Death and Taxes

As you read this the Senate is preparing to vote on the proposal to permanently repeal the estate tax, as if we aren't facing record budget deficits.

Currently, only those who leave estates greater than $2 million, or $4 million for couples, must pay the tax. In 2006, it is estimated that 0.27% of all estates in the U.S. will pay estate tax, meaning 99.73 percent of Americans can pass 100 percent of their estates to heirs tax free. Repealing the estate tax is estimated to cost $1 trillion over the first ten years of full repeal.

"We are currently facing a large list of multi-billion-dollar obligations, including up to $1.3 trillion for the cost of the war in Iraq, $3.3 trillion in interest on the national debt, and $797 billion to pay for the Medicare drug benefit," says Steven C. Rockefeller, chairman of the Rockefeller Brothers Fund."

To reduce the nation's revenue stream by $1 trillion in order to enrich a small group of multi-millionaires and billionaires, is fiscally irresponsible and bad social policy. The estate tax could be reformed, but it should certainly be preserved and the revenue used to pay our national bills."

Read the complete article by Sean Gonsalves at http://www.zmag.org and then find out more at http://www.responsiblewealth.org, a project led by the father of the richest man in the world, Bill Gates, and endorsed by the Rockefeller Foundation.