On 2010-09-30 18:39:55 -0400, Jonathan Cook said:

On Sep 30, 3:45*pm, D. LaCourse wrote:

BTW, Jon, I am going to assume that your estate is worth *more* than a
million bucks.

I come from a blue-collar family that can't even imagine anything like
a million dollars, and while I'm doing OK my "estate" is not even
close to that.

d;o) So did I. The *maximum* amount my father ever made was
$3000/year. He worked until he was 67 and died behind the wheel of his
trailor truck. When my mom died, she left the three of us $900 apiece.
So, I started from scratch

*As of Jan 1, I believe the estate tax will go from 0 to
55% with up to the first million being untaxed. *If you are worth,
let's say 2 mill, your survivors will pay $550k on you estate.

Sounds good to me, bring it on. I'd tax large estates (say, 7+
figures) _very_ heavily. Let the kids earn their own. I'd be all in
favor of exemptions for, say, "land-rich and cash-poor" family farmers
and ranchers, but our politicians can't do anything special like that
without selling out to their big donors...

Ah, but that's the rub, Jon. The land-rich and cash-poor farmers are
included. Chances are farm sales will abound.

*Your survivors owe the U.S. Government NOTHING,

And even under the above they still won't...

a tax such as what Obama has in store for us is onerous.

Don't include me in that, and FWIW I didn't see the rich give up being
rich when previous eras had inheritance taxes. If it bothers you so
much give your money all away until you fall back under the
cap...problem solved.

I think Obama's tax scheme is onerous. You *never* raise taxes during
a recession, but he is. I don't think the outcome is going to be like
he thinks it will be.

Jon.

Dave