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Trumka: Boost Fairness and Revenue with Estate Tax Reinstatement
New York Yankees owner George Steinbrenner and hundreds of other multimillionaires (and some billionaires, like Steinbrenner) who have passed away this year disproved the old adage, “the only two things certain in life are death and taxes.”
They couldn’t dodge death, but their estates have dodged taxes—some $14.8 billion so far this year, according to Sen. Tom Harkin (D-Iowa). The federal estate tax that in the past applied to multimillion-dollar fortunes fully expired at the end of 2009, after President George W. Bush’s 2001 $1.35 trillion tax cut package for the wealthy exempted larger and larger estates from the levy each year.
Today, AFL-CIO President Richard Trumka, former Treasury Secretary Robert Rubin, philanthropist and Walt Disney heir Abigail Disney and others called for a reinstatement of the tax.
During a telephone press conference sponsored today by United for a Fair Economy (UFE), Trumka said:
Today, the Bush tax cuts for the wealthy, the suspension of the estate tax and other policies favoring the super-rich are key contributors to our nation’s budget deficits.
Our nation desperately needs revenue to invest in job growth, education, health and infrastructure.
Rubin said the revenue generated by an estate tax could be used for public investments that would create “a rapid spend out” to boost job creation.
It’s time to restore the estate tax and restore it now. It’s a progressive tax and can supply revenue without any supply side effects.
The AFL-CIO, UFE and others on the call said the estate tax should be restored at its 2009 levels or stronger. In 2009, the estate tax exempted the first $3.5 million and applied a 45 percent rate thereafter. Trumka said the AFL-CIO has endorsed two current bills. The first, from Rep. Jim McDermott (D-Wash.), includes a $2 million exemption and rates of 45 percent to 55 percent. That would raise about $31 billion more over 10 years than the 2009 levels.
Legislation from Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) and Harkin has a $3.5 million exemption and rates of 45 percent to 65 percent and would produce about $62 billion more over the next 10 years than the 2009 levels. Says Harkin:
Across this country, schools are firing teachers, first responders are underfunded and hard-working Americans are being denied basic services, all while our deficit reaches record highs. And yet, billion-dollar fortunes are exempt from paying their fair share of estate taxes. There is something wrong with this picture.
A proposal from Sen. Jon Kyl (R-Ariz.) and Blanche Lincoln (D-Ark.) would boost the 2009 exemption and lower the rate at a cost, Trumka said, of $544 billion over 10 years. He asked, “Does the estate tax really need to be further reduced?”
Many Republicans have long called for complete abolishment of the estate tax, and Sen. Jim DeMint (R-S.C.) introduced an amendment to a small business bill to permanently repeal the tax. Said Trumka:
It is ludicrous that some in Congress are proposing to end the estate tax at the same time they oppose action to create jobs.
Our economy remains on the edge of a double-dip recession, and we urgently need to create millions of jobs and invest in our future, not give more tax breaks to the wealthy.
Disney, the grandniece of Walt and granddaughter of Roy E. Disney, stressed the fairness of the estate tax and scoffed at those who claim the estate tax is a heavy burden for the wealthy. The founder of the philanthropic Daphne Foundation that funds programs to fight poverty in New York City said:
My life of great comfort was made possible despite the estate tax. We should never avoid paying to the government our fair share.
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23 Comments
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Death tax is not needed. As soon as the govt stops spending money like drunken socialist we will be able to keep what we have worked for… open a window and get some fresh air people!
The reason for the Estate Tax (no such thing as a Death Tax in the US) is an attempt to prevent massive wealth concentration in one family. Remember, this wealth is from the person who made it, not their family. If the family made the wealth they would have paid income taxes on it.
“Figures on inheritance tell much the same story. According to a study published by the Federal Reserve Bank of Cleveland, only 1.6% of Americans receive $100,000 or more in inheritance. Another 1.1% receive $50,000 to $100,000. On the other hand, 91.9% receive nothing (Kotlikoff & Gokhale, 2000). ”
309,802,000 people in the US means 4.9 million people receive $100K or more. Sadly I can’t quickly find the percenateg of people who receive 3 million or more but I’d lay a large wager it’s a very small percent.
You and everyone else knows damn well that it will not be reinstated. They’ll probably end up extending the millionaire bush (now Obama) tax breaks too.
Is it not about time that the Democrats and President Obama realize that Wall Street is waging class warfare against the working class;and increasingly we as union members,as medicare or social security participants or financial/ medical customers / patients feel that we are victimized by two parties who protect the incomes and profits of the wealthy and corporations.President Trumka should be congratulated for pressing the Democrats on estate taxes and the catfood deficit reduction commission.Without him pushing,the Democrats will suffer the bloodbath they deserve.
This tax should never have been cut. In fact it shows just how much power the rich have in this country. Well we put up with 8 years of your rule and with or without your TeaPartyGang you will never see that power again. People that take jobs away from Americans and ship the jobs overseas, may also be looking at a new tax. And trust me when I say your really going to wish you left your jobs right where they were! I would set down, its about to become a bumpy ride!
I do not want to see tax increases on anyone. I want tax cuts. That means I have more money to spend on things I want. I am against the estate tax. I want to abolish it. I want a flat tax so everybody pays.
You don’t have to be rich to inherit a small business or farm!
If you do inherit one and have to pay an estate tax what is the first thing you do? RAISE PRICES!
That hurts the poor – not the rich.
A flat tax is better.
About damn time! Get these people to pay their fair share. Why do the working class allways toe the line?
If the estate tax is not reinstated then there should be a luxury tax assesed on all the wealthy on everything they buy instead.And the entire revenue from the tax goes toward entitlement programs such as Social Security and Financial asistance for economically distressed people.
Anyone who wants to leave me millions, or billions in their will, please go ahead, knowing that I am alright with paying the taxes, just like I would if I won the lottery. Let’s be realistic – Sanders proposal exempts the first 3.5 million inherited.
face it – we working people are not going to inherit more than that, and if we did, who cares about the taxes? This inheritance is the only reliable tax on the superwealthy that we have in the US.
Clearly, sweartogod does not know anything about Math, or who pays the inheritance tax, or what a flat tax would mean, or else he is just pretending to be a union member. Unless he is a major league baseball star, he need not worry about the inheritance tax. You who claim to oppose taxes – are you also against roads, schools, fire departments, sewer systems, etc.? It takes money, and that means someone has to pay taxes. Your proposal for a flat tax would mean the greatest tax increase for the greatest number of people in history, and would bring about an underground economy more vast than the official economy. Either you an imposter masquerading as a worker or you are an example of a school system which teaches students not to think.
Even the conservative magazine The Economist says the cut in the estate tax was foolish for a country that has a huge budget deficit. They went on to point out that the revenue received from the tax (as it was before they started playing around with it) would be enough to cover projected shortfalls in Social Security.
Also, I have to reply to some of the earlier comments: Please do a little independent research into the estate tax and the flat tax proposals. Look for information from reputable sources like universities and the GAO, for example. Don’t take the word of anti-tax lobbyists. If those guys got their way maybe you could afford a new car every few years – but you’d be driving on horrible roads and taking detours to get to bridges that are still standing.
not only should it be reinstated, the estate tax should be progressive with multi-tiered marginal rates…why should an estate worth $5 billion be taxed at the same rate of one at $5 million
djspellchecker is right. Right now, all the rage is for superrich ‘outsiders’ to bankroll their own campaigns, and buy their way into the Senate or Governorship, because, as the Supreme Court said, money is just free speech. Unfortunately, our system concentrates, as a result, all of the free speech in the hands of a tiny minority of superrich thieves. The electorate becomes spectators befuddled by BS commercials on TV. We are imitating Italy, whose richest billionaire is their embarassment of a premier.
Why don’t you ‘anti-tax’ people ever complain about the real taxes workers pay? – SALES TAX! Maybe you don’t know why, but it is because the rich, whose media created your ‘movement’, like sales taxes, because the poor pay those, and that way they get to keep all of their stolen wealth.
How severely graduated should the estate tax be? We should figure out how much money it takes for a greedy rich thief to buy his way into government, cut that number in half, and implement a 100% tax on any inheritance over that amount, and then graduate it on down. You could easily leave anything below 5 million tax-free and still make more money than needed to create jobs and preserve social security. You people act like we could not live without the superrich. What have they given us? – Paris Hilton?
As an avid union supporter and leader, I must strongly disagree with you on the estate tax. Any tax of 45% or more is unfair and devastating. Why should the government take almost half of what a person earns in their lifetime, after that person has ALREADY paid taxes on that money? Even though I can only dream of leaving more than 2 million dollars to my son, it is only the wealthiest who can afford to set up Trusts and Foundations to preserve their estates for their children. Reinstating this devastating death tax only hurts the middle class. In addition, the more money the government takes from the people, the more money gets wasted. And that’s before you factor in corruption.
I for one, as a UNION LEADER, will be agressively protesting against the reinstatement of the death tax!
@DeborahE I agree that their needs to be changes or provisions on estate taxes, because families of people who earned very little in their lifetimes are paying of debt of their dead loved ones. However the rich should be paying WAY more than they are. It’s quite simple, they used to deal with it because they had to in order to keep the infrastructure that keeps their steal coming intact, now that most of their money is in “globaly diversified investments” or some crap, they don’t have a reason to give a crap (you know aside from caring for the land that’s given them opportunity and human compassion or whatever…)
I really find it hard to understand the leadership of the union and congress , u s seante and state lagislators ! the way they think and they pass laws that protect the rich and them selfs and give them raises after raises , medical trips , expen’s and the list goes on the same for union leaders with double and triple pensions and expen’s , medical and so on ! the president creates 10,000 jobs each month and gives high raises to 10,000′s of his people who got him into office one account there were over 2,000 friend jobs given with a 172,000 on top of there already pay , thats not bad !
what bothers me no one is taking about the 125,000 foreign born workers taking american jobs each month or the 23 million babby boomers that went on social security last year up 33-1/3% or the arizoan law and supporting arizona and the 20 other states the our followng arizona , look at san francisco the haven for criminlas and illeagls in america and other citys through america , why is A G holder not going after those citys that break the law ?
we were hit very , very hard by the past union leader who had taken over 2 billion out of the u a pension fund none of the leaders tak about it at all , they want you to be brain deed about it dont ask any questions , trust us look what had happen and no insurance to back up criminal fraud ! they paid him 2 years pay and told him to leave ? what kind of deal was that pat him on the back and have a good life and he gets his full pension and his others in full while we eat dirt ! our pension stinks , we could make more on welfare , then to live off our pensions totals! the plan is for the plan and not for its members , well i would go on about many areas , but dont buy this bull about dieing and when you die have all these grave diggers show up to clean you out , why have to pay taxes , they paid taxes while they were alive , what has the union become grave diggers with there political friends , this should be a law that there moneys go to there familys , there should be no death tax at all at any level in state or federial , what will be next ? what they will be doing next selling our body parts when we die ! like they all did some years ago in N J political system that was on national world news !
they will never change , just like death and taxes , they will berry there mistakes and if its you , they will berry you and thats for sure !
I WOULD LIKE TO JUST SAY BEFORE YOU EVEN GET STATRTED ABOUT THIS , YOU FAILED ALREADY ! YOUR GOING IN THE WROUNG DIRECTION , IS THE SYSTEM SO CORRUPT AND THE ECONOMY SO BAD YOU HAVE ALL BECOME GRAVE DIGGERS . YOU OUR IN DARKNESS FEELING YOUR WAY AROUND TRYING TO FIND SOLUTIONS TO A PROBLEM YOU COULD OF FIXED A LONG TIME AGO BEFORE IT GOT TO WHERE IT IS NOW ! NOW YOU HAVE BECOME GRAVE DIGGERS IT THE THE LEADERSHIP OF THE UNION AND OUR LEGISLATORS TODAY ?
THE DIRECTION YOU SHOULD BE TAKING IS A NEW DIRECTION ON NATURAL GAS , NOT DEAD PEOPLES MONEY AND TAKING FOOD OUT OF THE MOUTH OF THERE FAMILYS ! YOU NEED TO CREAT JOBS AND ASK OBAMA AND THE DEMOCRATS TO HAVE ACCOUNTABILITY , TRANSPARENCY AND HONEST WITH ALL THE MONEY THEY OUR SPENDING HAS ANY ONE SEEN IT OR THE JOBS ? WE NEED MORE CREATIVITY FOR REAL AMERICANS IN AMERICA , NOT ILLEGALS OR THE 125,000 FOREIGN BORN WORKEWRS WITH QWORK PERMITS THAT COME EACH MONTH TO TAKE AMERICANS JOBS AND LOWER OUR STANDARD OF LIVING AND PAY WHILE PRICES KEEP GETTING HIGHER ALL THE TIME ! THATS WHAT YOU SHOULD BE FIGHTING FOR FOR UNION MEMBER AND YOUR LEGISLATOR FRIENDS , 23 MILLION BAABY BOOMERS WENT ON SOCIAL SECRITY LAST YEAR COULD NOT FIND JOBS COMPETING AGAINTS ILLEGALS AND 125,000 BORN WORKERS EACH MONTH TAKING AMERICAN JOBS , THATS THE DIRECTION YOU NEED TO PUT YOUR ENERGY MEN AND WOMEN, THEY SAY LESS TALK MORE WORK IN THE WORK PLACE , WELL THE WORK PLACE IS SAY LESS BULL AND MORE ACTION FOR AMERICANS ! YOU FOLKS HAVE LOST ALL YOUR POWER GOING AFTER GRAVE DIGGERS JOBS !
Right on, DeborahE!!
Williamrayson: The FairTax is the way to go, it encourages an underground economy. The current progressive tax system drives our businesses offshore, and takes our jobs with them. Who do you think pays the 35% corporate tax, the corporations??? The workring class does, through higher prices.
Abolish the estate tax, the income tax and the corporate tax, institute the FairTax and you’ll see the greatest economic expansion and growth in good jobs since WW2!
http://www.fairtax.org – check that out, yo
Chris
10-years IBEW Union Member, 39 years American
Your agenda has been prepared for you by the superrich and the media they own. It is simple – abolish all taxes that the rich pay, and keep all of the taxes that the poor pay. Then the rich will be so grateful that they will, what, share the money with the poor? Were you asleep during the Reagan years. It would be nice if we had one rich person on or side for every 10,000 working class morons who carry water for their exploiters.
I would agree to a flat-tax; only if it included the purchase price of land (even farmland) as well as stock, bonds, and capital gains and abolished the Labor Tax. The tax collected on the income of one’s labor is not a consumption tax; it’s a tax on the disposable ability of workers to grow the economy by consuming within it. So…good luck getting a truely FAIR flat-consumption tax.
WHY IS THERE SUCH A DEBATE OVER COMFORTING THE COMFORTABLE?
98% of America will not experience any change, AT ALL, to their current tax rate when the Bush tax cuts expire, as scheduled. Why are Republicans & tea-baggers up in arms with Democrats over a sunset provision placed into a Law and passed by…Republicans?
Perhaps, they should be as upset and disappointed, with Republicans, as I am.
Lets not forget that most states still have inheritance taxes that are relatively high. If the feds reinstate the estate tax, it just pulls more money from the states also.
The example given in the case of George Steinbrenner is one on a massive scale. Perhaps they could afford an extra percentage point or two on their estate taxes. However, if a poor family inherits a small farm or their parent’s home they may likely lose it if they can’t pay the taxes. Often the property goes to probate and the lawyers and the state get their cut first. Then there’s the funeral expenses and repair and maintenance if the property is to be sold in addition to the taxes due.
In other words, you’d better be sitting on a wad of cash or you’ll wind up selling the family farm because you can’t pay the taxes. I’m a yellow dog democrat but I side with the Republicans on this one. A use tax would be more appropriate or government construction bonds to create jobs. Better yet, how about an import tax? Like the Ford and Chevrolet cars and trucks being built in Mexico. Why shouldn’t they pay for all the jobs lost to NAFTA?
Yes, reinstate this tax, we need the income.