who leaves a million bucks in cash lying around is going to have a trust set up somehow that it wouldn’t be taxed anyway meaning that people who grew up in certain parts of California — and there’s a heck of a lot of them — are going to be the only ones getting screwed here and meanwhile it’s going to do all that detrimental stuff to the development of communities and cities that I’m always banging on about.