Quote:
|
Originally Posted by GenuineRisk
Hey, Ez; the like is mutual, and yes, I hope we get a day to hang out at the track, too. You too, DTS.  I'm sorry about the family you know; I just haven't been able to find any specific accounts with names, etc., of people losing small family farms as a result of the estate tax. Neil Harl did a study on midwest farmers and couldn't find any who lost their farms due to estate tax. I'm not discounting your acquaintance's story, but I'm curious as to the specifics- what was the value of the farm (a farm couple can pass on 4.1 million dollars untaxed as long as the descendants continue to farm for at least ten years and there are few family farms worth anywhere near that) , was it entirely due to estate tax or were there outstanding debts, etc. In any event, if their heirs sold when they didn't want to, then it sounds like bad planning on behalf of the farm owners-- they should have been able to gift enough of their assets to their heirs before death to avoid estate taxation. But possibly they didn't know how to do any of that stuff, which is a shame. Finances are so complicated and boy, it's hard to find info on it. It took me two books to figure out what to do with setting up retirement accounts for myself and I have barely anything to put in it each month.
Once again, the google nerd(me) finds an article about farms and the estate tax- from 2001, so it's a bit out of date in that the bill discussed in it did pass, but worthwhile reading for info on the estate tax and how it applies to farms:
http://www.responsiblewealth.org/pre...nyt_farms.html
And "Black Dahlia" (the movie I saw last night) sucks big fuzzy bunnies. Holy cow; what a bad film. I'd have been better off staying home and chatting with all of you-- more educational and more fun. |
GR,
It's not just one farm, it's very many.
The stories will never hit the news. No blogs, no front pages.
These are just decent people that have lived with their land and animals for a long time.
Poor planning...sure.
Heck, if they could have paid their last feed bill, they could have paid for that too.
The times have changed.
What was once something that could be passed on to the next generation now has lawyers taking their take.
Leases for wind turbines and powerline right of ways.
Such a mess. Way to much for me to sort out.
I throw up my hands and scream an anguished cry!
The days of the farm family are going away. Very sad.
The land grows back to poplars and thorn apples.
The same fields where I picked rocks, pitched hay bales. So very sad.
DTS