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A thread on the Estate Tax
H5215 from @RepPhillips51 @RepPatSerpa Hawkins & Casey would "increase the exemption for estate taxes to $2.5M effective January 1, 2023 [and] to $5M effective January 1, 2025."
http://webserver.rilegislature.gov/BillText21/HouseText21/H5215.htm
@UpriseRI
H5215 from @RepPhillips51 @RepPatSerpa Hawkins & Casey would "increase the exemption for estate taxes to $2.5M effective January 1, 2023 [and] to $5M effective January 1, 2025."
http://webserver.rilegislature.gov/BillText21/HouseText21/H5215.htm
@UpriseRI
It’s important to realize that the estate tax is literally a tax on dead millionaires. The person being taxed has no further stake in their estate. They are dead, and money is meaningless to them.
https://upriseri.com/2019-02-03-estate-tax/
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https://upriseri.com/2019-02-03-estate-tax/
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What people opposed to the estate tax like to do is pretend that the estate tax is being imposed on the inheritors. It’s not. Inherited wealth is unearned wealth. A windfall given not to the deserving, but to those fortunate enough to be related to the rich & the dead.
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The last time the estate tax was "reformed" was in 2014. Rep Ruggiero and @RepCraven led that charge.
http://www.rifuture.org/dead-millionaires-mattiello/
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http://www.rifuture.org/dead-millionaires-mattiello/
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House Finance was then under Rep Gallison, a Mattiello crony who went to jail for stealing from his clients. Estate tax was one of Mattiello's top priorities when he took power, and a gift to the richest RIers.
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. @RepCraven justified his support of the bill in terms of long discredited trickle down economics...
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If rich people stay in the state, instead of running off to avoid paying taxes, said @RepCraven, they will engage in “taxable conduct” that may exceed the taxes lost through changes in the estate tax law.
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Rep Ruggiero told the Finance Committee "Rhode Island is a horrible place to die.” But more accurately, Rhode Island is a slightly less ideal place for your rich parents to die, because you’ll inherit slightly less money.
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In 2013, said Rep Ruggiero, 4262 people died. 208 people paid estate taxes. The state took in $31 million. Ruggiero estimated changing the estate tax would lose the state between $17 and $23 million a year.
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That money, said Ruggiero, would be better off going to the heirs of the rich dead people, (people who might not even live in RI). Ruggiero suggested that these heirs would possibly exercise their “philanthropic discretion” to fund RI arts and charities.
. @_andyboardman has wrote about the estate tax in 2020, noting that "a bump in the estate tax threshold would help the heirs of about 300 large estates."
https://upriseri.com/2020-02-17-andy-boardman/
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https://upriseri.com/2020-02-17-andy-boardman/
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A tax break for the richest 300 families in RI?
If ever a tax break served the one percent of the one percent, this is it.
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If ever a tax break served the one percent of the one percent, this is it.
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I first started writing about our General Assembly's push to eliminate the estate tax in 2017. I explained how RI eliminated the "fiscal cliff" and raised the estate tax threshold.
http://www.rifuture.org/dead-millionaires-mattiello/
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http://www.rifuture.org/dead-millionaires-mattiello/
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The estate tax giveaway bills in 2014 were never voted on. They were instead folded into the budget and passed that way, so there was no blood on the hands of the legislators.
http://www.rifuture.org/dead-millionaires-mattiello/
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http://www.rifuture.org/dead-millionaires-mattiello/
@UpriseRI
Folding unpopular economic bills into the budget is a classic Mattiello/Gallison move & probably predates them. They did the same thing with a bill preventing local municipalities from raising the minimum wage. No debate - it was dropped into the budget w/the chiropractor funding
There's no effective way for the public to object to budget items. The budget is voted on as a single document. Once finalized it is very difficult to make changes. Every Rep opposes parts of the budget, but they vote for it as a whole because they all get something they want.
