8 ms·

Taxes are whack, the more you make the more you get to keep. But you wanna know whats really whack? My mom died and I'm going thru the process of transferring h

Taxes are whack, the more you make the more you get to keep. But you wanna know whats really whack? My mom died and I'm going thru the process of transferring her property to me. I've got to pay a MF'ing inheritance / property transfer tax on it. She owned it 100%, the house and property have been in the family for 60+ years. My grandparents paid tax on it when they bought it. Nothing like America to come back and double dip at every turn.

mckirk 6y ago
On the one hand, it's really frustrating to be in that situation, because the property is clearly already yours. On the other hand, an inheritance tax is one of the few mechanisms I can think of to keep a wealth distribution at least somewhat under control. There's a constant accumulation of wealth at the top already anyway; re-distributing some of that back down the ladder when rich people die seems like a good idea. It of course would make more sense if the (elusive) middle class was hardly taxed at all in this scenario, and the 1% a ton, but... that would of course upset a lot of people with a lot of power.
- csomar 6y ago
  We don't really know anything about the OP. It's possible he is not rich, the house is not worth that much and that's all he has/inherited, he doesn't have money to pax the tax, and thus will need to sell the home at (probably) a discount to cover the tax bill. He could be actually slipping from middle-class as we speak.
  - mckirk 6y ago
    That was my initial impression of the OP actually, but after looking at [1], it seems they wouldn't have to pay an estate tax at all if the inheritance wasn't worth at least $5.3 million. [1]: https://americansfortaxfairness.org/tax-fairness-briefing-booklet/fact-sheet-the-estate-inheritance-tax/ https://americansfortaxfairness.org/tax-fairness-briefing-bo...
    - jjeaff 6y ago
      I believe the Trump tax bill raised that limit to $10m.
- someguydave 6y ago
  America is supposed to mean freedom for individuals, not free riches for the masses.
  - mckirk 6y ago
    I'm not sure you'd want to live in that kind of America. We aren't talking about "free riches" here, we are talking about keeping a country and society stable. And I'm convinced you can't do that without keeping inequality of all kinds -- income, wealth, education -- in check, because you'd cripple the country and ultimately end up with revolts otherwise, and probably justifiedly so. Every individual benefits from the (infra)structure and stability that a country and society offers them, so pretending it's okay for someone to make millions by using those benefits and then turning their back and saying "yes but all this is now solely my own and taxation is theft" is kind of ridiculous.
    - someguydave 6y ago
      taxation is not theft. it is also not charity.
  - TheCoelacanth 6y ago
    America is supposed to mean freedom from hereditary aristocracy. If billionaire dynasties don't count as that, I don't know what does.
    - throwawaytaxes1 6y ago
      I missed that part of the constitution, could you show it to me?
- bluefirebrand 6y ago
  > re-distributing some of that back down the ladder when rich people die seems like a good idea. Money going into government hands isn't exactly the same as redistributing it down the ladder, though.
  - didibus 6y ago
    > Money going into government hands isn't exactly the same as redistributing it down the ladder, though Because of corruption?
    - bluefirebrand 6y ago
      Corruption, incompetence, differing priorities, mismanagement, bloat, misallocation, probably a mixture of a bunch of factors really. It will still generally find itself in the hands of people with less wealth than the richest portion of society, but it almost always stops much higher than the bottom run.
  - mckirk 6y ago
    True, it is not exactly the same, because the wealthier people would probably still benefit disproportionately from most government spending. But by taking wealth out of the system at the top, you at least limit the growth of the divergence between rich and poor. And of course, you could in theory use the additional tax income to actually help the poor with better public education and better government-sponsored healthcare -- but that I guess would be dirty socialism.
    - bluefirebrand 6y ago
      My point is you take the money from the top, you kick it some distance (but not that far, generally) down the ladder and then that money inevitably makes its way back up. The problem isn't that we don't tax rich people enough. It's that the way the system is built, rich people become black holes that suck in any wealth that enters their orbit. Once they have it, it's effectively locked away from everyone. Taxes are one way to try and slow that down but it's clearly not a perfect solution and simply turning up the amount of tax isn't going to stop it.
LatteLazy 6y ago
I don't mean to be personal but... The company employing you likely paid tax on the money it got, now it passes it to you as wages and you pay "another" tax. The same for investments. Why shouldn't you pay on inheritance? You haven't paid tax on that property before right? And with an inheritance, the inheritors haven't done anything to deserve not to be taxed. Workers have worked, investors invested, inheritors are basically lottery winners. People don't like how inheritance tax feels but its actually one of the most logical, fairest, least economically expensive taxes.
- techstrategist 6y ago
  While there may have been some top-line VAT or sales tax, companies deduct wages and pay taxes on the net profit.
milliondollar 6y ago
I'm sorry, but unless you are in the US the estate is over $10m, you owe no federal taxes. https://smartasset.com/taxes/all-about-the-estate-tax#:~:text=For%20tax%20year%202017%2C%20the,now%20%2411.7%20million%20for%202021 https://smartasset.com/taxes/all-about-the-estate-tax#:~:tex.... I don't know what your local / state is shafting you for, but the estate tax rhetoric is totally a put on by rich people.
- nly 6y ago
  $10M is insanely generous. Here in the UK inheritance tax is 40% on everything over £325K ($450K USD), unless you leave it to your spouse (unlimited) or a charity. Even if you leave your estate to your kids or grand kids, it's only £500K ($700K) and that is only if you're leaving the family home (another example the UK being obsessed with property ownership). It's also payable by the recipient, not the executor of the will.
didibus 6y ago
Sorry for your loss, and apology to bring up what I'm about too. Since you didn't contribute anything for this house, why should it go to you? Why shouldn't it go back to society at large? I understand that we've all grown with this cultural idea of legacy and inheritance, but I find it more and more problematic and morally unjustifiable as I get older. It just seems like as much as we try to create equal opportunities for all children, we keep around this massive inequality where children whose parents have more wealth pass it along and create privilege classes, giving some unfair advantages over others. Already we see that the wealthier the parents the more successful the child, due to better education and care. To also have them inherit wealth they didn't amass themselves seems a tad too much in my opinion. I can see some reasonable scenarios, like when the child is still a dependent, or leaving behind a certain amount of sentimental goods, but beyond that it seems unfair to me. I tend to be very much aligned with the idea of equal opportunities, unequal outcomes. Each one of us should be able to compete on an even playing field with the rest for a bigger slice of the pie, and so if you contribute more to making the pie bigger you deserve a bigger slice and can enjoy it for yourself. Your kids though didn't, and shouldn't have unfair advantages of opportunities. Similarly, I think everyone deserves a minimum, which allows you to again have the necessary safety net to be able to equally compete with others. Traditionally this safety net has been provided through these inheritance schemes and the parents you have determined if you get a safety net or not.
- throwawaytaxes1 6y ago
  I hope this is satire.
  - didibus 6y ago
    No, I've seriously been rethinking the assumptions, benefits and merits of inheritance. I'm actually curious to learn what is the history behind it and the current philosophies for it. I'm not yet at a point where I'd fight against it, but it's been gestating in my head that it seems to be a wart to the system more than anything. Here's some literature around it: * http://www.ditext.com/current/0022.html#:~:text=No%2C%20Haslett%20contends%2C%20inheritance%20is,they%20fail%20to%20do%20so http://www.ditext.com/current/0022.html#:~:text=No%2C%20Hasl.... * https://www.theatlantic.com/business/archive/2011/06/why-do-we-allow-inheritance-at-all/240004/ https://www.theatlantic.com/business/archive/2011/06/why-do-... It also appears that Adam Smith and Thomas Jefferson similarly were against inheritance, or at least struggled to fit it in a capitalist model.

mckirk 6y ago

On the one hand, it's really frustrating to be in that situation, because the property is clearly already yours. On the other hand, an inheritance tax is one of the few mechanisms I can think of to keep a wealth distribution at least somewhat under control. There's a constant accumulation of wealth at the top already anyway; re-distributing some of that back down the ladder when rich people die seems like a good idea. It of course would make more sense if the (elusive) middle class was hardly taxed at all in this scenario, and the 1% a ton, but... that would of course upset a lot of people with a lot of power.

csomar 6y ago
We don't really know anything about the OP. It's possible he is not rich, the house is not worth that much and that's all he has/inherited, he doesn't have money to pax the tax, and thus will need to sell the home at (probably) a discount to cover the tax bill. He could be actually slipping from middle-class as we speak.
- mckirk 6y ago
  That was my initial impression of the OP actually, but after looking at [1], it seems they wouldn't have to pay an estate tax at all if the inheritance wasn't worth at least $5.3 million. [1]: https://americansfortaxfairness.org/tax-fairness-briefing-booklet/fact-sheet-the-estate-inheritance-tax/ https://americansfortaxfairness.org/tax-fairness-briefing-bo...
  - jjeaff 6y ago
    I believe the Trump tax bill raised that limit to $10m.
someguydave 6y ago
America is supposed to mean freedom for individuals, not free riches for the masses.
- mckirk 6y ago
  I'm not sure you'd want to live in that kind of America. We aren't talking about "free riches" here, we are talking about keeping a country and society stable. And I'm convinced you can't do that without keeping inequality of all kinds -- income, wealth, education -- in check, because you'd cripple the country and ultimately end up with revolts otherwise, and probably justifiedly so. Every individual benefits from the (infra)structure and stability that a country and society offers them, so pretending it's okay for someone to make millions by using those benefits and then turning their back and saying "yes but all this is now solely my own and taxation is theft" is kind of ridiculous.
  - someguydave 6y ago
    taxation is not theft. it is also not charity.
- TheCoelacanth 6y ago
  America is supposed to mean freedom from hereditary aristocracy. If billionaire dynasties don't count as that, I don't know what does.
  - throwawaytaxes1 6y ago
    I missed that part of the constitution, could you show it to me?
bluefirebrand 6y ago
> re-distributing some of that back down the ladder when rich people die seems like a good idea. Money going into government hands isn't exactly the same as redistributing it down the ladder, though.
- didibus 6y ago
  > Money going into government hands isn't exactly the same as redistributing it down the ladder, though Because of corruption?
  - bluefirebrand 6y ago
    Corruption, incompetence, differing priorities, mismanagement, bloat, misallocation, probably a mixture of a bunch of factors really. It will still generally find itself in the hands of people with less wealth than the richest portion of society, but it almost always stops much higher than the bottom run.
- mckirk 6y ago
  True, it is not exactly the same, because the wealthier people would probably still benefit disproportionately from most government spending. But by taking wealth out of the system at the top, you at least limit the growth of the divergence between rich and poor. And of course, you could in theory use the additional tax income to actually help the poor with better public education and better government-sponsored healthcare -- but that I guess would be dirty socialism.
  - bluefirebrand 6y ago
    My point is you take the money from the top, you kick it some distance (but not that far, generally) down the ladder and then that money inevitably makes its way back up. The problem isn't that we don't tax rich people enough. It's that the way the system is built, rich people become black holes that suck in any wealth that enters their orbit. Once they have it, it's effectively locked away from everyone. Taxes are one way to try and slow that down but it's clearly not a perfect solution and simply turning up the amount of tax isn't going to stop it.

LatteLazy 6y ago

I don't mean to be personal but... The company employing you likely paid tax on the money it got, now it passes it to you as wages and you pay "another" tax. The same for investments. Why shouldn't you pay on inheritance? You haven't paid tax on that property before right? And with an inheritance, the inheritors haven't done anything to deserve not to be taxed. Workers have worked, investors invested, inheritors are basically lottery winners. People don't like how inheritance tax feels but its actually one of the most logical, fairest, least economically expensive taxes.

techstrategist 6y ago
While there may have been some top-line VAT or sales tax, companies deduct wages and pay taxes on the net profit.

milliondollar 6y ago

I'm sorry, but unless you are in the US the estate is over $10m, you owe no federal taxes. https://smartasset.com/taxes/all-about-the-estate-tax#:~:text=For%20tax%20year%202017%2C%20the,now%20%2411.7%20million%20for%202021 https://smartasset.com/taxes/all-about-the-estate-tax#:~:tex.... I don't know what your local / state is shafting you for, but the estate tax rhetoric is totally a put on by rich people.

nly 6y ago
$10M is insanely generous. Here in the UK inheritance tax is 40% on everything over £325K ($450K USD), unless you leave it to your spouse (unlimited) or a charity. Even if you leave your estate to your kids or grand kids, it's only £500K ($700K) and that is only if you're leaving the family home (another example the UK being obsessed with property ownership). It's also payable by the recipient, not the executor of the will.

didibus 6y ago

Sorry for your loss, and apology to bring up what I'm about too. Since you didn't contribute anything for this house, why should it go to you? Why shouldn't it go back to society at large? I understand that we've all grown with this cultural idea of legacy and inheritance, but I find it more and more problematic and morally unjustifiable as I get older. It just seems like as much as we try to create equal opportunities for all children, we keep around this massive inequality where children whose parents have more wealth pass it along and create privilege classes, giving some unfair advantages over others. Already we see that the wealthier the parents the more successful the child, due to better education and care. To also have them inherit wealth they didn't amass themselves seems a tad too much in my opinion. I can see some reasonable scenarios, like when the child is still a dependent, or leaving behind a certain amount of sentimental goods, but beyond that it seems unfair to me. I tend to be very much aligned with the idea of equal opportunities, unequal outcomes. Each one of us should be able to compete on an even playing field with the rest for a bigger slice of the pie, and so if you contribute more to making the pie bigger you deserve a bigger slice and can enjoy it for yourself. Your kids though didn't, and shouldn't have unfair advantages of opportunities. Similarly, I think everyone deserves a minimum, which allows you to again have the necessary safety net to be able to equally compete with others. Traditionally this safety net has been provided through these inheritance schemes and the parents you have determined if you get a safety net or not.

throwawaytaxes1 6y ago
I hope this is satire.
- didibus 6y ago
  No, I've seriously been rethinking the assumptions, benefits and merits of inheritance. I'm actually curious to learn what is the history behind it and the current philosophies for it. I'm not yet at a point where I'd fight against it, but it's been gestating in my head that it seems to be a wart to the system more than anything. Here's some literature around it: * http://www.ditext.com/current/0022.html#:~:text=No%2C%20Haslett%20contends%2C%20inheritance%20is,they%20fail%20to%20do%20so http://www.ditext.com/current/0022.html#:~:text=No%2C%20Hasl.... * https://www.theatlantic.com/business/archive/2011/06/why-do-we-allow-inheritance-at-all/240004/ https://www.theatlantic.com/business/archive/2011/06/why-do-... It also appears that Adam Smith and Thomas Jefferson similarly were against inheritance, or at least struggled to fit it in a capitalist model.