How poverty affects intellegence

Yes I do. The rapid dramatic drop in the middle class since 2000 backs him up.

Yes I do. The rapid dramatic drop in the size the middle class since 2000 backs him up.

I agree. The wealthiest corporations that have the most at risk and the most to profit from defense need to pay a much higher rate.

Compromise, right?

OK. 1.5M per person, 3M Couple is fine by me.

Corporations? Do you mean individuals?

From an income tax standpoint, all C-Corps, should be taxed on undistributed "profits" from all worldwide sources. Either distribute the income to shareholders (if public) or employees and stockholders (if private).

(Corporations never "die")

Why should your parents give up their SS?

The "theory" posted is nonsense.

In principle perhaps, but you seem to have determined that the only, or at least the best, way to determine the extent of benefit someone has derived from living in a free society is the extent of their wealth.

A person who has come to this country to avoid the high probability that they will be killed in their home country for their political or religious views, has obtained an enormous benefit, that, in most people's minds, exceeds great wealth in actual value.

Bill Gates has, obviously amassed quite a fortune in our free society, but there is little actual reason to believe he could not have done the same in a much less free society. How much of his wealth is attributable to the fact that he developed it in a free society. There are billionaires around the globe and that includes countries with far individual freedom than ours: China is #2 (behind the US and ahead of Russia) on the list of number of billionaires.

Someone living in the bottom 10% of our economy have a much better lifestyle than some their counterparts in China or the Congo or any number of other countries where society is less free than in the US. Does this mean they have benefited financially from living in a free society? And if the difference in personal lifestyle between them and their Chinese counterpart is much greater than it is between counterparts at the highest economic strata, can their benefit be said to be greater than that of the billionaire's.

In any case, no one is arguing that the wealthy should not be taxed, nor do I believe I have seen an argument made that a progressive tax policy is unacceptable.

You've remarked that an Estate Tax of exemption of $1.5M per person is OK, but $10M is not. On what to you base these judgments? You personal sense of how much rich people should be allowed to leave their kids? It's OK to make them wealthy when they die, just not very wealthy?

Is this a matter of "the government needs more money so the wealthy should provide it," or "no one should be so wealthy, and the government's the only one that can 'legaly' take their money"?

Are you content with the way the government now spends the money they take from us? Are you confident that if they get more from increasing the Estate Tax they will put it to good use?

Should they take only what they need, or should they take as much as they can and then figure out what to spend it on?

Do you think that if they take more through the Estate Tax they will
a) Not increase what they take from you
b) Take less from you.

Because they do not need it. I believe everyone should contribute, but that payout should be means tested.

It was meant to keep my parents from being evicted from their home or from being force to eat dogfood which a lot of people were compelled to do in the sixties, not subsidize their vacation lifestyle. Whatever they contributed in they took out YEARS ago. They have a very good life and more power to them. But they do not need whatever it is they pull out of SSI. I don't think folks should get social security to build a bigger inheritance for their heirs, either. Why should taxpayers subsidize a persons health care or their housing just to protect their nest eggs so they can be passed on to their heirs?

Your parents paid into the system didn't they? Why shouldn't they be able to get as much as as they put in? Just because they don't need doesn't mean they shouldn't get it. You are just putting forth another version of income redistribution. You pay into the system then you get to draw from the system.

The Estate Tax has nothing to do, imo, with taking more/less from me. It is the ONLY tax I feel is justifiably a redistribution of wealth. Those who benefit most, have an obligation to maintain this free society. The Estate Tax is not unique to the US. Most European Nations have some form of a "inheritance tax" far more aggressive than ours.

Statistics prove that the vast majority of wealth passed to the second generation, never make it to the 3rd generation. It is consumed or wasted by a 2nd generation that contributes nothing to the enhancement of the society as compared to the contributions of the senior generation.

"Studies in America provide contemporary evidence that families still lose their wealth following the time-tested pattern. 60% of families waste away their wealth by the end of the second generation. By the end of the third generation, 90% of families have little or nothing left of money received from grandparents. Ultimately, 95% of all traditional inheritance plans fail.

Statistics collected from family businesses provide similar sobering facts. Only 30% of businesses make it to generation two and a mere 3% still generate profits in generation three. Given the dismal success of family enterprises, it is no wonder that 65% of family wealth is lost by the 2nd generation and 90% by the third generation. By the third generation, more than 90% of estate value is lost and, even worse, the generation three can usually articulate very little about the values that accumulated the wealth. Even in Australia, where there has been no estate tax, families lose their financial wealth and the values that accumulated the wealth by the third generation."

https://www.wealthcounsel.com/Free-Resources/Why%20Most-Families-Lose-Their-Wealth-by-the-Third-Generation/

An estate tax will take nothing from me. Not because I don't stand to take an inheritance, but because its taxed before I get it and it doesn't represent anything of mine until I actually inherit.

Why do these "conservatives" count their chickens before they hatch?