<p>dstark–the generation skipping trust may be there because they can spread the tax burden out over more years. Say the grandkids are 2 and 4 when Grandpa dies, the trust can spread the taxes out over 60+ years or delay the taxes until those kids are 65, vs only having a few years to do that for their parents. There are a lot of ins and outs to this but that is the basic idea.</p>
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<p>I think that he made a trade with over the AIG investigation. Only reason I can see for him selling at such a horrible price just before the price of silver quadrupled.</p>
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<p>I’m fine if they all go away - but I live as if they weren’t there in the first place.</p>
<p>Is everyone else fine with that?</p>
<p>As I said before, I think that everyone here can manage without the Bush tax cuts. It won’t be fun in adjusting but we should have been planning for this last year or this past summer at the latest.</p>
<p>My dentist asked me what I thought about the fiscal cliff. I wasn’t sure if he was talking about business in general or the stock market because we chat about both from time to time. I assumed that he was talking about the market so I gave him my usual line about binary events. You can bet one way, or the other, and win big or lose big or you can just step aside and see what happens. I’m more inclined to step aside (I took long profits on the market swing the last two weeks). He told me afterwards that he was in cash.</p>
<p>We also talked about some of the negative things that will happen if there is big defense and NIH cuts. Those will affect our local area and the Boston area considerably. My area gets an outsized amount of defense dollars. The Boston area gets an outsized amount of defense and NIH funding.</p>
<p>He asked me for a prediction and I just said that I couldn’t make one.</p>
<p>SteveMA, the generation skipping and dynasty trusts are ways to delay taxes and have your assets grow tax free for your family. </p>
<p>A link about the myth of estate taxes. It is a good link. </p>
<p><a href=“http://www.cbpp.org/files/estatetaxmyths.pdf[/url]”>http://www.cbpp.org/files/estatetaxmyths.pdf</a></p>
<p>Somebody mentioned small businesses and farms affected by the estate tax. We are talking about 40 farms and small businesses a year and 15 years to pay the estate tax.</p>
<p>The rumors are that Buffett was playing with derivatives and ended up selling his silver. </p>
<p>"> The Bush tax cuts were supposed to expire in 2010, right?</p>
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<p>I’m fine if they all go away - but I live as if they weren’t there in the first place.</p>
<p>Is everyone else fine with that?"</p>
<p>I think it is pretty obvious that everyone is not fine with that.</p>
<p>One this about this thread, we can see people who make very good money unhappy to pay a couple of extra percent of their income in taxes.</p>
<p>If a person makes $400,000 a year, the tax increase by eliminating the tax cuts on incomes above 250,000 a year comes to approximately 2 percent of income.</p>
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<p>Well you can be unhappy or you can just do something about it and adjust. You may have to adjust anyways. Unhappiness is just a state of mind. Sometimes it’s pretty unproductive. People adjusted to the recession too. People adjusted to really low interest rates. People will adjust to higher taxes in one way or another.</p>
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<p>The derivatives stuff that I heard was Enron leasing out his silver with JPM as the guarantor. When Enron went under, someone had to make Buffett whole. Pretty interesting that silver took off just as Enron was going under. The good old days when you could buy Hecla and Coeur for under a buck and Pan American for $3.</p>
<p>I like this…</p>
<p>“Well you can be unhappy or you can just do something about it and adjust. You may have to adjust anyways. Unhappiness is just a state of mind. Sometimes it’s pretty unproductive. People adjusted to the recession too. People adjusted to really low interest rates. People will adjust to higher taxes in one way or another.”</p>
<p>"One this about this thread, we can see people who make very good money unhappy to pay a couple of extra percent of their income in taxes.</p>
<p>If a person makes $400,000 a year, the tax increase by eliminating the tax cuts on incomes above 250,000 a year comes to approximately 2 percent of income."</p>
<p>I think if people knew, this was it, this is what we can plan for…no changes, they could suffer through that. The problem is that many of us think that this is just the beginning. Seeing as raising taxes as planned isn’t going to bring in near enough income, it is just a pittance (especially since many will find ways to lower their income, and they won’t get as much as expected anyways). They are going to want more, and will keep aggressively going after what they can. The economy will go back in the tubes, and this will be another opportunity and reason to keep going for the money, they will never stop spending…money buys votes and power. These people would take every cent from you if they think they could get it. You have far too much trust in spendthrifts, dstark.</p>
<p>Life is uncertain, busdriver11. </p>
<p>I do not have too much trust, busdriver11. The proposals by both parties are not onerous.</p>
<p>If that changes, I will change my opinion. I just want taxes to work back towards 18 percent of gdp and I want those that can afford to pay to pay. It is not a lot of money in the scheme of things.</p>
<p>If we were talking about California’s financials, you would get a different argument from me. I voted against the state propositions that would cost taxpayers more money. This includes prop 30. I lost. One party has a super majority now. I dislike that. There is talk of changing prop 13. I may not like all aspects of prop 13, but overall, I like prop 13. I would prefer proposition 13, which limits property taxes, be left alone.</p>
<p>Cal is a high taxed state. The fed taxes are low. That is a big difference to me.</p>
<p><a href=“http://ballotpedia.org/wiki/index.php/California_Proposition_30,_Sales_and_Income_Tax_Increase_(2012[/url])”>http://ballotpedia.org/wiki/index.php/California_Proposition_30,_Sales_and_Income_Tax_Increase_(2012)</a></p>
<p>I am not pro taxes. I am pro enough taxes. That is it. I don’t like taxes.
I guess I voted against more taxes and more funding for education. :)</p>
<p>Everyone is going after the fatted calf. I read an article on a bunch of proposals in MA to add taxes and fees to generate more revenue for the Department of Transportation (the Big Dig has drained transportation money for well over a decade). Some proposals are aimed at high income folks. Some are aimed at drivers.</p>
<p>The better thing about the state level is that you always have the option to move to a more friendly state.</p>
<p>Yes, you people in California really are in big trouble. Don’t know how you solve that one. Almost 10% tax on income over 50K, really? How do you get anyone with a decent income to stay? Prop 13 should be left alone. People shouldn’t be taxed out of their homes, also.</p>
<p>I don’t trust anyone in a position of power to take a reasonable, balanced approach to solve our problems. It is nothing but buying constituency groups and holding onto power.</p>
<p>I lived in MA for a long time and just assumed that everywhere else was the same way with taxes. Then we moved to NH - it felt like a 50% pay increase. I imagine that a lot of people live there because they have always lived there.</p>
<p>There are a lot of great jobs there too and various industry centers. I have two sisters that live there - one is independently wealthy and the other got in before real estate became really expensive. I think that she struggles a little more than the rest of us.</p>
<p>“I imagine that a lot of people live there because they have always lived there.”</p>
<p>I suppose so. Many people don’t want to move away from their family and where they’ve always lived. But some of these high tax states with high cost of living have got to be chasing people who can relocate away, and some of those people are large contributors to the economy and the tax base. If I was in that position, I’d move to Florida in a heartbeat.</p>
<p>A couple of plans have come out today…</p>
<p>One was a complete joke. </p>
<p>I like this plan. It is not going to happen.</p>
<p><a href=“http://www.americanprogress.org/wp-content/uploads/2012/12/CAPTaxPlanReportFINAL.pdf[/url]”>http://www.americanprogress.org/wp-content/uploads/2012/12/CAPTaxPlanReportFINAL.pdf</a></p>
<p>The plan is on page 10. Taxes go up very small until income is over 422,000.
The plan is progressive which I like. No more amt. Cap gains do go up to
28 percent and there is no more carried interest. I am surprised a little by the cap gains and no more carried interest because a private equity
guy and an investment banker and other wall strret people helped design the plan. This is a group of one party’s plan. A lot of these people were
Clinton’s people.I am sure the other party will object. This plan does capture more of the upper incomes’, well, income.</p>
<p>The plan is a little aggressive. It could be tweaked.
Estate taxes look a little too high for me.</p>
<p><a href=“http://www.americanprogress.org/wp-”>http://www.americanprogress.org/wp-</a>
content/uploads/2012/12/CAPTaxPlanReportFINAL.pdf</p>
<p>Couples that make 450,000 won’t see their taxes go up that much.</p>
<p>NRE, great link. Was aware that the income in corps that leads to dividends was taxed, but didn’t know about all the nuances of corp to corp dividend taxes. Thank you.</p>
<p>Oracle is going to pay out a special dividend.
Intel just announced a $6 billion special bond holding. They haven’t announced a special offering yet but I suspect that they’ll get to that before EOY. It could be a huge bonanza in special dividends by the end of the year.</p>
<p>Though it wouldn’t be all that great if the market crashes by then.</p>
<p>It’s threads like these that continue to enforce my belief that we should have a flat tax rate, no deductions, no credits, just everyone pay 10% and be done with all this mess. The savings at the IRS alone would probably balance the federal budget (ok, not really :D).</p>
<p>I met with our accountant yesterday. Since DH and I are a two-person business, every year it’s a guessing game as to how much I should pay us and how much I should take out as owner’s draws. I really thought I hadn’t taken enough out in taxes, so I was sweating the meeting.</p>
<p>Turns out there is an ADVANTAGE to this God-awful economy, who knew!! We’ve made enough less this year that we qualify for more credits than before! We get the $2,500 credit for our son’s college costs, for example. Whoo hoo! Right now, we’re on track to get a fairly large federal refund.</p>
<p>The flat tax rate would be wonderful!</p>
<p>I just realized that the special dividend stuff is doubly good. You take the income this year and you can take the capital loss next year when it is worth more.</p>
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<p>10% of what, though? Defining “income” is the hardest part of any tax system. </p>
<p>Does “no deductions” mean that businesses pay 10% of the gross? </p>
<p>Under current law, “gross income” for individuals (for purposes of determining whether you have a filing requirement) includes all your capital gains, with no netting of capital losses. So if you had $5,000 of gain on the sale of Stock A on Day 1, and $5,000 of losses on the sale of Stock A on Day 2, you technically have $5,000 of gross income. Do you owe $500 of tax, even though you didn’t make anything?</p>
<p>Are employer-provided health insurance, and other currently-tax-free fringes, “income”? Every pull of the slot machine handle that makes a coin come out, despite the fact that you walk out of the casino no richer than you walk in? (Current law allows session netting above the line, if you keep records; reporting just what’s on the W-2G is technically incorrect, even though many people do it that way.)</p>