As many on the blog are aware, I am a fiscal conservative and social liberal (the profile of many a libertarian). I have previously railed against our soaring debt and the continued inability of our presidents and members of Congress to exercise a modicum of fiscal responsibility. This is a new low with the Treasury Department taking on $1trillion in more debt — for a second year in a row. We are saddling our children with this crippling level of debt to avoid our politicians to escape their responsibility to make tough decisions. With the start of the 2020 presidential election, politicians are lining up with expansive new spending proposals to entice supporters as our government plunges deeper into debt.
Congress in March approved a bloated $1.3 trillion spending bill. Notably, the stumbling block in the end was not a demand for fiscal responsibility but an objection from a Republican Senator over the renaming of an Idaho wilderness area.
Representative Nita M. Lowey (D., NY) heralded the spending bill as “repudiat[ing] the abysmal Trump budget, investing robustly in critical priorities like child care, transportation infrastructure, national security, election protection, medical research, opioid abuse prevention and treatment, veterans’ health services and much more.” What it did not do is make responsible cuts to balance programs. There were big increases for both defense and domestic programs. I also disagree with the Trump Administration which seems to relish cuts in the environment (which produce collateral and greater costs) while increasing spending on defense and other preferred areas.
With new election, this will only get worse as candidates dangle shiny and expensive objects before the voters to induce their votes. Despite watching meltdowns in countries like Greece and Spain over debt, we are gleefully adding debt and kicking the can down the road for a future generation to face the consequences.
Under George H. W. Bush the government to the right to put a tax on 50 percent of our social security income. Bill Clinton added another 35 percent. As far as I’m concerned that’s a tax on a tax. Obama wanted to put a tax on Roth IRAs. I wish the people of this country would just plain wake up.
I, Bob,
The revision that subjected 50% of Social Security benefits was actually made toward the end of Reagan’s first term, over 4 years before Bush 41 became president.
While the Reagan tax cuts and revisions in 1982 were not reversed, “new” areas to tax were subsequently “found”.
I listed some of those in a comment that did not post, so I won’t go over those “new” areas of taxation again.
It looks like a reply by Diane that reached my email never reached the blog. This should make her even more paranoid. I noted a comment of hers that said: “I used to think that maybe the low-glucose phase of type II diabetes might explain Ptom’s irritability.”
This made me wonder if her knowledge of what low sugar does to the brain might be because in the past her mental condition was treated with insulin shock therapy which was used decades ago by psychiatrists. That form of treatment was discontinued with advances in medicine.
If L4D has never noticed that people find her irritating, it’s pretty clear that she doesn’t get out much.
At least beyond her own small circle ( and/or pentagram).
This is so irresponsible it’s insane. We’re going to end up like Cypress or Greece.
We have set up a political system in which politicians running for re-election buy votes by promising lots of stuff to voters and big donors. We’ve gotten so addicted to tax and spend that we’ve about hit bottom with glassy eyed promises of Medicare for All!” Free Education for All! Free healthcare for illegal aliens! Global Warming is our WWIII and you’re worried how we’re going to pay for all these Global Warming Initiatives? Ban Gas Vehicles! Ban Fossil Fuels!
It’s like the drug addicted rat hitting that bar excitedly to get its dose of cocaine.
The spend addicts are bringing us to ruination, dragging the fiscal conservatives down with them. Republicans don’t have the backbone to slash spending, because they’re too afraid of the weaponized rhetoric of throw Grandma off the cliff. Plus, the way you play the game is to get Bill A passed, you have to promise Pork Spending to districts A-ZZZ to gain their votes.
Karen, tax cuts for the wealthy are freebies Republicans kick-back to their biggest donors. Yet you don’t mention that above. Instead it’s just a vague, generalized rant that any conservative might have made 20, 30 or 40 years ago.
And that’s common with Republicans. In their minds it’s always 1980 and Reagan is running against big-spending liberals. Never mind that Reagan ran up the debt more than any recent president. Symbolically he balanced the budget in the minds of conservatives like you.
Peter:
Politicians represent everyone’s best interests – the poor, middle class, and the wealthy. It is unethical to consider the wealthy to be enemies of the state, or to constantly raise taxes upon them without offering relief.
I certainly do not find tax relief for the wealthy to be immoral. They pay the freight in our economy. In fact, I am in the minority, in which I believe in one, single, flat tax for everyone. We should all be in the same boat. Research has shown that someone is more willing to inflict pain upon another person than himself. Obviously. When a majority of non wealthy people set the tax rate for the wealthy, then they will make sure their own rate is far lower, and the wealthy, who are helpless to do anything about it, is much higher. It is inflicting pain upon others. People are far more likely to vote for high taxes for other people than for themselves. That is a type of tyranny and lack of representation or self determination.
If everyone paid the same tax rate, then we would be a lot more careful about raising taxes. It would hurt us, too, and not just some abstract, “other people”. We should increase the benefits we pay to the poor, so that after taxes, they net the same. Then, we all “built that”. Right now, it’s just the middle and wealthy who build roads and bridges and schools. The poor pay sales tax, gas tax, phone taxes, and DMV fees, but no income tax. If we’re all in the same boat, tax wise, maybe we’ll start pulling together. Maybe, just maybe, we won’t stubbornly persist in the tax and spend mentality.
“TAXATION WITHOUT REPRESENTATION”
“REPRESENTATION WITHOUT TAXATION”
__________________________________
The American Founders did not establish a “Debtor Nation” of and by the “poor.”
The Founders conducted a violent American Revolution over “…taxation without representation.”
45% of Americans don’t pay income tax allowing parasites to enjoy “…representation without taxation.”
The American Founders were eminently logical and rational and never intended for the “poor” to vote.
To wit,
“The true reason (says Blackstone) of requiring any qualification, with regard to property in voters, is to exclude such persons, as are in so mean a situation, that they are esteemed to have no will of their own.”
“If it were probable that every man would give his vote freely, and without influence of any kind, then, upon the true theory and genuine principles of liberty, every member of the community, however poor, should have a vote… But since that can hardly be expected, in persons of indigent fortunes, or such as are under the immediate dominion of others, all popular states have been obliged to establish certain qualifications, whereby, some who are suspected to have no will of their own, are excluded from voting; in order to set other individuals, whose wills may be supposed independent, more thoroughly upon a level with each other.”
– Alexander Hamilton – The Farmer Refuted, 1775
It is long past time for states to apply criteria and require qualifications to vote.
“It is long past time for states to apply criteria and require qualifications to vote.”
George, I see you have changed your tune. Amendment X and Section 4 did the job.
Allen, Thanks for reading. The Constitution leaves the qualification of voters to the states. The states may apply criteria or allow everyone to vote. Thus it has always been. On critical issues, however, the vote, no matter who casts it, is moot because the Constitution precludes the principles of communism – central planning, control of the means of production (i.e. regulation), redistribution of wealth and social engineering. This is effected through:
1. The limitation on Congress that it may tax only for “…general Welfare…” not individual welfare,
2. The commerce clause that only allows regulation of the “flow,” exchange or trade of commerce “…among the several states…,” in order to preclude bias or favor by one state over another, not the design, engineering, production, marketing or any other aspect of free enterprise.
3. The right to private property “…in the exclusion of every other indivdual…,” including the government, per Madison, which precludes all forms of social engineering such as affirmative action, quotas, “Fair Housing” laws, “Non-Discrimination” laws, rent control, forced busing, “hate crime” laws, etc.
So the Founders restricted the vote in Franklin’s “…republic, if you can keep it…” and restricted the actions of government. limiting it to merely facilitating freedom and free enterprise and the thesis of the Constitution: Freedom and Self-Reliance.
Someone please tell the Supreme Court about the U.S. Constitution. Charity or voluntary redistribution of wealth is industry conducted in the free markets of the private sector. All voters should be required to read and comprehend the salient and bearing parts of the Constitution but, sorry, communism is not allowed, no matter who votes.
“Allen, Thanks for reading. The Constitution leaves the qualification of voters to the states.”
George, thank you for finally getting that point down straight. It was a hard road but we finally got you there so that in future posts you won’t make the same mistake again.
“the Constitution precludes the principles of communism – central planning, control of the means of production (i.e. regulation), redistribution of wealth and social engineering. This is effected through:”
Though I disdain communism here again you are making the same mistake you made earlier. In this case refer to Article 5, Amendments. Can you show us based on Article 5 how the Constitution “precludes the principles of communism” from suddenly being amended into the Constitution. Once again you are talking about a Constitution that resides in your head and not the one that resides in Washington.
Though I agree with points such as limited government, right to private property, etc. one can’t discuss that with you until you understand what the Constitution actually says and how virtually everything can be changed by Amendment.
Allen, as all Americans can read in Article 1, Section 8, that the Supreme Court erroneously, subjectively, politically, arbitrarily and treasonously did not support and enforce the obvious unconstitutionality of Obamacare, Medicare, Social Security, welfare, affirmative action and all other iterations of the American Welfare State, many Americans do not support the constitutionality of the “Reconstruction” and 19th Amendments. Amendments that are “injurious” to America and the Constitution itself must be opposed and, as was the case with the 18th, repealed. The 13th, 14th, 15th and 19th amendments were improperly “ratified,” are distinctly “injurious” to the Constitution and have led to the current dystopian, polarized, hysterical and incoherent condition of America. You would have to agree that the current fervency of political opposition exceeds that of the latter antebellum period. As American elections have been corrupted by unlimited and illegal immigration and election tampering and fraud, the Constitution has been corrupted by “injurious” amendments. The Constitution, like the Ten Commandments was written to stand not to be destroyed. As “Crazy Abe” Lincoln said, “America will never be destroyed from the outside. If we falter and lose our freedoms, it will be because we destroyed ourselves.” Lincoln was the architect of that destruction. Before that, the Founders “…secured the Blessings of Liberty to ourselves and our Posterity,…” and required citizens to be “…free white person(s)…” It seems clear that, for the most part, amendments subsequent to the Bill of Rights have “injured” the Constitution and America and require ultimate repeal. As His Eminence, King Lincoln, did, a president will be compelled to take the bull by the horns and restore constitutional America.
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”And if there are amendments desired, of such a nature as will not injure the constitution, and they can be ingrafted so as to give satisfaction to the doubting part of our fellow citizens; the friends of the federal government will evince that spirit of deference and concession for which they have hitherto been distinguished.”
– James Madison, Proposed Amendments to the Constitution, June 8, 1789
___________________________________________________________
“The influx of foreigners must, therefore, tend to produce a heterogeneous compound; to change and corrupt the national spirit; to complicate and confound public opinion; to introduce foreign propensities. In the composition of society, the harmony of the ingredients is all-important, and whatever tends to a discordant intermixture must have an injurious tendency.”
– Alexander Hamilton
_________________
Women were not allowed to vote with the rare exception of wealthy heads of household as “…any widow or feme sole (legally, the head of household) over 21 who paid property taxes…”
“Early voting activity”
“Lydia Taft (1712–1778), a wealthy widow, was allowed to vote in town meetings in Uxbridge, Massachusetts in 1756. No other women in the colonial era are known to have voted.
The New Jersey constitution of 1776 enfranchised all adult inhabitants who owned a specified amount of property. Laws enacted in 1790 and 1797 referred to voters as “he or she”, and women regularly voted. A law passed in 1807, however, excluded women from voting in that state.
Kentucky passed the first statewide woman suffrage law in the New Republic Era (since New Jersey revoked their woman suffrage rights in 1807) – allowing any widow or feme sole (legally, the head of household) over 21 who paid property taxes for the new county “common school” system.”
– Wiki
“Allen, as all Americans can “…
George, I don’t need to hear your rants about the Supreme Coiurt. It is enough that I have gotten you to look at the Constitution to see where you went wrong and then you made the same mistake on another issue.
Read the Constitution and its amendments along with SC decisions before you make any more mistakes. A lot of people are disatisfied with a lot of what the SC has done. You and everyone else are entitled to their opinions.
It is nice, however, that you spent the time and found that NJ was the state I referred to where woman could vote until early in the 19th century. I think that might have occurred because their Constitution was created when the British were coming and they may have been a bit rushed.
It isn’t as big a deal as it sounds at first examination. The results of a long series of events ended up in a reduction in the value of the dollar by 30% during the Obama administration and at best stagflation as evidenced by the eight machts nixt COLA.
The entire program that did this was based on a strategy first written up by Carlos Marighella called The Cycle or Circle of Repression. It was obvious back then one could switch the two major actors (government and anti government) at any time.
The advantage to the government came with the government’s ability to use manufactured crisis for whatever end purpose. The economic pathway was heavy borrowing, inflation of the money supply, devaluation of the value of the money supply and a call for uncalled for minimum wages and higher taxes.
Who suffered? The retirees and the elderly who took an extra hit to their retirement fund through ‘food costs’ to produce ethanol, medical costs, and increased direct and indirect taxes . The only out pushed many of us out of the country.
The plan produced by “I love a crisis” Clinton followed this same path for another ten trillion trip on the Cycle of Economic Repression. and the current crop of economic nit wits who want to stick to the retired and elderly again. This time using the worn out Green Party platform as an excuse.
Hopefully at some point such as two more Constitutional SCOTUS Judges who can revisit the ruling on recall and term limits passed in the 1980s to apply to all state level officials such as delegates to the national congress and perhaps automatically add initiative and referendum to every state.
The argument that it takes xyz number of years to learn the job is proof it’s too complex and that leads to the suspicion is a scam of one sort or another… regardless of party.
So for starters. When a bill is presented require the specific cites and site in The Constitution that allows the proposal. And allow that to be sent to the Courts before being further considered. Cases in point ….. Money as Free Speech and denial of being seated in government at any level where the very oath of office denies their presence.
Look the true center of a Constitutional Republic, The Constitution and disregard the phony centers of the fringe fanatics seeking a destruction of OUR system of government. in favor of something that does not now and never has existed.
.
DEBT INCREASES FOR EACH PRESIDENT SINCE REAGAN
Again using data from the St. Louis Federal Reserve, these are starting and ending federal debt numbers since President Reagan. I’ve computed the total percentage increase and the compounded yearly rate.
What the numbers show is that the total debt increased the most at 184% over 8 years and at the fastest rate under President Reagan at almost 14% per year. In fact, the three Republican presidents had the fastest growing debt on a yearly basis.
Reagan
Started Presidency: $965 billion
Ended Presidency: $2.74 trillion
Increased 184% or 13.9% per year
H.W. Bush
Started Presidency: $2.74 trillion
Ended Presidency: $4.23 trillion
Increased 54% or 11.5% per year (only in office for four years)
Clinton
Started Presidency: $4.23 trillion
Ended Presidency: $5.77 trillion
Increased 36% or 4.0% per year
G.W. Bush
Started Presidency: $5.77 trillion
Ended Presidency: $11.1 trillion
Increased 93% or 8.5% per year
Obama
Started Presidency: $11.1 trillion
Ended Presidency: $19.85 trillion
Increased 78% or 7.5% per year
President Obama’s debt actually grew at a slower annual rate than any of the Republican presidents even though there were events that negatively impacted the deficit that started before he became President. The Great Recession is probably the biggest of them as can be seen in the yearly deficit numbers. While all politicians use data to support their positions, the sound bite that the debt doubled under Obama is very misleading.
Edited from: “Don’t Blame Obama For Doubling The Federal Deficit”
FORBES, 1/15/18
RE. ABOVE:
There are certain Republicans on this thread who keep insisting tObama was particularly irresponsible with regards to debt increases. But as the table above demonstrates, debt increases under Obama were smaller than debt increases under Reagan and G.W. Bush. Bill Clinton comes out as the best manager with only 36% increase. It seems that occasional tax hikes are quite useful for paying-down debt (not that Donald Trump wants to know).
All of which explains the $10 Trillion in debt added during the Obama years, and means that it was actually Reagan and the Bushes’ fault.
What’s a piddlely little $10 Trillion when viewed in the perspective of the “long haul” and the “real” causes of that $10 Trillion in additional debt?
A good strategy for any incoming president would be to try for a $10Trillion deficit in his first year, and reduce it to $5 Trillion by his last year.
That way, a claim could be made that he “reduced the deficit by 50%” during his administration.
Don’t worry if he stacked on $50-60 Trillion in debt during his administration; try to spin it as “fiscal restraint”, instead.
Tom, are you going to blame the Great Recession on Obama or Barney Frank?
For some irrational reason you have it in your head that Obama was the biggest spender of all time. And facts seem to mean nothing to you. This is another example of how right-wing media dumbs people down.
The reason that I, and others, consider Obama to be “the biggest spender of all time” is because annual federal spending reach an all-time high during the Obama Administration.
Do you understand why, when an administration spents far more than any previous administration, that the administration might be considered to be ” biggest spender of all time?
Most people could probably understand that.
Reading your comments, I’m not certain if you are merely stupid, or willfully ignorant.
Let’s get back to your major, overriding point: Reagan deficits, bad👿, Bush 41deficits bad👿, Bush 43 deficits 👿bad, Obama deficits good😇.
This ties in with your consistent belief and theme:
Democrats good😇
Republicans bad👿
That’s why you have earned the title of “Sanctimonious Puke”.
You started out this year with a bang by adding the Peternomics tool of lying through your teeth, and since you need that crutch for your handicaps, there’s nothing to stop you from lying.
Just as there is nothing from stopping me from stating that you are, like most liars, lowlife trash.
Stop wasting my time, you fool.
Tom, Bush Sr and Clinton put the country on the right path by raising taxes when it was needed. And instead of hurting the economy, we had years of strong growth. I credit Bush Sr as much as Clinton.
Reagan drove the Soviets into bankruptcy. So it was probably worth all the spending. Therefore I don’t put historic blame on Reagan.
But with George W. you had a president who knew damn well Boomers would retire 10 years down the road. George W. was one of those Boomers. There was no excuse for him to cut taxes before war.
George W’s administration officially projected Iraq would cost $50 billion at the most. His Budget Director revised the figure to $100 billion without Bush’s permission. For that Bruce Bartlett had to resign!
9 / 11, Afghanistan, Iraq, The Medicare Drug Expansion were all essentially placed on the national charge card. Add to that Hurricane’s Katrina and Sandy.
Those huge outlays have driven debt ever since. They were never paid for! Obama couldn’t raise taxes enough to pay for all those outlays. Not with the Great Recession. Tax hikes are hard to sell in recessions.
So this manufactured outrage you keep expressing towards Obama is utterly pretentious. It’s just outrage for the sake of being outraged.
Peter – you have got to be kidding me, using percentages to justify massive spending increases.
A smaller percentage of a larger figure equals a far greater total sum, which makes it much easier to say you have a lower percentage rate.
Allow me to illustrate why statisticians warn about falling for numbers:
When you owe very little, anything you buy is a comparatively large increase in debt. For example, if Gretchen owes only $100, and you buy a suit jacket on credit for a job interview for $100, you have just increased your debt by 100%. For Rebecca, the Girl with the Green Scarf, who spent more money than she could make in 10 years, those 1,000 thread count sheets she didn’t need were only a small percentage increase in her overall, ruinous debt. Granted, they were $700, way more than that suit jacket, but, you see, that percentage increase was far less on her overall debt than what her sister incurred with her suit jacket.
Karen, I have never seen a more cynical argument to justify demonizing Obama. Like somehow Percentage of Increase no longer matters as a measure.
Interestingly Paul Ryan invented a form of math known as “Dynamic Scoring”. With Dynamic Scoring increased deficits from tax cuts are weighed against presumed benefits to the economy. Ryan had to invent this math because all the tax cuts he wanted looked terrible when projections were made regarding surged deficits and debt. So the Republican Congress actually passed a bill requiring the Office Of Budget & Management to use Dynamic Scoring in tax cut projections. That scoring made Trump’s tax cut look slightly less expensive than it is.
Karen, if percentages don’t mean anything, do you even care about interest on your credit cards or retirement accounts?
“demonizing Obama”. Please show me where I demonized Obama. I don’t believe I have done so, unless someone brings up Obamacare. Then I will happily draw a circle of salt around him, make the sign of the cross, and call in a priest.
Please address my point about how percentages can be misleading on skyrocketing debt. I used a very specific example. Did you understand what I was getting at? Did I say percentages don’t mean anything? No. I did not. I said “A smaller percentage of a larger figure equals a far greater total sum, which makes it much easier to say you have a lower percentage rate.” And then I used a very specific example about how once you get your debt up high enough, you can justify wasting all sorts of money because, percentage wise, it doesn’t seem that high. People have wracked up insurmountable credit card debt doing exactly that.
Good luck in dealing with that hyperpartisan, sanctimonious moron, Karen.
I have a certain amount of patience with a jackass like Peter.
But only a certain amount. Once they’re that committed, like Peter, in repeatedly proving what a sanctimonious jackass he is, that’s pretty much the end of any “discussion”.
It takes two to waive PAYGO. The 2009 waiver of PAYGO was “bipartisan” according to both Paulson and Geitner. The waiver of PAYGO for making the Bush-Era tax cuts permanent was well-nigh exclusively Republican.
https://www.cbpp.org/research/federal-budget/policy-basics-the-pay-as-you-go-budget-rule
Dec 3, 2018 … In the late 1990s, however, Congress and the President began waiving PAYGO in response to the booming economy and several years of …
Excerpted from the article linked above:
Congress can, however, waive PAYGO for a particular bill with the support of 60 senators and the majority of the House. It did so in response to the Great Recession, enacting the housing and financial rescue legislation of 2008 and the Recovery Act of 2009. Other PAYGO exceptions include the permanent extension of most but not all of the Bush tax cuts at the end of 2012 and the 2017 tax law.
[end excerpt]
Now who was President in 2017 when the Republican Majority in The Senate waived PAYGO for [what’s-his-name’s] tax cuts? For that matter, which Speaker of the House eliminated the PAYGO rule in the House? And which Speaker of the House reinstated the PAYGO rule in the House?
https://www.heritage.org/budget-and-spending/commentary/paygo-unworkable-gimmick
More people have probably heard of CITGO than PAYGO, and there’s a reason for that.
As noted in the article, the PAYGO “has been gutted into irrelevance”.
Lip service to spending restraints or an imaginary commitment to budget restraint don’t have a tangible impact on deficits, but it’s politically beneficial for to claim fiscal responsibilty while you’re running $1 Trillion + deficits.
Oh Tom, you were going to tell us ‘when’ George W. paid-off 9 / 11, Afghanistan, Iraq, Medicare Expansion, Katrina and Sandy.
You seemingly claimed that none of these expenses were passed on to Obama in terms of debt. So if you could just post something that documents ‘when’ George W paid-off off these outlays, we would appreciate.
Thanks
For whatever reason, St. Peter decided that I was going to tell how Bush 43 paid off 9-11, the Afghanistan War, Hurricane Katrine, etc.
I”ll get right on that as soon as I tell how Obama paid off the $Cash$ for Clunkers program. payroll tax moratorium/ reductions, green energy tax credits, “shovel-ready”😒 infrastructure projects, $10,000 home buyer tax credits, massive increase in MediCaid enrollees, etc.
As for inheriting the wars, Obama saved us a bundle when he “ended the war in Iraq” in his first term.
So he “disinherited” the expenses of that war when he “ended” it.
To the extent that Obama stayed engaged in the Afghan and Iraq wars, he was faced ongoing expenses of conducting those wars.
Just as the Bush 43 deficits were partially caused by the costs of these wars, some of those costs continued into the Obama Administration.
But whatever impact they had on the overall deficits of the Obama Administration, the “Bush war deficits” are part of the Bush Administration’s deficits,and the “Obama war deficits” are part of the Obam Administation’s deficits.
If $200 billion of a Bush Administration deficit was caused by the wars, you don’t get to “re-use” that same $200 Billion shortfall as an excuse for the Obama deficits.
Keep the Bush 43 war deficits in the Bush administration, and keep the Obama war deficits in the Obama Administration..
Tom, but it will post as Anonymous due to no log-in space
Tom, if Bush ran up only $200 billion in war costs, there would be no complaint from me. $200 billion would have been well-worth it just see Saddam hang.
But I think the real costs of Iraq were well north of a trillion before Obama even entered the White House.
And you’re trying to tell me ‘Bush paid that off before leaving’..??
Why are using “Anonymous” as your handle?? You’re more disingenuous than I ever figured.
…and yet, Turley neglects to mention the role the Trump Republican tax cuts play in the increasing debt.
” Conservatives say if you don’t give the rich more money, they lose their incentive to invest. As for the poor, they tell us they’ve lost all incentive because we’ve given them too much money” George Carlin
Amazingly incentives actually work that way.
some people are satsified with very little – those people tend to be poor. If you meet their basic needs, they will do nothing.
Some people are not satisified no matter how much they have. If you preclude the opportunity for them to get more they will stop producing.
Productive folks enjoy being productive. It is a reward in itself.
Meritless heirs never have and never will produce anything.
I guess what Samantha is saying is that productive folk that have meritless heirs should stop production and let their companies fail and their employees be left jobless or spend the money on prostitutes and bling.
No, he saying Uncle Schuyler didn’t leave him squat. Old man likely thought his nephew a rude little prick.
I think she might be indicating that Uncle Sam should take it all.
Should we apply an estate tax to only “meritless” heirs, or meritorious heirs as well?😉
I so happen to deviate from the most conservative camp when it comes to estate taxes. I believe in estate taxes though I don’t like that they have to be paid at one time. I think the British permit the payment over a period of 3 generations but could be completely wrong.
The entire tax system is lousy and permits people like Warren Buffet to virtue signal when he says he pays a lower percentage of tax then his secretary… His investment strategy permitted him to pay very little in taxes over the years despite his phenomenal gain in wealth. He wants rich people to pay more to the government but in death he will leave a substantial portion of his money to a charity avoiding the estate tax because he must feel that giving to the government wouldn’t be as good a use of the money as giving it to a private concern. If he weren’t a hypocrite he would pay the taxes on the gift and give the remainder to charity.
Sam. wrong. Every heir is by definition getting something they did not deserve. From a small bequest to a big one. And they MERIT it or not mostly just in the sole opinion of the person who GAVE it. That is one of the “sticks in the bundle” of property rights: the right to make bequests according to one’s own pleasure, that we enjoy wide latitude for in our English system of laws. This is fundamental estates practice.
Now in the minds of other people do they merit a bequest? Generally the only other opinions that will count are those who sit on a jury of a will contest. And it is a relevant question for evidence to be presented.
Now do YOU Think so and so merits their inheritance? Maybe or maybe not. Opinions, as they say, are like certain excretory orifices. everyone has one.
It may interest people to know that Ole Mass Tom Jeff advocated a confiscatory estate tax. Another one of his really really stupid ideas that he just flapped gums about and never dared to practice. Like that “equality” thing
When i say by definition beneficiaries are getting what they do not deserve, by definition, is based solely on my own value system which states that you DESERVE what you WORK for. And other things are just good luck or windfalls.
I thus did not deserve my inheritance, in my own thinking; even if I was a good kid and my parents believed I merited it. But as I did not work for it per se, I did not deserve it.
That is NOT to say however, that anybody else, “DESERVED” IT– CERTAINLY NOT THE TAX MAN!
Just wanted to clarify my meaning.
Likewise if I gamble, I do not DESERVE the winnings, if I am so lucky. But if I am entitled to the winnings per the rules of the game, I better GET them, or I will sue the casino.
Thus they are windfalls but I do not consider myself as “deserving” wins or losses at games of chance.
I would submit that my thinking is healthy for a normal productive adult. It is called not believing that one is “entitled” to what one does not work for, and that one does not DESERVE the property of other people
I wish i could say Democrats exhibit the same mentality but I think many of them think they are ENTITLED to what others have and that they DESERVE it because they are: women, minorities, disabled, refugees, foreigners, homosexuals, castrati, etc, take your pick of supposedly oppressed groups, who all essentially want to gang up on whomever has the money!
Those who have the money at the end of the day, will only keep the money, if they are smart and strong and capable of defending what they have. That is always the final equation regardless of place and time in history.
Thanks for the clarification. I understand why you feel that way.
I feel very strongly that it is my right to give my family heirlooms, or family business, or home, or my savings, to my heir. This is part of personal freedom.
“Sam. wrong. Every heir is by definition getting something they did not deserve.”
Why does the government deserve it?
Why should I work, scrimp, and save my entire life so that everything I built gets handed over to the government to waste? That is against evolution. Mammals evolved to improve the chances of successful offspring. It is my right to improve the circumstances of my offspring. It is not the government’s right to seize everything I’ve owned, and worked for, leaving my offspring destitute. For example, kicking an offspring out of a home because the parent has no right to bequeath it to him, but rather becomes the property of the government.
The government taxes properties, savings, income, businesses… I do not believe they are owed an additional piece of the pie when it changes hands after the death of the owner. It sometimes seems like the Walking Dead at the gate, ravening to seize what people earned, to take it away from their kids, under the color of government. This is after paying exorbitant taxes on almost every transaction possible for an entire lifetime.
No taxation without respiration.