But unless Congress does something, I can tell you that my father will die before 2011, and I hope he makes it to 2010. My mother's life is running up against the same deadline.
HA! HA! HA! Get it? DEAD-line!
Yeah, I know that I still don't know the hour or the day, but isn't it interesting that I am able to predict the year, or a range of years, and be so certain about it? How is that? I'll bet Gene Bob knows. He knows everything.
Okay, I'll let you in on the secret. A couple of years ago W managed to push through a change in estate tax law that causes the tax rate to decrease and the exempt value to increase, with end result that the estate tax will cease to exist in 2010. But the law that set this up expires in 2011, so the estate tax will be restored to pre-law condition in 2011.
W has promised to make the law permanent (in its 2010 form) ever since, but is having problems doing so, especially with the deficit running so high. So I would expect a great number of "suicides" among the monied elderly in 2010.
Once you get over the amazement that I would even suggest such a thing it is possible to start thinking about other effects of this 21st century Jonestown ceremony. For example, those who pass on their estates in 2010 will also stop drawing Social Security and other government benefits.
Since W is also looking at how to prevent those same benefit programs from becoming insolvent maybe he would be willing to combine these things to solve multiple concerns. Here's my (modest) proposal. Let the estate tax law expire. Then, after it expires pass a new estate tax reform which lowers the exempt amount each year while simultaneously raising the tax on the non-exempt amount, culmintating in a 100% tax on the entire estate. You see, not many people are affected by estate taxes. So we need to make it apply to more and more people and to encourage them to pass on as much as possible to their heirs by killing themselves before the estate tax causes them to lose (part or all of) the money.
I should make some extra time to spend with my folks while they're still with us.
1 comment:
I followed your logic until I wandered across the word "culmintating" at which point my ADD took over and I began A9'ing for this extraordinary new addition to the lexicon (what the Little People call a Dictionary).
Knowing that the W Regime has infarcted many new words into our vocabulestries, I knew that [culmintating] must be the combination of culmin (a deep hole in the ground from which coal is mined) and tating (the creating of an edible spud), so .. I am 100% FOR culmintating (the creation of edible spuds in deep holes).
I can see clearly now; the rain has gone.
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