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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 o
by 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 agoWe 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 agoThat 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 agoI believe the Trump tax bill raised that limit to $10m.
- someguydave 6y agoAmerica is supposed to mean freedom for individuals, not free riches for the masses.
- mckirk 6y agoI'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 agotaxation is not theft. it is also not charity.
- TheCoelacanth 6y agoAmerica is supposed to mean freedom from hereditary aristocracy. If billionaire dynasties don't count as that, I don't know what does.
- throwawaytaxes1 6y agoI 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 agoCorruption, 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 agoTrue, 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 agoMy 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.