Author Topic: Inheritance  (Read 1600 times)

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Offline Michael Hardner

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Inheritance
« on: February 09, 2019, 07:33:07 am »
Inheritance kills meritocracy and establishes a new kind of aristocracy. Discuss.

https://www.salon.com/2014/03/24/death_of_meritocracy_how_inheritance_is_poisoning_the_american_economy/


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Offline kimmy

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Re: Inheritance
« Reply #1 on: February 09, 2019, 11:16:56 am »
This is why Republicans have been pushing for years to kill the Inheritance Tax-- "the Death Tax", they call it. They call it that to make it sound more appealing to middle-class people, but it doesn't have anything to do with middle-class people because it only applies to estates with value above 10 million dollars. Republicans want to get rid of the inheritance tax because that's what their biggest donors are paying them for.

This is also why the idea of a wealth tax has been gaining ground in recent years. 

Income derived from capital is taxed at lower rates than income derived from labor. Why? The theory is that taxing it at lower rates encourages investment which in turn creates jobs. Is that really a good theory?  Sometimes investment creates jobs. But sometimes investment is an exercise in shuffling money around that doesn't actually create anything at all.  Maybe tax breaks for capital should be linked to demonstrated economic benefit.


Personally I doubt I'll inherit a nickel from my parents when they die, and that's ok.  For others, an inheritance is their hope of finally paying off their gigantic mortgages or things like that.  I recall hearing about some sort of scheme for aging boomers where you sign over your assets to some company that operates a variety of luxurious retirement resorts. In exchange for your estate, you get to live like a king for your remaining days.  As boomers dying off and passing their inheritances to their children becomes the biggest transfer of wealth in history, big business is trying to figure out how to get a piece of that action.


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Offline TimG

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Re: Inheritance
« Reply #2 on: February 09, 2019, 11:36:38 am »
Inheritance and wealth taxes are the worst forms of taxes because the can destroy family businesses built by entrepreneurs by forcing a sale. The can also force people out of their homes. People should be taxed on actual money made not paper values of assets which can be manipulated by accounting tricks. Get rid of special treatment for capital gains if necessary but inheritance and wealth taxes are simply wrong.

Offline ?Impact

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Re: Inheritance
« Reply #3 on: February 09, 2019, 02:00:18 pm »
inheritance and wealth taxes are simply wrong.

Then you are for 95% tax on income above $10 million.
« Last Edit: February 09, 2019, 02:14:37 pm by ?Impact »
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Offline wilber

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Re: Inheritance
« Reply #4 on: February 09, 2019, 02:04:18 pm »
Then you are for 95% tax on <b>income</b> above $10 million.

Depends what people are inheriting, if it is a small business, taxing it could be very counterproductive.
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Offline TimG

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Re: Inheritance
« Reply #5 on: February 09, 2019, 03:44:04 pm »
Then you are for 95% tax on income above $10 million.
Huh? Any marginal tax rate above 50% is wrong too. People should never have to pay the government more than they get to keep themselves.

Offline ?Impact

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Re: Inheritance
« Reply #6 on: February 09, 2019, 03:50:06 pm »
Huh? Any marginal tax rate above 50% is wrong too. People should never have to pay the government more than they get to keep themselves.

Marginal and Effective tax are completely different, but then you knew that.

Offline TimG

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Re: Inheritance
« Reply #7 on: February 09, 2019, 03:53:51 pm »
Marginal and Effective tax are completely different, but then you knew that.
Marginal tax rates affect incremental income. People should never have to pay more than 50% on incremental income as a matter of principle.

Offline Michael Hardner

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Re: Inheritance
« Reply #8 on: February 09, 2019, 04:31:38 pm »
I read that 60% of wealth in the US today comes from inheritance.  That's aristocracy.

Offline TimG

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Re: Inheritance
« Reply #9 on: February 09, 2019, 05:03:27 pm »
I read that 60% of wealth in the US today comes from inheritance.  That's aristocracy.
I would expect that to be true in every industrialized economy parents of baby boomers die off and transfer their wealth to their children. Our entire system is setup so people need to save for their own retirement which, in turn, means there will often be money leftover if someone dies early. Someone with even a modest income can have 500K+ in retirement savings at age 65 if they are diligent about saving 10% of their income from a young age.

Offline Queefer Sutherland

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Re: Inheritance
« Reply #10 on: February 09, 2019, 05:13:32 pm »
I read that 60% of wealth in the US today comes from inheritance.  That's aristocracy.

Is there something wrong with earning wealth and then passing it to your children?  Why are strangers or government more deserving of it?  It's your money, you earned it, you should be able to give it to whomever you want.

As far as I know, at least in Canada if you inherit money it's counted as income, so its taxed there anyways.  I get the argument about super wealth concentrations, so go tax wealthy incomes above whatever ridiculous amounts.

Everyone should be able to have their basic needs met: a roof, healthy food, high school education, necessary healthcare, basic physical safety & security.  The US doesn't even have that yet for everyone.  But after that, it should be fair game and nobody deserves anything from anyone else.
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Offline Michael Hardner

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Re: Inheritance
« Reply #11 on: February 09, 2019, 05:30:39 pm »
Inheriting $100B is a different thing than a million.

Offline TimG

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Re: Inheritance
« Reply #12 on: February 09, 2019, 05:50:28 pm »
Inheriting $100B is a different thing than a million.
The problem with the soak the rich mentality is the number of rich people is small compared to the not so rich. This means the not so rich inevitably pay the lions shared of any taxes targeting the rich.
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Offline waldo

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Re: Inheritance
« Reply #13 on: February 09, 2019, 06:12:57 pm »
As far as I know, at least in Canada if you inherit money it's counted as income, so its taxed there anyways.

living large waldo says: no, inherited money is not taxed in Canada. But... an estate (hence estate beneficiaries) is responsible for paying any outstanding taxes owed by the estate.
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Offline Queefer Sutherland

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Re: Inheritance
« Reply #14 on: February 09, 2019, 08:12:15 pm »
Inheriting $100B is a different thing than a million.

Yes, the difference is exactly 99,999,000,000.

Kidding aside.  There's 2 people in the world worth 100 billion or more:  Jeff Bezos and Bill Gates.  Jeff Bezos is probably going to get fleeced in a divorce, so he might be worth less than 100 bil soon.  Even if no divorce, they have 4 kids, and Bill Gates has 3, so nobody is going to inherit 100 billion.

Even 500 million is quite different than 1 million, these days.
"Nipples is one of the great minds of our time!" - Bubbermiley