How much should you be able to inherit without paying taxes?

[blakeh02]

We need a national sales tax. It's not perfect but it would be better than what we have now.

[Sarah]

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[crondanet5]

I am pleased to see 45% of the resopndents voted for more than 10 million to be passed tax free. Did not realize I was in such an elite group.

[Sarah]

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[DavidTiger]

It's the classic false pretense. Everyone thinks they are going to make a million dollars so they never want anyone to have to pay taxes on it. Even though they'll never even come close. Like my dad always said "I'd love to have to pay taxes on a million dollars".

[Bill-77]

We need a national sales tax. It's not perfect but it would be better than what we have now.

National sales tax only punishes the middle and lower wage earners, I didn't realize I was in such elite company.

[colts4life]

I don't think that we NEED a national sales tax. There are many ways to balance the budget without it. It was done in the 1990s and can be accomplished again.

With respect to the question at hand, one consideration must be the elimination of loopholes. Today, you can inherit 100% of any sum, if you handle it properly.

A Fair/Flat tax is the best option we have in my opinion. What we are doing now is just convoluted and easily manipulated. Also, if the budget you are refering to being balanced was that under Clinton, it never was. He added to our deficit every year. Look at the national debt numbers under his administration. They go up every year.

[Sarah]

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[colts4life]

Clinton balanced the federal budget, and erased the federal deficit (see Fact Check below). He did not eliminate the federal debt.

http://www.factcheck.org/askfactcheck/d ... deral.html

Smoke and Mirrors. Just look at the increase in debt each year. Read this article if you want the truth.

http://www.craigsteiner.us/articles/16

[flight23]

That article you just linked sounds like smoke and mirrors.

Essentiallly he is saying that yes the public debt went down but intragovernmental debt went up by more. He then goes on to explain that this increase in intragovernmental debt went up because social security had such a surplus and they were required to use that surplus to buy government securities. So essentially that should be considered a wash (increasing social security reserve offsets increase in intragovernmental debt). Instead he decides to just ignore the fact that the social security reserve increased and only focus on the increase in intragovernmental debt. If Social security wasnt *required* to use that money on intragovernmental debt, and if instead it was allowed to use that surplus to pay off the national debt via buying back securities, then the national debt would have gone down.

Anyone can twist an argument as complex as this to make it seem like they are right.

[colts4life]

That article you just linked sounds like smoke and mirrors.

Essentiallly he is saying that yes the public debt went down but intragovernmental debt went up by more. He then goes on to explain that this increase in intragovernmental debt went up because social security had such a surplus and they were required to use that surplus to buy government securities. So essentially that should be considered a wash (increasing social security reserve offsets increase in intragovernmental debt). Instead he decides to just ignore the fact that the social security reserve increased and only focus on the increase in intragovernmental debt. If Social security wasnt *required* to use that money on intragovernmental debt, and if instead it was allowed to use that surplus to pay off the national debt via buying back securities, then the national debt would have gone down.

Anyone can twist an argument as complex as this to make it seem like they are right.

Nothing is being twisted here. Debt is debt, whether it is future or current. You cant make a surplus claim that isn't there. Quite simply, did the the national debt go up?....Yes. So, no surplus.

I'll barrow an example from Beck's Broke. "Last year you made $30K(taxes) at your job and spent $32K(budget) on living expenses. Your brother(SS), seeing that you were having a hard time, loaned you $10K and you gave him an I.O.U. in return. Common sense says that your "deficit"(public debt) for the year was $2K and your "personal debt"(intragovernmental) increased by $10K. ...But our presidents would claim that you didn't have a deficit at all, you had a surplus of $8K. Congratulations! But what about the $10K you borrowed, you might be wondering? Dont worry about it, politicians would say; it's not real. He's your brother, after all!"

[Sarah]

.

[colts4life]

http://georgewbush-whitehouse.archives.gov/news/usbudget/blueprint/bud01.html

In 2001, the Bush Administration itself referred to the fact that the country had begun to make "real progress in paying down its debt" from 1998 - 2000.

I'm sure they did. Bush was probably worse than Clinton or Obama. He claimed to be a conservative republican when his actions showed otherwise. At least with Obama there is no doubt in him being a progressive democrat. He just managed to make people think otherwise to get elected. Don't get me wrong...I wasn't trying to bash Clinton. This has been an American problem for 75+ years.

[flight23]

That article you just linked sounds like smoke and mirrors.

Essentiallly he is saying that yes the public debt went down but intragovernmental debt went up by more. He then goes on to explain that this increase in intragovernmental debt went up because social security had such a surplus and they were required to use that surplus to buy government securities. So essentially that should be considered a wash (increasing social security reserve offsets increase in intragovernmental debt). Instead he decides to just ignore the fact that the social security reserve increased and only focus on the increase in intragovernmental debt. If Social security wasnt *required* to use that money on intragovernmental debt, and if instead it was allowed to use that surplus to pay off the national debt via buying back securities, then the national debt would have gone down.

Anyone can twist an argument as complex as this to make it seem like they are right.

Nothing is being twisted here. Debt is debt, whether it is future or current. You cant make a surplus claim that isn't there. Quite simply, did the the national debt go up?....Yes. So, no surplus.

I'll barrow an example from Beck's Broke. "Last year you made $30K(taxes) at your job and spent $32K(budget) on living expenses. Your brother(SS), seeing that you were having a hard time, loaned you $10K and you gave him an I.O.U. in return. Common sense says that your "deficit"(public debt) for the year was $2K and your "personal debt"(intragovernmental) increased by $10K. ...But our presidents would claim that you didn't have a deficit at all, you had a surplus of $8K. Congratulations! But what about the $10K you borrowed, you might be wondering? Dont worry about it, politicians would say; it's not real. He's your brother, after all!"

Your example is nothing close to an analogy to what happened. A closer analogy would be that you made 35k and had a 30k budget. You put 8k into savings because you were "forced" to and had to take a loan for 3k. Then according to your method you had 3k in "debt" even though you increased your savings by 8k.

[colts4life]

That article you just linked sounds like smoke and mirrors.

Essentiallly he is saying that yes the public debt went down but intragovernmental debt went up by more. He then goes on to explain that this increase in intragovernmental debt went up because social security had such a surplus and they were required to use that surplus to buy government securities. So essentially that should be considered a wash (increasing social security reserve offsets increase in intragovernmental debt). Instead he decides to just ignore the fact that the social security reserve increased and only focus on the increase in intragovernmental debt. If Social security wasnt *required* to use that money on intragovernmental debt, and if instead it was allowed to use that surplus to pay off the national debt via buying back securities, then the national debt would have gone down.

Anyone can twist an argument as complex as this to make it seem like they are right.

Nothing is being twisted here. Debt is debt, whether it is future or current. You cant make a surplus claim that isn't there. Quite simply, did the the national debt go up?....Yes. So, no surplus.

I'll barrow an example from Beck's Broke. "Last year you made $30K(taxes) at your job and spent $32K(budget) on living expenses. Your brother(SS), seeing that you were having a hard time, loaned you $10K and you gave him an I.O.U. in return. Common sense says that your "deficit"(public debt) for the year was $2K and your "personal debt"(intragovernmental) increased by $10K. ...But our presidents would claim that you didn't have a deficit at all, you had a surplus of $8K. Congratulations! But what about the $10K you borrowed, you might be wondering? Dont worry about it, politicians would say; it's not real. He's your brother, after all!"

Your example is nothing close to an analogy to what happened. A closer analogy would be that you made 35k and had a 30k budget. You put 8k into savings because you were "forced" to and had to take a loan for 3k. Then according to your method you had 3k in "debt" even though you increased your savings by 8k.

The example is exactly whats happening. The point you're missing here is you aren't increasing your savings in your example. You are simply paying for a future debt. By borrowing it to show a surplus, you are hiding that. It isn't actually there for you to use. Your budget is really more like 38K. You aren't putting 8K in savings for giggles, you are putting it there because you owe that money to social security recipients in the future. SS isn't funded enough. To use that money to count towards making a surplus, you are pulling smoke and mirrors. Your acting like your borrowed money is income and that makes no sense. Bottom line, our own government uses this accounting method to determine its national debit. Clinton, and basically all presidents, are simply using tricks to make it look like they are pulling surpluses, when in reality the debt continues to climb. Just look at the national debt numbers and you'll find they climb every year, even during Clinton.