From: "Gary Britt" 


"James Adams"  wrote in message
news:3FE6FE44.22208F7D{at}compuserve.com...
> > Confiscating 1/3 to 1/2 of a person's already
> > TAXED accumulated wealth from the hands of the grieving widow and
children
> > is OK, just so its not 60%?
>
> A good portion of that wealth has not been taxed.  Unrealized capital
> gains are not taxed and realized gains are taxed at a lower rate than
> income.


Most small business owners don't have unrealized capital gains of any
substantial amount, save and except for the value of the family business
that is intended to be passed on to the kids not sold.  Yet the taxation is
done as though it were sold, and the confiscatory taxation is imposed on
the deceased person's heirs by taking so much of the value of the business
that in many cases they are FORCED to sell the business in order to have
the money to pay the taxes.  Stealing the money from the widow and the
children before they ever have a chance to finish a reasonable mourning
period.

Whether capital gains should be taxed at all is another question.  One that
isn't properly answered as long as the tax rate on capital gains is above
0%.  Paying 15% or 20% on the capital gains and another 30% to 50% as a
confiscatory death tax for a total of 45 to 65% is an immoral level of
taxation.

>
> > Any estate tax above 0% is immoral in and of itself.
>
>
> What makes it immoral?

The entire basis of the tax is the greed and avarice of the taxers.  It is
the government taking advantage of grieving widows and children of the
deceased, merely because they can and not because it is justified by the
economic benefits conferred on the deceased by government or any other
rational basis.

>
> Also, one of the reasons for an estate tax is to prevent a society where
> the overwhelming proportion of wealth in a nation is controlled by an
> ever smaller percentage of the population.  It goes to what kind of
> society that would create.

The above statement sounds all nice and high filutin, but cannot stand up
to even a superficial rational inquiry.

1.  There is not now nor has there ever been ANY evidence that the estate
tax would accomplish or has ever accomplished the purpose you state.   The
statement above is in essence nothing but saying the government has
determined that no person or family should be allowed by law to succeed
beyond a certain governmental specified point, and therefore it is the
government's province to confiscate their wealth, by force if necessary, at
the end of each generation and transfer that wealth to the King.  That all
wealth belongs to the King, and at some point the King must get it all.
That is the basis and rationale for the DEATH tax.  It comes from old
England for the purpose of enriching the KING, not society.

2.  It is not a constitutionally granted power of the federal government to
determine and set by law the level of economic success that any one person
or family may achieve, yet you state above that is exactly the purpose of
the death tax.  In the limited powers granted to the federal government by
the constitution, I don't see that one listed anywhere.  I don't see
anything about the federal government being granted the power to
confiscate, without compensation, the property of any person and
redistribute that property to the rest of society.

3.  Not everything a government can do, even if it were a benefit to
society in general, is a moral act.   For example, the government could
confiscate
the entire wealth of Bill Gates and use the money to buy food for the
alcoholic and drug addicted homeless or any other high filutin purpose you
care to pick.  The argument that the good of the many out weighs the good
of the one fails to morally justify such an action, however.  In the case
of the DEATH tax, the amount of revenue collected in total on this tax is
not enough to even be a drop in the proverbial bucket of federal
expenditures, it therefore has no meaningful affect on any part of society,
but has a tremendous almost catastrophic affect upon the VICTIMS of this
type of immoral taking.

3.  The purpose of the estate tax is as I have previously stated, it stems
from a long history of greed, jealousy, avarice on the part of taxers and
those who have less than the deceased.  The deceased usually worked hard,
took risks that the have nots did not take, and built his/her fortune for
himself and his/her family.

4.  The death tax is not justified by any good that the death tax might
inadvertently accomplish.  Because redistribution of wealth in and of
itself is NOT a moral act or the proper role of a MORAL government. 
Redistribution of wealth has no basis in a FREE society, it is for the
province of the communists and socialists of the world, where money,
economic freedom, and personal individual liberty are all restricted and
controlled by the all knowing elitist ruling class that seek to keep all
other classes of society equally poor and equally powerless, less someone
be able to challenge the ruling class for power.  It is for governments
that function as a dictatorship of the few, but NOT for governments of the
people, by the people, and for the people, that are established with
LIMITED powers.

Cheers,

Gary

--- BBBS/NT v4.01 Flag-5