Via the Koster campaign this afternoon after a Mount Vernon event:
Washington’s Second Congressional District candidate John Koster signed the American Family Business Institute’s (AFBI) “Death Tax Repeal Pledge” at a press conference today. The event was hosted at Morrison Farms (Mount Vernon, WA).Koster
By signing the pledge, Koster commits to vote for permanent repeal of the Federal Estate Tax, commonly referred to as the “Death Tax”.
AFBI’s President Dick Patten praised Koster for signing the pledge, saying “By supporting estate tax repeal, Koster will help save local jobs and businesses.”
A recent study from the American Family Business Foundation, AFBI’s research and education arm, found that repealing the Death Tax would increase nationwide employment by 1.5 million jobs. In Washington alone, repealing the Death Tax would add nearly 34,000 new jobs.
“Koster has been a strong advocate for permanently repealing this unfair double tax. He understands that the Death Tax penalizes family farmers and business owners when they die. I’m encouraged that he has committed to taking a more active role in the repeal fight,” Patten added. “With the economy in the midst of a prolonged recession, we need to be helping family businesses and farmers, not hitting them with an additional tax.”
The estate tax is a tax on the net value of a decedent’s estate, including all personal and business assets, before distribution to their heirs. Because business assets are included, the Estate Tax hits family business owners and farmers - the engines of economic growth — particularly hard.
The Federal Estate Tax has expired for one year in 2010, but will return at a 55 percent rate on all assets over $1 million in 2011 unless Congress acts first. Most political observers expect a heated legislative battle over the tax this year.
The American Family Business Institute is a national, non-partisan organization of farmers and business owners who are committed to permanent repeal of the Death Tax.
July 26th, 2010 at 7:20 PM
I won’t go as far as calling Koster unAmerican or an enemy of democracy, but…
July 26th, 2010 at 9:04 PM
So who is lazy? The person struggling to find a job after free market corporatists shipped their jobs overseas? Or the person who inherits millions of dollars from a dead relative without earning that money and then refuses to pay taxes on it?
July 26th, 2010 at 9:11 PM
Steve,
As a courtesy, when posters here quote from material on the web, Sam demands a link.
Your material was easy to find.
http://lawprofessors.typepad.com/property/2006/11/thomas_jefferso.htm
I liked this comment: “I believe that Jefferson’s point is that the natural right of man to property is inalienable and “that the earth belongs in usufruct to the living” is primary to orderly maintenance of a liberal society; that property, when left in tail, has rights only to the extent of the natural rights of mankind. When commerce usurps the right of property they have obligation to provide accommodation for the lose of use of the property for the purpose of the natural citizen to protect their unalienable rights. Property was considered a unalienable right as that man cannot protect life and liberty without it. He was not contradictory in his philosophy, merely nuanced as to specifically how to protect both common law property rights in its submission to mans natural right of property.”
My point is that political discourse is not as simple as your quote would have us believe.
July 26th, 2010 at 9:16 PM
Bhamborn,
“…without earning that money and then refuses to pay taxes on it?”
I would be interested in your argument about the moral basis for those taxes. Why is the state entitled to any portion of the fruits of my labor, on which I have already paid taxes, when I would like to give that property to my heirs?
July 27th, 2010 at 12:02 AM
I grew up on a family farm and 99% of all family farms don’t pay any “death tax” or “estate tax” now anyway. So, what’s the beef about?
Well, it just so happens that the Washington State Farm Bureau has endorsed Koster, so now he’s gotta dance to their tune, that means signing a pledge to repeal the estate tax.
In reality, though, Koster would be working against his own best interests by pledging to repeal the estate tax. Koster preaches competition and the estate tax would actually help make family farms (his farm) and businesses more competitive whereas repealing the estate tax would not only encourage mega-scale agriculture through unlimited exemption of assets, but also create a giant loophole for the corporate-run farms to use their wealth to buy out the much smaller family farms. Economic growth depends on more family farms, not fewer!
Besides, 99% of family farmers don’t need another regressive tax structure to help billionaires skirt responsibility for paying their fair share of taxes.
What’s more, there’s no estate tax this year – costing the Treasury billions – because Congress allowed it to expire. Since there is no tax revenue coming in, this is driving up the deficit. Koster, the Tea Party candidate, said that he was against increasing the deficit, right? Repealing the estate tax would drive up the deficit. What is he thinking?
I believe we need a strong estate tax that holds the wealthy accountable for their fair share of our tax responsibility. A strong estate tax law will have a progressive rate structure and an exemption that results in 98% of Americans paying no estate tax.
Larry Kalb
Candidate, WA-CD-2
US Congress 2010
July 27th, 2010 at 5:51 AM
[...] press conference today. The event was hosted at Morrison Farms (Mount Vernon, WA). SAM TAYLOR with The Bellingham Herald — [...]
July 27th, 2010 at 6:01 AM
Davesix Says: Why is the state entitled to any portion of the fruits of my labor, on which I have already paid taxes
Because your heirs did not pay any taxes on that inheritance and that inheritance is INCOME to them.
This is all about a bunch of rich kids worried their free ride is going to be over when their parents who worked hard all their lives pass away.
July 27th, 2010 at 9:01 AM
Larry Kalb:
Simply put: liberty. Us conservatives don’t think the way you do: we don’t say to ourselves, “well, since it doesn’t hurt ME, and it only hurts a small number of RICH people, that makes it OK.” That way of thinking is completely foreign to most of us.
Oh, come on, Larry. Do you really not know ANYTHING about your opponent? John has always been against the estate tax. If you want to criticize his view, fine, but to pretend his view is biased because of who is supporting him — rather than that they are supporting him because of what we know is his strongly held, longtime, view — makes you look bad.
Koster believes in fair competition, not government-manufactured competition that violates all free market principles. Koster does not selfishly support something that may help himself, but will unreasonably harm others by taking away their rights.
I always find it bizarre that liberals attack us conservatives for not being selfish enough by trying to personally enrich ourselves through wealth redistribution, while at the same time accusing us of being selfish by not wanting our own taxes increased. This is very simple: we want to keep what is ours, as much as possible, and we also want everyone else to keep what is theirs. The principle is not selfishness, it’s liberty.
That said, of course, we also know that an inheritance tax can hurt everyone. Many people have lost their jobs or businesses over the years because of the inheritance tax. For example, look at all the small businesses swallowed up, and sometimes killed off, by Warren Buffet because of the inheritance tax (don’t be fooled by his support for it: he profits directly from it).
That is factually untrue, Mr. Kalb. It’s literally impossible for a lack of revenue to drive up deficits: it’s always expenses that drive up deficits. You could have revenues of zero, and unless you spend money, you’ll still have no deficit.
If revenues are down, you need to reduce your spending to match. It’s quite simple, and John Koster is the man to do it. Clearly, you are not, Mr. Kalb, as you are expressly stating that we need more revenue, instead of less spending.
Here’s the problem, Mr. Kalb: despite seeing a one-year jump in spending (because of TARP and stimulus and so on) of more than half a trillion dollars, combined with an existing Democrat-created deficit (from FY2007 to FY2008, where it jumped $300 billion in one year) of nearly half a trillion, plus a reduction in revenue from the recession of another $400 billion … we had a deficit of over $1.4 trillion in 2009. This year we’re looking at an even greater deficit, over $1.55 trillion.
But even though FY2011 is projected to return our revenue to FY2008 levels ($2.5 trillion), our spending will be nearly $1 trillion more than FY2008.
We are spending $3.7 trillion, 40 percent more than we are taking in, and a trillion more than we were just three years ago — and DOUBLE what it was when Bush took office — and that spending is not set to decrease over the next five years, but to jump up another $650 billion.
Let that sink in: our spending is right now double what it was when Bush took over from Clinton (FY2001). This is insanity. We cannot sustain it.
Please do not tell us our deificit problem is revenue. That makes no sense on any level. Not only does it ignore the fact that deficits are caused 100% by spending, but it also ignores the fact that our specific spending has grown wildly out of control since the Democrats took over Congress in 2006.
I have no problem with the Tea Party — especially as I’ve performed at and attended several of them — but I always find it odd when someone who’s been a Republican legislator for 16 years is referred to as the “Tea Party candidate.” He obviously has much broader appeal than that. Even the Mainstream Republicans (what some the Tea Party people often call the “RINOs”) support Koster. So do many Blue Dog Democrats, including some of his colleagues from his time on the County Council.
I know you have an interest in trying to make his appeal seem narrow, but I wonder if you really think it’s going to work, when it’s so obviously misrepresentative.
July 27th, 2010 at 9:15 AM
In a country well governed, poverty is something to be ashamed of. In a country badly governed, wealth is something to be ashamed of.
Confucius
AFY!!theheelotsheepdog!!!
July 27th, 2010 at 7:25 PM
http://www.kalbforcongress.org
August 7th, 2010 at 8:40 PM
Please support the repeal of this insane tax that we kids will have to pay on money that our parents have worked for and already paid taxes on! It’s a ridiculous idea.
August 7th, 2010 at 10:03 PM
Gayle,
There is no tax on the first $3,500,000 of an estate.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Estate_tax_in_the_United_States
August 7th, 2010 at 10:15 PM
Correction: the exclusion amount was $3.5 million in 2009. The estate tax is suspended for 2011, and unless Congress acts, the exclusion amount in 2011 will be $1 million. However, some in Congress have moved to establish a $5 million exclusion with a flat 35% tax on amounts that exceed that amount.
Ever since Republicans turned the inheritance taxes into a political football, it’s been kicked around so much by Congress that it’s almost impossible to keep your eye on all the changes.