Reply to Generational Wealth

Forum Index » Money and Finances

Reply to "Generational Wealth"

Subject:

Emoticons





More smilies

Text Color: Font: Close Marks

[quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous]I'm rather agnostic on the topic of raising inheritance taxes on the very rich. Yes, it's easy to look at the top 1% and think, my god, they have so much money. But then I look at the bottom 20 or 30% of society and wonder why they deserve the wealth transfer? Because many if not most don't. A lot of people at the bottom of society are leeches who never produce anything useful for society and just feed off the welfare state.

In reality, inheritance tax is a red herring concept, a feel-good policy which never, ever, raises anywhere near the amount of revenue it theoretically promises as the wealthy find ways around it or simply stop producing more wealth. And the argument that it's a double tax, taxing incomes and wealth that has already been taxed at least once, is a valid one. And there's no question it involves class jealousy.

If you really want to increase tax revenues on a significant scale to fund all your pet programs, you have to raise taxes across the middle classes. Not just the wealthy.[/quote]

Agreed that it is a Double tax.  Most of us who are wealthy (in the 10-50M range) don't have ways to shelter the money as it came in.  We paid taxes to fed and state on ALL of it (and PAID a ton of $$$ each year). It was income or LT/ST Cap Gains of stock options.     That money is ours and it really is not fair to tax it again just because we die.  So we will fully utilize all legal methods to ensure our kids don't pay 40-60% in estate taxes.  Why wouldn't we?

Also agree that most who say "tax it again" are simply jealous of those who have that much.  [b]We got there thru hard work---years of long hours and lower paying jobs at smaller companies in the hopes that the options pan out.  Eventually they did---but that doesn't happen for everyone.  [/b]
   [/quote]

So hard work + luck.  Got it.[/quote]

luck is largely about taking risks.  Willing to take lower salary in return for options in hopes those turn into something.   Could have taken a "safer path" in tech and made double the salary during those 10 years and worked less hours.  Instead we took the riskier path and it paid off. 
Partner has been CEO at smaller company for over 12 years.  Their salary has not changed once in those 12 years, except for the 2 years the company struggled and they chose to actually take a 35% pay cut for those years.  10 year and their salary has NOT increased at all.  And nope, nobody knows about those pay cuts except the CFO/finance people who would see that.  Instead they focus on getting pay increases and bonuses for the employees that deserve it.  Not your typical CEO.

So yes, hard work, picking a career path and then a lifestyle that can be supported by your career path.  If you only make $50-75K/year, you need to live on that, not $100K.  THat's what we did when just starting out---live beneath our means, work our asses off to pay of major student loans and then save save save rather than upgrading our lifestyles.

[/quote]

Nope.  Luck is about being born into a decent family that has everything needed to raise their children.  Luck is getting through life without any serious illnesses and being born without disabilities.  Luck is being born in a country where there is a chance to make a decent living without being surrounded by war.

I would hope when people takes risks they weigh the pros and cons and then choose.   Luck has nothing to do with it.  [/quote]

Options

	Disable HTML in this message
	Disable BB Code in this message
	Disable smilies in this message

Review message

Search Recent Topics Hottest Topics