Inheritance Tax Quotes

Nothing is certain but death and taxes.

I am waiting for the meek to be blessed and inherit the earth... without taxes

Jameson, Better the devil you know than the one you don’t—or is it? Power corrupts. Absolute power corrupts absolutely. All that glitters is not gold. Nothing is certain but death and taxes. There but for the grace of God go I. Don’t judge. —Tobias Tattersall Hawthorne

perhaps I possess a certain Midwestern sensibility that I inherited from my mother and her parents, a sensibility that Warren Buffet seems to share: that at a certain point one has enough, that you can derive as much pleasure from a Picasso hanging in a museum as from one that's hanging in your den, that you can get an awfully good meal in a restaurant for less than twenty dollars, and that once your drapes cost more than the average American's yearly salary, then you can afford to pay a bit more in taxes.

This is the true inheritance tax of life. Behaviours and habits, ingrained, your own but not your own, a duty on your existence, a tariff to be levied on those who try to love you.

I always knew you had good taste, Mia. You should go talk to him.” “I should go talk to him. I should also file my taxes on time, remember to floss regularly, and inherit seven million dollars. But I won’t. Ever.

Your letter is written in proverbs,” I said, starting with the obvious. “All that glitters is not gold. Absolute power corrupts absolutely. He’s saying that money and power are dangerous. And the first line—better the devil you know than the one you don’t—or is it?—that’s obvious, right?” His family was the devil that Tobias Hawthorne had known—and I was the devil he hadn’t. But if that’s true—why me? If I was a stranger, how had he chosen me? A dart on a map? Max’s imaginary computer algorithm? And if I was a stranger—why was he sorry? “Keep going,” Jameson prompted. I focused. “Nothing is certain but death and taxes. It sounds to me like he knew he was going to die.” “We didn’t even know he was sick,” Jameson murmured. That hit close to home.

Among other strategies, he set up a “charitable lead trust” that enabled him to pass on his estate to his sons without inheritance taxes, so long as the sons donated the accruing interest on the principal to charity for twenty years. To maximize their self-interest, in other words, the Koch boys were compelled to be charitable. Tax avoidance was thus the original impetus for the Koch brothers’ extraordinary philanthropy. As David Koch later explained, “So for 20 years, I had to give away all that income, and I sort of got into it.

Holly inherited half a million dollars. Less after taxes, of course,

We still own 38 percent of the company’s stock today, which is an unusually large stake for anyone to hold in an outfit the size of Wal-Mart, and that’s the best protection there is against the takeover raiders. It’s something that any family who has faith in its strength as a unit and in the growth potential of its business can do. The transfer of ownership was made so long ago that we didn’t have to pay substantial gift or inheritance taxes on it. The principle behind this is simple: the best way to reduce paying estate taxes is to give your assets away before they appreciate.

was for fifteen-million-dollar Central Park apartments that remained empty all year round, ghost homes, tax shelter homes. Artists were as common as subway rats, except subway rats had free food options. New York gutted artists, used them as food, sucking out their marrow to make the glamour stronger.

Robert Jordan, wiping out the stew bowl with bread, explained how the income tax and inheritance tax worked. 'But the big estates remain. Also, there are taxes on the land,' he said. 'But surely the big proprietors and the rich will make a revolution against such taxes. Such taxes appear to me to be revolutionary. They will revolt against the government when they see that they are threatened, exactly as the fascists have done here,' Primitivo said. 'It is possible.' 'Then you will have to fight in your country as we fight here.' 'Yes, we will have to fight.' 'But are there not many fascists in your country?' 'There are many who do not know they are fascists but will find it out when the time comes.

Do you have no big proprietors?” Andrés asked. “Many.” “Then there must be abuses.” “Certainly. There are many abuses.” “But you will do away with them?” “We try to more and more. But there are many abuses still.” “But there are not great estates that must be broken up?” “Yes. But there are those who believe that taxes will break them up.” “How?” Robert Jordan, wiping out the stew bowl with bread, explained how the income tax and inheritance tax worked. “But the big estates remain. Also there are taxes on the land,” he said. “But surely the big proprietors and the rich will make a revolution against such taxes. Such taxes appear to me to be revolutionary. They will revolt against the government when they see that they are threatened, exactly as the fascists have done here,” Primitivo said. “It

Income and inheritance taxes imply the denial of private property, and in that are different in principle from all other taxes. The government says to the citizen: “Your earnings are not exclusively your own; we have a claim on them, and our claim precedes yours; we will allow you to keep some of it, because we recognize your need, not your right; but whatever we grant you for yourself is for us to decide.” This is no exaggeration. Take a look at the income-tax report that you are required by law to make out, and you will see that the government arbitrarily sets down the amount of your income you may have for your living, for your business requirements, for the maintenance of your family, for medical expenses, and so on. After granting these exemptions, with a flourish of generosity, the government decides what percentage of the remainder it will appropriate. The rest you may have.

Having your parents live rent free in a house is actually a good investment. When they die all you have to do is make sure that they leave everything to you because in some countries you don't pay tax on an inheritance, but you do on rent. And to think that your parents think that you are a nice person and that you love them, but all you are is a shrewd business person. Not to mention that you will also have good tenants who will look after the place. May greed be with us!

Everyone said New York City was for creatives, for artists, but that was a washed-up remnant of the past. New York wasn’t for artists anymore. It was for steel and glass and suits. It was for fifteen-million-dollar Central Park apartments that remained empty all year round, ghost homes, tax shelter homes. Artists were as common as subway rats, except subway rats had free food options. New York gutted artists, used them as food, sucking out their marrow to make the glamour stronger.

they demand—along with the restoration of the Golden Age—are amendments of certain laws that bear on inheritance, how they can dispose of their goods in their wills. These are not the concerns of simple people. What has Hob or Hick to leave behind him, but some bad debts and broken shoes? No: these are the complaints of small landowners, and men who don’t like to pay their taxes. Men who want to be petty kings in their shires, who want the women to curtsey as they pass through the marketplace. I know these paltry gods, he thinks. We had them in Putney. They have them everywhere.

unfairness can take many forms. It can take the form of the inheritance of property—bonds and stocks, houses, factories; it can also take the form of the inheritance of talent—musical ability, strength, mathematical genius. The inheritance of property can be interfered with more readily than the inheritance of talent. But from an ethical point of view, is there any difference between the two? Yet many people resent the inheritance of property but not the inheritance of talent. Look at the same issue from the point of view of the parent. If you want to assure your child a higher income in life, you can do so in various ways. You can buy him (or her) an education that will equip him to pursue an occupation yielding a high income; or you can set him up in a business that will yield a higher income than he could earn as a salaried employee; or you can leave him property, the income from which will enable him to live better. Is there any ethical difference among these three ways of using your property? Or again, if the state leaves you any money to spend over and above taxes, should the state permit you to spend it on riotous living but not to leave it to your children?

Formerly, the nobility and the clergy contributed towards the expenses of the State only by voluntary aid and gratuitous gift; their property could not be seized even for debt, — while the plebeian, overwhelmed by taxes and statute-labor, was continually tormented, now by the king’s tax-gatherers, now by those of the nobles and clergy. He whose possessions were subject to mortmain could neither bequeath nor inherit property; he was treated like the animals, whose services and offspring belong to their master by right of accession. The people wanted the conditions of ownership to be alike for all; they thought that every one should enjoy and freely dispose of his possessions his income and the fruit of his labor and industry. The people did not invent property; but as they had not the same privileges in regard to it, which the nobles and clergy possessed, they decreed that the right should be exercised by all under the same conditions. The more obnoxious forms of property — statute-labor, mortmain, maîtrise, and exclusion from public office — have disappeared; the conditions of its enjoyment have been modified: the principle still remains the same. There has been progress in the regulation of the right; there has been no revolution.

When we survey the wretched conditions of man, under the monarchical and hereditary systems of Government, dragged from his home by one power, or driven by another, and impoverished by taxes more than by enemies, it becomes evident that those systems are bad, and that a general revolution in the principle and construction of Governments is necessary. What is government more than the management of the affairs of a Nation? It is not, and from its nature cannot be, the property of any particular man or family, but of the whole community, at whose expense it is supported; and though by force and contrivance it has been usurped into an inheritance, the usurpation cannot alter the right of things. Sovereignty, as a matter of right, appertains to the Nation only, and not to any individual; and a Nation has at all times an inherent indefeasible right to abolish any form of Government it finds inconvenient, and to establish such as accords with its interest, disposition and happiness. the romantic and barbarous distinction of men into Kings and subjects, though it may suit the condition of courtiers, cannot that of citizens; and is exploded by the principle upon which Governments are now founded. Every citizen is a member of the Sovereignty, and, as such, can acknowledge no personal subjection; and his obedience can be only to the laws.

But we may fairly say that they alone are engaged in the true duties of life who shall wish to have Zeno, Pythagoras, Democritus, and all the other high priests of liberal studies, and Aristotle and Theophrastus, as their most intimate friends every day. No one of these will be "not at home," no one of these will fail to have his visitor leave more happy and more devoted to himself than when he came, no one of these will allow anyone to leave him with empty hands; all mortals can meet with them by night or by day. No one of these will force you to die, but all will teach you how to die; no one of these will wear out your years, but each will add his own years to yours; conversations with no one of these will bring you peril, the friendship of none will endanger your life, the courting of none will tax your purse. From them you will take whatever you wish; it will be no fault of theirs if you do not draw the utmost that you can desire. What happiness, what a fair old age awaits him who has offered himself as a client to these! He will have friends from whom he may seek counsel on matters great and small, whom he may consult every day about himself, from whom he may hear truth without insult, praise without flattery, and after whose likeness he may fashion himself. We are wont to say that it was not in our power to choose the parents who fell to our lot, that they have been given to men by chance; yet we may be the sons of whomsoever we will. Households there are of noblest intellects; choose the one into which you wish to be adopted; you will inherit not merely their name, but even their property, which there will be no need to guard in a mean or niggardly spirit; the more persons you share it with, the greater it will become. These will open to you the path to immortality, and will raise you to a height from which no one is cast down. This is the only way of prolonging mortality—nay, of turning it into immortality. Honours, monuments, all that ambition has commanded by decrees or reared in works of stone, quickly sink to ruin; there is nothing that the lapse of time does not tear down and remove. But the works which philosophy has consecrated cannot be harmed; no age will destroy them, no age reduce them; the following and each succeeding age will but increase the reverence for them, since envy works upon what is close at hand, and things that are far off we are more free to admire. The life of the philosopher, therefore, has wide range, and he is not confined by the same bounds that shut others in. He alone is freed from the limitations of the human race; all ages serve him as if a god. Has some time passed by? This he embraces by recollection. Is time present? This he uses. Is it still to come? This he anticipates. He makes his life long by combining all times into one. But those who forget the past, neglect the present, and fear for the future have a life that is very brief and troubled; when they have reached the end of it, the poor wretches perceive too late that for such a long while they have been busied in doing nothing.

Stanley Perlman. She hurried out of the building at One Market Plaza, stepped off the curb, and hailed a cab. It occurred to her, as it always did, that one of these days when she met with him, it would really be for the last time. He always said it was. She had begun to expect him to live forever, despite his protests, and in spite of the realities of time. Her law firm had handled his affairs for more than half a century. She had been his estate and tax attorney for the past three years. At thirty-eight, Sarah had been a partner of the firm for the past two years, and had inherited Stanley as a client when his previous attorney died. Stanley had outlived them all. He was ninety-eight years old. It was hard to believe sometimes. His mind was as sharp as it had ever been, he read voraciously, and he was well aware of every nuance and change in the current tax laws. He was a challenging and entertaining client. Stanley Perlman had been a genius in business all his life. The only thing that had changed over the years was that his body had betrayed him, but never once his mind. He was bedridden now, and had been for nearly seven years. Five nurses attended to him, three regularly in eight-hour shifts, two as relief. He was comfortable, most of the time, and hadn't left his house in years. Sarah had always liked and admired him, although others thought he was irascible and cantankerous. She thought he was a remarkable man. She gave the cabdriver Stanley's Scott Street address. They made their way through the downtown traffic in San Francisco's financial district, and headed west uptown, toward Pacific Heights, where he had lived in the same house for seventy-six years. The sun was shining brightly as they climbed Nob Hill up California Street, and she knew it might be otherwise when they got uptown. The fog often sat heavily on the residential

When the time comes, & I hope it comes soon, to bury this era of moral rot & the defiling of our communal, social, & democratic norms, the perfect epitaph for the gravestone of this age of unreason should be Iowa Senator Chuck Grassley's already infamous quote: "I think not having the estate tax recognizes the people that are investing... as opposed to those that are just spending every darn penny they have, whether it’s on booze or women or movies.” Grassley's vision of America, quite frankly, is one I do not recognize. I thought the heart of this great nation was not limited to the ranks of the plutocrats who are whisked through life in chauffeured cars & private jets, whose often inherited riches are passed along to children, many of whom no sacrifice or service is asked. I do not begrudge wealth, but it must come with a humility that money never is completely free of luck. And more importantly, wealth can never be a measure of worth. I have seen the waitress working the overnight shift at a diner to give her children a better life, & yes maybe even take them to a movie once in awhile - and in her, I see America. I have seen the public school teachers spending extra time with students who need help & who get no extra pay for their efforts, & in them I see America. I have seen parents sitting around kitchen tables with stacks of pressing bills & wondering if they can afford a Christmas gift for their children, & in them I see America. I have seen the young diplomat in a distant foreign capital & the young soldier in a battlefield foxhole, & in them I see America. I have seen the brilliant graduates of the best law schools who forgo the riches of a corporate firm for the often thankless slog of a district attorney or public defender's office, & in them I see America. I have seen the librarian reshelving books, the firefighter, police officer, & paramedic in service in trying times, the social worker helping the elderly & infirm, the youth sports coaches, the PTA presidents, & in them I see America. I have seen the immigrants working a cash register at a gas station or trimming hedges in the frost of an early fall morning, or driving a cab through rush hour traffic to make better lives for their families, & in them I see America. I have seen the science students unlocking the mysteries of life late at night in university laboratories for little or no pay, & in them I see America. I have seen the families struggling with a cancer diagnosis, or dementia in a parent or spouse. Amid the struggles of mortality & dignity, in them I see America. These, & so many other Americans, have every bit as much claim to a government working for them as the lobbyists & moneyed classes. And yet, the power brokers in Washington today seem deaf to these voices. It is a national disgrace of historic proportions. And finally, what is so wrong about those who must worry about the cost of a drink with friends, or a date, or a little entertainment, to rephrase Senator Grassley's demeaning phrasings? Those who can't afford not to worry about food, shelter, healthcare, education for their children, & all the other costs of modern life, surely they too deserve to be able to spend some of their “darn pennies” on the simple joys of life. Never mind that almost every reputable economist has called this tax bill a sham of handouts for the rich at the expense of the vast majority of Americans & the future economic health of this nation. Never mind that it is filled with loopholes written by lobbyists. Never mind that the wealthiest already speak with the loudest voices in Washington, & always have. Grassley’s comments open a window to the soul of the current national Republican Party & it it is not pretty. This is not a view of America that I think President Ronald Reagan let alone President Dwight Eisenhower or Teddy Roosevelt would have recognized. This is unadulterated cynicism & a version of top-down class warfare run amok. ~Facebook 12/4/17

Now, I don’t want to be reductive, but I’ll bet half of you are here so you can someday wheedle money out of people—torts people, there’s nothing to be ashamed of!—and the other half of you are here because you think you’re going to change the world. You’re here because you dream of arguing before the Supreme Court, because you think the real challenge of the law lies in the blank spaces between the lines of the Constitution. But I’m here to tell you—it doesn’t. The truest, the most intellectually engaging, the richest field of the law is contracts. Contracts are not just sheets of paper promising you a job, or a house, or an inheritance: in its purest, truest, broadest sense, contracts govern every realm of law. When we choose to live in a society, we choose to live under a contract, and to abide by the rules that a contract dictates for us—the Constitution itself is a contract, albeit a malleable contract, and the question of just how malleable it is, exactly, is where law intersects with politics—and it is under the rules, explicit or otherwise, of this contract that we promise not to kill, and to pay our taxes, and not to steal. But in this case, we are both the creators of and bound by this contract: as citizens of this country, we have assumed, from birth, an obligation to respect and follow its terms, and we do so daily. “In this class, you will of course learn the mechanics of contracts—how one is created, how one is broken, how binding one is and how to unbind yourself from one—but you will also be asked to consider law itself as a series of contracts. Some are more fair—and this one time, I’ll allow you to say such a thing—than others. But fairness is not the only, or even the most important, consideration in law: the law is not always fair. Contracts are not fair, not always. But sometimes they are necessary, these unfairnesses, because they are necessary for the proper functioning of society. In this class you will learn the difference between what is fair and what is just, and, as important, between what is fair and what is necessary. You will learn about the obligations we have to one another as members of society, and how far society should go in enforcing those obligations. You will learn to see your life—all of our lives—as a series of agreements, and it will make you rethink not only the law but this country itself, and your place in it.

Indian Express (Indian Express) - Clip This Article at Location 721 | Added on Sunday, 30 November 2014 20:28:42 Fifth column: Hope and audacity Ministers, high officials, clerks and peons now report for duty on time and are no longer to be seen taking long lunch breaks to soak in winter sunshine in Delhi’s parks. Reform is needed not just in economic matters but in every area of governance. Does the Prime Minister know how hard it is to get a passport? Tavleen Singh | 807 words At the end of six months of the Modi sarkar are we seeing signs that it is confusing efficiency with reform? I ask the question because so far there is no sign of real reform in any area of governance. And, because some of Narendra Modi’s most ardent supporters are now beginning to get worried. Last week I met a man who dedicated a whole year to helping Modi become Prime Minister and he seemed despondent. When I asked how he thought the government was doing, he said he would answer in the words of the management guru Peter Drucker, “There is nothing quite so useless as doing with great efficiency something that should not be done at all.” We can certainly not fault this government on efficiency. Ministers, high officials, clerks and peons now report for duty on time and are no longer to be seen taking long lunch breaks to soak in winter sunshine in Delhi’s parks. The Prime Minister’s Office hums with more noise and activity than we have seen in a decade but, despite this, there are no signs of the policy changes that are vital if we are to see real reform. The Planning Commission has been abolished but there are many, many other leftovers from socialist times that must go. Do we need a Ministry of Information & Broadcasting in an age when the Internet has made propaganda futile? Do we need a meddlesome University Grants Commission? Do we need the government to continue wasting our money on a hopeless airline and badly run hotels? We do not. What we do need is for the government to make policies that will convince investors that India is a safe bet once more. We do not need a new government that simply implements more efficiently bad policies that it inherited from the last government. It was because of those policies that investors fled and the economy stopped growing. Unless this changes through better policies, the jobs that the Prime Minister promises young people at election rallies will not come. So far signals are so mixed that investors continue to shy away. The Finance Minister promises to end tax terrorism but in the next breath orders tax inspectors to go forth in search of black money. Vodafone has been given temporary relief by the courts but the retroactive tax remains valid. And, although we hear that the government has grandiose plans to improve the decrepit transport systems, power stations and ports it inherited, it continues to refuse to pay those who have to build them. The infrastructure industry is owed more than Rs 1.5 lakh continued... crore in government dues and this has crippled major companies. No amount of efficiency in announcing new projects will make a difference unless old dues are cleared. Reform is needed not just in economic matters but in every area of governance. Does the Prime Minister know how hard it is to get a passport? Does he know that a police check is required even if you just want to get a few pages added to your passport? Does he know how hard it is to do routine things like registering property? Does he know that no amount of efficiency will improve healthcare services that are broken? No amount of efficiency will improve educational services that have long been in terminal decline because of bad policies and interfering officials. At the same time, the licence raj that strangles private investment in schools and colleges remains in place. Modi’s popularity with ordinary people has increased since he became Prime Minister, as we saw from his rallies in Kashmir last week, but it will not la

In 1957, the death of a trio of millionaires, Sir James Dunn, Isaak Killam, and Harold Crabtree, produced such a windfall of inheritance taxes that the federal government launched the Canada Council and endowed it with $100 million, half for capital grants to universities, the rest for scholarships, loans, and grants.

The one who requests less than he deserves from God will surely obtain more than he deserves. This is clearly shown by the tax-collector who requested forgiveness but obtained justification. And the thief merely requested to be remembered in His Kingdom, but he inherited Paradise.

It's the knowledge I spit that's detrimental to those powerful. Mental elemental procedures to the mass of ignorance. It's an on-going, never-ending symbol of punishment for the suffering is due to its lack of acknowledgement. Masquerades, gimmicks, and monopoly games; giving your heart to this money instead of Almighty, so it's suffering and burning of flames, a burning of shame. Playing the game can never leave you the same so who is to blame? Complete conspiracy, committed theft of inherited immunity, live a life of misery and taxing our energy. A straw afloat on water of deceptive ingenuity. A false replica of me, an enemy with my name but non-resistant so I agree with my adversary.

The very same government that, by raising taxes, permitting uncontrolled immigration, weakening the military, failing to control the national debt, and fostering skyrocketing unemployment, was making it impossible for them to feed their families and provide better lives for their children. She’d come to tell them that their problems could be solved if they were willing to sacrifice, to transcend their personal interests and become part of something larger. Their needs would be met, their nation restored to its former glory—a process that could start with sports and physical fitness. Who didn’t want their destinies to be more heroic, to surrender to something higher than the question of who cheated which sibling out of an inheritance and

It was expected that a proper burgher would leave from a third to a half of his movable property for uses that would benefit the public and his own estate in the next world. Now the state takes over such functions by means of inheritance taxes. The judgment of the state is substituted for that of the decedent, and the merit of voluntary well-doing is lost.

And after generations of redistributive progressive income and inheritance taxes, the economic elite was losing its lead. Income in America during the mid-1970s was as equally distributed as at any time in the country’s history.

Brown inherited a growing economy, low inflation and rising tax revenues. If he had just done nothing, or stayed in bed, or taken up Scottish country dancing full time, or gone on holiday for the rest of his life and not meddled with the economy, he would have gone down in history as one of Britain’s greatest ever chancellors.

Reagan inherited a prime interest rate of 20.5 percent, making it hard to start a new business or buy a new home or car. The top marginal income tax rate stood at 70 percent.

else we should know?” “There are inheritance taxes and some forms I need, but they can wait….” “Besides those.” “No.” If only she could run out to her truck and sit in

This is a venerable historical office. You don’t realize this, but it is. Usually inherited, a patrimony. El judío de corte, der Hofjude, the Court Jew. The protected Jew. The useful Jew to keep in your pocket, as a consultant on your taxes. Sometimes an intermediary, sometimes an intercessor. Always balancing competing interests. The Elder of the Judenrat who when the Gestapo says, we need to kill one thousand Jews, he’s the one who picks which one thousand. The shtadlan who when the emperor summons him and says, we need more money for our treasury, he tries to bargain down the price while averting a massacre. A tenuous duty, susceptible to all corruptions. Powerful, but never the most powerful, and only partially trusted by both sides, belonging entirely to neither.

Conservatives have consistently voted to cut taxes on the rich. Current proposals for a “flat tax” would mean cutting taxes on the rich. The arguments are often versions of the Moral Hierarchy principle, that the rich are just better people than the poor: they have earned their money through hard work; the poor just haven’t worked hard enough and so deserve to be poor. Hmmm . . . Corporate CEOs tend to make about two hundred times as much as their average employees—they can’t be working two hundred times as hard. And many of the rich have inherited their money not earned it through work. Another

She is even willing to stomach her multimillionaire parents crafting all sorts of family trusts to avoid inheritance taxes so that she will have enough millions not to worry about having to make millions to support a lifestyle she doesn’t much like.

Mainstream economists habitually treat asset depletion as income, while ignoring the value of the assets themselves. If the owner of an old-growth forest cuts it and sells the timber, the market may record a drop in the land’s monetary value, but otherwise the ecological damage done is regarded as an externality. Irreplaceable biological assets, in this case, have been liquidated; thus the benefit of these assets to future generations is denied. From an ecosystem point of view, an economy that does not heavily tax the extraction of non-renewable resources is like a jobless person rapidly spending an inheritance.

peaceful empire Hadrian inherited was by no means long-established, and the recent past provided both lessons for would-be tyrants and examples of successful, survivable, rule. At the time of Hadrian’s birth Rome was ruled by the benign and thrifty Vespasian, whose most notorious deed was taxing urinals.

Politicians must find a way – or several ways for different groups – of framing basic income so as to outflank critics from the media and the establishment, most of whom have had more than the equivalent of a basic income from birth. Opponents will continue to use the sophistry of reciprocity – surely, you cannot want to give something for nothing – which they do not demand of inherited wealth. They will continue to depict images of laziness, dependency, scrounging and such like while reporting gleefully on the frolicking of the indolent rich. And they will leap on any policymaker or politician who suggests that, to finance a basic income, the affluent might need to pay more tax or lose certain tax privileges, while not questioning tax cuts for the wealthy at the expense of reduced social benefits and public services.

Ultimately, the most powerful way to rebalance the interests of private owners and the common good is by shifting the focus towards taxes on wealth - that is, asking those who have accummulated substantial assets down the years (or with inherited wealth, down the centuries) to make a fairer contribution. The case is indisputable: since 2008, average earnings have hardly risen, while the amount of wealth held by the better-off has sky-rocketed. Clearly paying for shocks such as the 2008 crash or the Covid-19 pandemic should not fall solely on those dependent on their immediate income. A Land Value Tax could also play an important role: a policy that would be difficult to evade, and would tackle the vast windfall profits that come from the development of land. It's an idea that has long enjoyed support from all sides of the political spectrum, including Winston Churchill, as well as from economists as divergent as Milton Friedman, Adam Smith and J.K. Galbraith. Given its elegant simplicity and essential fairness, the fact that it has not been introduced in England is a case-book example of the landowners' ability to block reform.

America is now undertaking the boldest experiment in its history: to discover whether a property developer who inherited his wealth and has been bankrupt four times, who never pays taxes (and thinks you’re dumb if you do), who has hosted a cheesy reality TV show, and has literally zero political or military experience of running anything, can successfully preside over the most powerful and racially complex nation country on earth. Good luck with that, Donald. You’re going to need it. It’s not a case of God Bless America. More like … God help America! Hey Donald, you’re fired.

All preferments (of the emperor) were dependent upon the outstanding size of member of those recommended. He appointed as collectors of the five per cent inheritance tax a muleteer, an athlete, a cook and a locksmith.

Legacy is about three things: the first is being able to retire with enough income-generating assets so you can live with dignity. The second is being able to set aside resources so that you can give freely to those who are in need. And the third is being able to leave a sizable inheritance for your children’s children.

Backlash theorists, as we shall see, imagine countless conspiracies in which the wealthy, powerful, and well connected—the liberal media, the atheistic scientists, the obnoxious eastern elite—pull the strings and make the puppets dance. And yet the backlash itself has been a political trap so devastating to the interests of Middle America that even the most diabolical of stringpullers would have had trouble dreaming it up. Here, after all, is a rebellion against “the establishment” that has wound up cutting the tax on inherited estates. Here is a movement whose response to the power structure is to make the rich even richer; whose answer to the inexorable degradation of working-class life is to lash out angrily at labor unions and liberal workplace-safety programs; whose solution to the rise of ignorance in America is to pull the rug out from under public education.

COLM O’GORMAN: I feel very, very strongly from my own professional perspective that if any organisation is seeking to advance the human rights of any group of individuals or population, it’s incredibly important that their positions are fully informed by an engagement with that population and with those people. So rights holders’ participation, and active rights holders’ participation, is incredibly important. And ensuring that your campaign and your calls are representative, and reflect what that rights-holder group actually want, as opposed to your assessment of it, even if you’re a member of that group, is absolutely vital. I think it’s fair to say that there was a disconnect between the case that was presented for civil partnership and the lived reality for LGBT people. Now, I don’t know if that was GLEN’s fault or even their responsibility – GLEN are GLEN, you know, they were an organisation doing a piece of work, and their structure is their structure, and their constitution is the way that they’re constituted, but I do think that there needed to be more of a considered engagement with the LGBT community in all of its diversity, you know? And it’s not white, middle-class, male, single, with concerns about pensions and inheritance and income tax and property. Those are very real concerns for people, but they’re very limited. They deny the reality of huge numbers of people. Absolutely women, and men who aren’t concerned with that. Again, it’s been really interesting in the context of the whole debate that we’ve had on prejudice [in early 2014] that you know one of the things that I think was most valuable about what Rory was certainly saying, and it’s something I feel very strongly too – prejudice is nobody’s dominion. Look at this community. Look at how this community treated lesbians. Look at the view of lesbians in this community. Or transgender people particularly. There’s no point in imagining or pretending that the LGBT community would be very different from wider society, and that power and influence wouldn’t be almost automatically in the hands of educated, middle-class, middle-aged men. That’s the way the world has been. And it’s changing thankfully, but it’s the way the world has been.

passed to make anything a crime. Do you realize, Mr. Scott, that 'a heavy progressive, or graduated, income tax' is one of the cardinal points of the Communist Manifesto?" "Sure. Point two, between 'Abolition of property in land' and 'Abolition of all right of inheritance.' But, since we're stuck with it, Mr. Lorimer, what was the beef against you?

If your preferred way of solving big problems requires my money and gives me a board seat on the initiative, I may not encourage solutions involving inheritance taxes or the breakup of companies like the one from which I have made the money I am giving.

Currency Affairs by Stewart Stafford Monies lent with warm smiles of trust, Are debts collected at a dagger thrust, Gold shipped home from battles worst, Are taxes paid to the mermaid's purse. Whoever seeks to locate buried treasure, Digs their own grave by merest measure, Wealth bequeathed, deceased's pleasure, Forfeited by greed, a dead countermeasure. Cupidity looms outside a counting house, Alimony spat out to a prenup-free spouse, Bankruptcy declared by a profligate louse, Dermatitis creams for itchy hands do douse. © Stewart Stafford, 2022. All rights reserved.

First, private schools and universities should lose their tax-exempt status unless they draw at least half of their students from families in the bottom two-thirds of the income distribution. And second, schools should be encouraged (including through public subsidies) to meet this requirement by expanding enrollments. Together, these reforms would exchange meritocracy’s exclusive, narrow, and profligately educated elite for an inclusive, broad, and yet still well-educated replacement. The reforms would spread the wealth that the meritocratic inheritance now concentrates, distributing “elite” education across a wider population and at the same time improving education generally by reducing the strain on resources outside the elite. In this way, they would dramatically shrink the educational gap between the rich and the rest.

The Chinese had invented the modern state more than a thousand years before Europe did. A finishing touch was added when the Mandarin examination system was instituted in 124 BC under emperor Wu. Besides an army, tax collection systems, registration of the population and draconian punishments, China had another institution, one that the sociologist Max Weber considered the defining mark of a modern state, that of an impersonal bureaucracy chosen by merit.

The hobby scientists flourished under laissez faire, but laissez-faire Britain came to an end in 1914. Before 1914 the Government sequestered less than 10 per cent of the nation's wealth in taxes, but between 1918 and 1939 the Government increased this to about 25 per cent of GNP, and since 1945 the Government has spent between 40-50 per cent GNP. Because of the attrition of inherited wealth and of private means, the hobby scientist is now practically extinct.

Elite Wealth Management is a firm of independent financial advisers specialising in providing advice on Personal and Corporate Pensions, Mortgages, Equity Release, Investments, Inheritance Tax planning, Corporate, Wealth and Personal Protection. We’ve been helping clients navigate complex financial markets since 2009 as a company, and each adviser has many years experience in their own right having worked for various companies, and from those very early days, our business has evolved primarily through client, accountant and solicitor recommendations.

list of documents that may be required. It can look intimidating, especially if you’ve not been actively involved in your family finances, but don’t panic. If you can’t find all of them or don’t have access, there is a later step in the divorce process called “discovery,” when you can legally compel the other side to provide copies of anything else you need: •Individual income tax returns (federal, state, local) for past three years •Business income tax returns (federal, state, local) for past three years •Proof of your current income (paystubs, statements, or paid invoices) •Proof of spouse’s income (paystubs, statements, or paid invoices) •Checking, savings, and certificate statements (personal and business) for past three years •Credit card and loan statements (personal and business) for past three years •Investment, pension plan, and retirement account statements for past three years •Mortgage statement and loan documents for all properties you have an interest in •Real estate appraisals •Property tax documents •Employment contracts •Benefit statements •Social Security statements •Life, homeowner’s, and auto insurance policies •Wills and trust agreements •Health insurance cards •Vehicle titles and/or registration •Monthly budget worksheet •List of personal property (furnishings, jewelry, electronics, artwork) •List of property acquired by gift or inheritance or owned prior to marriage •Prenuptial agreements •Marriage license •Prior court orders directing payment of child support or spousal support Your attorney or financial advisor may ask for additional documents specific to your case. Some of these may not be applicable to you.

The master stroke for this campaign was a concerted effort to rebrand the debate as one about the “death tax.” Frank Luntz, a political operative on the repeal payroll, later revealed that this rebranding “kindled voter resentment in a way that ‘inheritance tax’ and ‘estate tax’ [did] not.” To control the ownership narrative, the repeal campaign relied on personal stories that activated people’s fears. That’s why Thigpen was not alone testifying on the panel. With him were Bill McNutt, owner of Collin Street Bakery in Corsicana, Texas; Jim Turner, a rancher in Florida; and Robert Lange, a farmer from Malvern, Pennsylvania. Each expressed concern that their family businesses would need to be sold to pay estate taxes. The key for pro-repeal lobbyists was that nearly 40 percent of Americans mistakenly believed they were in the top 1 percent, or soon would be, and thus were potentially subject to the tax. Thanks to the lobbying campaign, Thigpen’s story went viral. Luntz and his hired associates transformed a tax that affected fewer than two out of every hundred Americans into a seemingly populist cause. As one commentator notes, “Thigpen’s story was repeated over and over again, and its racial undertones implied that the tax disproportionately impacts Black families. The only problem? It was a complete lie.

In 1916 Congress passed an estate tax, eventually setting the rate at 25 percent for estates over $10 million (worth over $230 million in today’s dollars). The tax helped pay for the U.S. war effort in World War I, and it achieved Roosevelt’s goal to tame what he called “the really big fortune, the swollen fortune.” Politicians and the public understood the estate tax as a moral imperative. As Franklin Delano Roosevelt made clear, “The transmission from generation to generation of vast fortunes by will, inheritance or gift is not consistent with the ideals and sentiments of the American people.” The president believed, as did most Americans, that each generation should stand on its own.

Honesty—Lolo should not have hidden the refrigerator in the storage room when the tax officials came, even if everyone else, including the tax officials, expected such things. Fairness—the parents of wealthier students should not give television sets to the teachers during Ramadan, and their children could take no pride in the higher marks they might have received. Straight talk—if you didn’t like the shirt I bought you for your birthday, you should have just said so instead of keeping it wadded up at the bottom of your closet. Independent judgment—just because the other children tease the poor boy about his haircut doesn’t mean you have to do it too.

By securing the Rockefeller Foundation charter in 1913, Rockefeller insulated a large portion of his wealth from inheritance taxes.

A complete meritocratic accounting of earned advantage is more expansive than this and traces income through its shallow sources back to its deep roots—to reveal that some income nominally attributed to capital in fact originates in labor and therefore should be counted as earned through effort, skill, and industry. An entrepreneur who sells founder’s shares in her firm, an executive who realizes appreciation after being paid in stock, and a hedge fund manager who gets paid a “carried interest” share of profits on funds she invests (but does not own) all report capital gains income on their tax returns. But all these types of income ultimately reflect returns to the founder’s, the executive’s, or the manager’s labor and, the meritocrat insists, are on this account earned. A similar analysis applies to pensions and owner-occupied housing. All this income is earned in a way that distinguishes it from the true capital income of the hereditary rentier who lives, at leisure, from returns on an inherited patrimony. Regardless of what the tax accounts say, therefore, accurate meritocratic accounting attributes all these types of income not to capital but to labor.

In the last two decades, Stern and Helen had their share of friends relocate to Florida to escape state income and inheritance taxes up north. As far as Stern is concerned, no amount of money is worth the change. With swamps and alligators inland, and the gated communities and shopping malls in the traffic-clotted towns along the coasts, the state seems to Stern like a giant penal colony for America's elderly, where the residents--like characters in a famous play--have all been blinded by the sun and do not realize they are actually in hell.

Right, the class thing here is strange. I mean, I’m American. We don’t do class.” “You don’t really believe that, do you?” Startled, I looked at him. He only looked back with his liquid black eyes. I said, “It’s not like here.” “Perhaps not. But you can’t possibly think it doesn’t exist.” “I guess.” I thought of those dinners I’d eaten, the very privilege of living in San Francisco at all, the homeless people down on Treat Avenue, the neighborhood where my mother’s house had sold for millions, the stories of people riding the train for two hours to get to work from places as distant as Stockton, people being taxed out of the homes they’d lived in for decades. “I mean, yeah, of course it does.” Thinking more, I felt a little ashamed—the country had been under siege over class for several years now. “But it’s different, don’t you think? America is essentially a meritocracy, in that you can earn your way up the ranks via education and money.” “But can you, really? University is wildly expensive, is it not? Not everyone can afford the cost.” I nodded.

Since the late 1970s, social justice organizations within the US have operated largely within the 501(c)(3) non-profit model, in which donations made to an organization are tax deductible, in order to avail themselves of foundation grants. Despite the legacy of grassroots, mass-movement building we have inherited from the 1960s and 70s, contemporary activists often experience difficulty developing, or even imagining, structures for organizing outside this model.

the welfare of inheritances, tax cuts, government contracts, hookups, and bailouts

very privilege of living in San Francisco at all, the homeless people down on Treat Avenue, the neighborhood where my mother’s house had sold for millions, the stories of people riding the train for two hours to get to work from places as distant as Stockton, people being taxed out of the homes they’d lived in for decades. “I mean, yeah, of course it does.” Thinking more, I felt a little ashamed

Some of Becker’s most compelling research concerned altruism. He argued, for instance, that the same person who might be purely selfish in business could be exceedingly altruistic among people he knew—although, importantly (Becker is an economist, after all), he predicted that altruism even within a family would have a strategic element. Years later, the economists Doug Bernheim, Andrei Shleifer , and Larry Summers empirically demonstrated Becker’s point. Using data from a U.S. government longitudinal study, they showed that an elderly parent in a retirement home is more likely to be visited by his grown children if they are expecting a sizable inheritance. But wait, you say: maybe the offspring of wealthy families are simply more caring toward their elderly parents? A reasonable conjecture—in which case you’d expect an only child of wealthy parents to be especially dutiful. But the data show no increase in retirement-home visits if a wealthy family has only one grown child; there need to be at least two. This suggests that the visits increase because of competition between siblings for the parent’s estate. What might look like good old-fashioned intrafamilial altruism may be a sort of prepaid inheritance tax. Some governments, wise to the ways of the world, have gone so far as to legally require grown children to visit or support their aging moms and dads. In Singapore, the law is known as the Maintenance of Parents Act. Still, people appear to be extraordinarily altruistic, and not just within their own families.

Capitalism is not evil per se. It is the particular implementation that is evil – the one designed to cater for a small super rich elite who call all of the shots and create global empires outwith the control of the State and the people. This model of capitalism is not a servant of the people, but a Dictatorship of Mammon. The world can be free only when the controllers are removed from power. Only one policy guarantees the end of the super rich – 100% inheritance tax.

Here, after all, is a rebellion against “the establishment” that has wound up cutting the tax on inherited estates. Here is a movement whose response to the power structure is to make the rich even richer; whose answer to the inexorable degradation of working-class life is to lash out angrily at labor unions and liberal workplace-safety programs; whose solution to the rise of ignorance in America is to pull the rug out from under public education.

Meritocracy is based on the absolute destruction of the rigged race of life, via the introduction of 100% inheritance tax, i.e. an overwhelming advantage can no longer be passed on by rich parents to their children. All children, no matter the wealth of their parents, must begin at the same starting line as everyone else. No parent can rig the race. The 1% can no longer dictate the outcome of the race

Something was making poor people poor, according to this idea. And it was welfare. Welfare "transforms the individual from a dignified, industrious, self-reliant spiritual being into a dependent animal creature without his knowing it," U.S. senator Barry Goldwater wrote in The Conscience of the Conservative in 1960. Goldwater and his ideological descendants said little to nothing about rich White people who depended on the welfare of inheritances, tax cuts, government contracts, hookups, and bailouts.

Goldwater and his ideological descendants said little to nothing about rich White people who depended on the welfare of inheritances, tax cuts, government contracts, hookups, and bailouts. They said little to nothing about the White middle class depending on the welfare of the New Deal, the GI Bill, subsidized suburbs, and exclusive White networks.

Universal last names are a fairly recent historical phenomenon. Tracking property ownership and inheritance, collecting taxes, maintaining court records, performing police work, conscripting soldiers, and controlling epidemics were all made immeasurably easier by the clarity of full names and, increasingly, fixed addresses.

Know Your Ground Despite my blistered hands And calloused knuckles And over-taxed knees I cannot grow tomatoes It’s the soil, they said, Have your tested your levels? Calcium. Sand. Nitrogen. Clay. You must know your ground. But only lately have I walked this land Of my inheritance, Only recently looked At the wild mystery That lives beneath my toes, Only newly raked My fingers through earth And wondered, Is this bone that eroded To silt in my hand? Life that bled iron To fashion this bed? History that tastes So sweet on my tongue? In my frivolous hunger I surrendered my birthright. In your just disapproval I fled from my ground And now I fear this dormant soil Will never grow for me.

In short, by this time, Castro had concluded that the nation’s political, social, and cultural problems required real solutions beyond the reach of individual conscience, no matter how well-meaning. The crisis in housing, education, and health care were “problems for the state to resolve.” The way to address inequality was not through philanthropy but by taxing “the owners of 5th Avenue and Country Club mansions, recreational farms, aristocratic clubs, inheritance, and luxury.” Only then could Cuba ensure that no patient died because a rain shower had put off a fundraising drive, or because some soaking-rich countess had taken ill. It was past time for the very rich to lapse into extinction—“like Siboney Indian chiefs and manatees.

The state should seize all the hotels in Dublin and turn them into social housing.” “Ah now, Ava.” “And there should be a one hundred percent inheritance tax. And universal basic income.” “Ah now.

As an accomplished entrepreneur with a history that spans more than fourteen years, Annette Wise is constantly looking for ways to give back to her community. Using enterprising efforts, she qualified for $125,000 in startup funding to develop a specialized residential facility that allows developmentally disabled adults to live in the community after almost a lifetime of living in a state institution. In doing so, she has provided steady employment in her community for the last thirteen years. After dedicating years to her residential facility, Annette began to see clearly the difficulty business owners face in planning for retirement successfully. Searching high and low to find answers, she took control of financial uncertainty and in less than 2 years, she became a Full Life Agent, licensed Registered Representative, Investment Advisor Representative and Limited Principal. Her focus is on building an extensive list of clients that depend on her for smart retirement guidance, thorough college planning, detailed business continuation, and business exit strategies. Clients have come to rely on Annette for insight on tax advantaged savings and retirement options. Annette’s primary goal is to help her clients understand more than just concepts, but to easily understand how money works, the consequences of their decisions and how they work in conjunction with their desires and goal. Ever the curious soul who is always up for a challenge, Annette is routinely resourceful at finding sensible means to a sometimes-challenging end. She believes in infinite possibilities as well as in sharing her knowledge with others. She is the go-to source for “Smart Wealth Solutions.” Among Annette’s proudest accomplishments are her two wonderful sons, Michael III and Matthew. As a single mom, they have been her inspiration and joy. She is forever grateful to the greatest brothers in the world- Andrew and Anthony Wise, for assistance in grooming them into amazing young men.

10 Steps Process Requirement So that we can get a clear picture of your current financial position and your future lifestyle desires our 10-step process requires 2 meetings. Meeting #1 include steps 1 through 5 and should take no longer than 45 minutes. If in meeting #1 we determine that what we do fit with what you are looking for, you will receive 2 very short questionnaires to complete and we will then schedule meeting #2. The first is a very short and simple financial questionnaire. The second is an online communication profile that assesses how you like to be communicated to and how you naturally approach or respond to problems, information, change and risk. Both are very important to us moving forward. They help us be more effective in how we communicate your data to you. Meeting #2 include steps 6 – 10 and should take no longer than one (1) hour. In this meeting we will identify areas in which you are losing money unknowingly and unnecessarily. We will customize appropriate wealth strategies to help you become more efficient in your finances so that you can achieve your goals and objectives.