Posts tagged as:

federal-estate-tax

Congressional Officials Critical of Tax Breaks in Proposed Stimulus Plan

12 January 2009

As blogged previously, Obama’s proposed stimulus package is meeting resistance – on both sides of the aisle. Key members of the Senate Finance Committee have criticized plans for a $3,000 tax credit for new hires, citing that it wasn’t the most effective means of promoting employment. Sen. John Kerry (D-MA) said, “I’d rather spend the [...]

2 comments Read the full article →

Ask the taxgirl: “Buying” the family home at discount

19 November 2008

Taxpayer asks: My father wants to sell me his house (approx. value of $300,000) for what he owes on it ($54,000). I know, a pretty sweet deal. Some friends advised him that the best way to do this is simply to “give” me the house, and I will send him a Christmas card with $54,000 [...]

6 comments Read the full article →

Stranger things have happened.

26 July 2007

But not many… in the Ways and Means Committee. The Business Journal of Phoenix (how’s that for a source?) is reporting that U.S. Rep. Harry Mitchell, a Democrat of Arizona, is introducing a bill to keep federal capital-gains taxes permanently at 15 percent and to make recent cuts to federal estate taxes permanent. The Democratic [...]

0 comments Read the full article →

Fix The Tax Code Friday: Estate Tax

23 February 2007

When Congress first introduced the wacky legislation that is the current federal estate tax situation (an exemption that gradually rises to $3.5 million per person, is eliminated in the year 2010 and returns in 2011 to its "old self") most folks assumed we had plenty of time to fix it. 2010 seemed years away. Now, [...]

0 comments Read the full article →

Death and Taxes… Actually Certain?

15 January 2007

As Congress continues to ponder whether the federal estate tax makes any sense, the Citizens for Tax Justice weighs in with some IRS statistics. Consider this: In 2004, there were 2,429,024 Americans who died. Only 18,431 of those Americans were required to pay federal estate tax in 2005. If you’re keeping score, that’s .8% – [...]

3 comments Read the full article →

Housecleaning

8 November 2006

Nobody wants a partisan tax blogger. It’s so… impolitic, if you will. So, I’m not going to offer any real commentary about the election on yesterday in terms of winners and losers. You can do your own Wednesday morning quarterbacking. That said, the face of the House has changed drastically with the loss of 27 [...]

0 comments Read the full article →

And Down Again…

4 August 2006

Okay, who other than Senator Frist will admit that they thought the newly packaged estate tax reduction/minimum wage increase bill was going anywhere? Every practitioner that I spoke with saw the tacking on of the estate tax reduction to the minimum wage increase as both a deathknell for the bill and politicking. Nothing more. Democrats [...]

0 comments Read the full article →

Estate Tax Repeal, Take Two

21 June 2006

Earlier this year, Congress again failed to repeal the federal estate tax. As many practitioners anticipated (including this blogger), Congress went back to the drawing board to produce a bill which modifies, rather than repeals, the existing tax. The proposed bill would: Reunify the estate, gift and generation-skipping transfer (GST) taxes. Increase the estate [...]

3 comments Read the full article →