Internet Tax Lawyers

Joe Kristan tells of the case of  Estate of Louise Paxton Gallagher, T.C. Memo. 2011-148 where the  Tax Court made a valuation ruling more favorable to the taxpayer than what it had originally claimed on its tax return:
The executor files an estate tax return valuing a 15% interest inan LLC at $34,936,000.
The IRS audits the estate tax [...]

Joe Kristan chimes in on the issue of whether the estate tax makes any sense:
David Logan puts it starkly:
Simply put, the federal estate tax does nobody any good.
Why?
Estate taxes are generally levied for two reasons: To break up concentrations of dynastic wealth and to raise significant tax revenues. The seminal 1987 NBER paper by B. [...]

I usually agree with Megan McArdle, but this time she’s drifted so far to the left she’s treading water off the coast of Malibu:
I don’t see by what right people should be allowed to order living people how to dispose of their stuff after they’re beyond caring.  I think people should be allowed to make [...]

The United States Congress passed and President Obama signed into law on December 17, 2010 the Tax Relief, Unemployment Insurance Reauthorization and Job Creation Act of 2010.
Included in this act were significant changes to existing estate tax law.
This law is effective until Dec. 31, 2012. Estate and business succession planning requires thinking many years into [...]

He pointed out that farms are valued at their current agricultural use value, as opposed to being valued for commercial or residential development. This is asignificant benefit that can save family farms from being broken up and lost to the family because of estate tax liquidity.

With a new Republican Governor and Republican control over both the Ohio House and the Ohio Senate, a move is afoot to eliminate Ohio’s estate tax. The secretary/treasurer of a county farmers union addressed the need for keeping the estate tax and how small family farmers can avoid losing their farms because of the estate tax in a letter to a Dayton newspaper.

He also pointed out that there is a “Qualified Family-owned Business Interest Deduction” up to $675,000. In fact, the author points out, with some reasonable estate tax planning, family farmers can exclude around $1.5 million of value from the calculation of Ohio’s estate tax. These and other things point to possibly raising the amount exempted from the estate tax, rather than repealing the tax, altogether.

Your Cincinnati Tax, Probate, Elder Law, and Estate Planning Attorney
Paul A. Nidich
http://paulnidich.webs.com

Andrew Sullivan of The Daily Dish posted this ABC News/WaPo Poll today:  
Andrew tells us what Kevin Drum of Mother Jones thinks it all means: 
 Why are so many more people in favor of an estate tax cut they’ll never see but not in favor a payroll tax cut that will put immediate money in their own pockets?
Possible answers: (a) people [...]

Megan McArdle of the Atlantic includes this chart in her blog post titled Fiscal Fitness: Felix Salmon of Reuters thinks this proves that we need to raise taxes, but he says nary a word about spending cuts: This chart should be ingrained in the mind of anybody who cares about fiscal policy. The main things to note:
  Federal taxes are the [...]

“Ever notice how you come across somebody once in a while you shouldn’t have messed with? That’s me.”
– Walt Kowalski, Gran Torino (2008) -
Daniel Mitchell of Cato has an interesting take on the tentative tax agreement between Democrats and Republicans titled The Good, the Bad, and the Ugly of the Tax Deal. Here are some [...]

This is what’s wrong with our political system.
Jonathan Strong of the Daily Caller reports that the driving force in opposition to the repeal of the estate tax is the life insurance industry:
A new report from a trade association representing family-owned businesses fighting against the estate tax says a giant life insurance lobby is a key [...]

The National Pork Producers Council today urged Congress to fix the estate tax law saying U.S. pork producers and other farmers deserve more for their hard work than to be “taxed in death, to death.” NPPC joined nine other agricultural organizations calling on Congress to act on estate-tax reform before current exemptions expire at the [...]

The expiration of the Bush tax cuts is rapidly approaching.  Disagreement in Congress over which taxes should go up and which should stay down threaten to paralyze the process. A new possible clogging issue is beginning to emerge in the Senate, the estate tax.
The estate tax has changed dramatically over the past decade.  The tax [...]

Higher taxes on the rich results in an increase in the size of government at the expense of private charity.
Docuticker reports that Bank of America has published its High Net Worth Philanthropic Study which finds that charitable giving by high net worth households to nonprofit organizations accounts for about two-thirds of all individual giving and about half of all [...]

The “old saw” in litigation is the answer to the question, “What is a good settlement.” That answer is “when no one walks away happy.” We are in the situation we’re in because of everything that has gone on in the past. We are in the situation we’re in because every national (and most local) politician thinks that the most important legislative or administrative decision is to make sure the politician gets re-elected.

President Obama appointed a bi-partisan Commission to study the country’s deficit problems and make recommendations. The Co-Chairs’ Proposal was released, yesterday. This is just a preliminary document. The Final Report is expected to be released next month. Not surprisingly, the recent comments by the two chairmen have hit a brick wall.

One of the oldest and most common forms of taxation is the taxation of property held by an individual at the time of their death. Such a tax can take the form, among others, of estate tax (a tax levied on the estate before any transfers). An estate tax is a charge upon the decedent’s [...]

One of the oldest and most common forms of taxation is the taxation of property held by an individual at the time of their death. Such a tax can take the form, among others, of estate tax (a tax levied on the estate before any transfers). An estate tax is a charge upon the decedent’s [...]

The estate tax is simply unfair.  It tells every American that no matter how hard you work or how wisely you manage your affairs, in the end the Federal Government is going to step in and take it away.  The estate tax is double and, in some cases triple taxation, it punishes hard work and [...]

It just got a little easier for taxpayers to plan around two thorny bits of the Internal Revenue Code: the estate tax and the alternative minimum tax.
The Obama administration budget resolution Congress approved on Wednesday for fiscal 2010 outlines changes for these controversial levies.
It extends the estate-tax top rate of 45% on estates over $3.5 [...]

Chairman Levin decried the lack of civility and bi-partisanship that has been building over the many years he has been in Congress. Ohio Rep. Steve Driehaus pointed out that the Democrats have quite divergent views in their caucus but have been able to arrive at compromises in order to move critical pieces of legislation forward. For example, Rep. Driehaus said, the Democrats in the House reached a compromise to pass a bill to fix the estate tax problem last year, but the Republicans in the Senate have been holding the bill hostage. Rep. Driehaus also noted that quite a few pieces of legislation contained amendments put forward by Republicans, yet few, if any, Republicans vote in favor of the legislation when it comes up for a final vote.

Rep. Driehaus and Chairman Levin agreed that if the Republicans don’t start to work with the Democrats to fix the tax problems this year, the prospects for legislative compromise in the new Congress in 2011 will likely be worse. Even if the Republicans increase their numbers in Congress, they probably won’t win control of both houses. No pundit has even suggested that the Republicans can win a majority in the House and the 60 seats in the Senate needed to get the legislation passed it is promising the public.

At lunch today, Sandy Levin, Chairman of the House Ways and Means Committee, told a small group of business people, tax attorneys, and accountants that he had no idea what was going to happen with the mess left by the Bush income tax and estate tax situations. The tax cuts, of course, are due to expire at midnight on December 31st, and the estate tax will come roaring back with a vengeance at the same time.