Two Senators Propose Reinstating Estate Tax

From Reuters.com:

Two senators, a Democrat and a Republican, have reintroduced a proposal to reinstate the estate tax, which lapsed this year amid a row among lawmakers over taxing the wealthy when they die.

Democratic Senator Blanche Lincoln and Republican Senator Jon Kyl late on Tuesday reintroduced a plan to tax estates over $5 million at a rate of 35 percent. The estate tax that expired last year had taxed estates at a rate of 45 percent, above an exemption of $3.5 million for individuals and above $7 million for couples.

There is no estate tax in 2010 because lawmakers last year failed to reach a deal to extend the tax. The House of Representatives last year had passed an extension of the 2009 rates, but senators clashed over the level of the tax.

Without action, under current law the tax will rise to 55 percent, with an exemption level of $1 million.

Several billionaires have died this year, escaping the estate tax, including former New York Yankees owner George Steinbrenner.

U.S. Lost Most Jobs Among Rich Countries

From ABCNews.com:

Unemployment in rich countries may have peaked — but there are still 17 million more people out of work than at the start of the crisis, the OECD said Wednesday.

They are "the human cost of the crisis," OECD chief Angel Gurria said, urging governments not to neglect them as they seek to repair wrecked balance sheets.

The longer a person is unemployed, the harder it typically becomes for them to gain paid employment.

"This threatens to mark whole generations," Gurria said in a news conference to mark the publication by the Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development of the report 'Employment Outlook 2010.'

There are 47 million unemployed in the OECD's 31 member countries — the world's most developed economies, the report says.

That's a rate of 8.6 percent, according to May 2010 figures, and compares with 5.8 percent in 2007.

New Jersey Democrats fail to extend millionaires tax

Do you think millionaires should be charged a hefty income tax? What if it was to solve one of the highest budget short-falls in history?

According to Reuters.com, New Jersey Democrats had wanted to reimpose a one-year, 10.75 percent tax on income above $1 million that would have hit 16,000 people. New Jersey's fiscal shortfall, at 37.4 percent of the current year's budget, is the second-highest among U.S. states, second only to Nevada, according to the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities. However, New Jersey Democratic legislators on Monday failed to gather enough votes to extend a tax on millionaires that would have been used to provide property tax relief for senior citizens and the disabled.

The millionaires' tax would have raised $637 million for rebate checks of up to $1,295 for some 600,000 senior citizens who would otherwise face steep increases in their property taxes during fiscal 2011.

Gov. Christie claimed the tax would keep the millionaire business owners from hiring in our tough economy. However, he proposed a constitutional amendment placing a 2.5 percent cap on annual increases in residential property taxes.

Read the full article here. Tell me what you think on Facebook or @ronideutch on Twitter.

World's Rich Got Richer Amid '09 Recession

From MSNMoney.com:

The United States was home to the most millionaires in 2009 -- 2.87 million -- followed by Japan with 1.65 million, Germany with 861,000, and China with 477,000.

Switzerland had the highest concentration of millionaires: nearly 35 for every 1,000 adults.

Yet as portfolios bounced back, investors remained wary after a collapse that erased a decade of stock gains, fueled a contraction in the global economy and sent unemployment soaring.

The report, based on surveys with more than 1,100 wealthy investors with 23 firms, found that the rich were well served by holding a broad range of investments, including commodities and real estate.

"The wealthy allocated, as opposed to concentrated, their investments," Merrill Lynch head of U.S. wealth management Lyle LaMothe said in an interview.

Millionaires poured more of their money into fixed-income investments seeking predictable returns and cash flow. The challenge ahead for brokers is convincing clients to move off the sidelines and pursue riskier, more fruitful investments.

Confusion Over the Dormant Estate Tax Keeps Advisers Busy

From NYTimes.com:

The disappearance of the federal estate tax this year has created confusion and frustration among the wealthy, even among those who stand to benefit from it. And this has sent them in droves to amend documents that they may have to change again next year.

Steven H. Goodman, an accountant and financial planner in Melville, N.Y., says he has not had a meeting recently without clients asking him what they need to do this year and for 2011, when the tax is set to return at a higher rate than when it expired. Yet for all the business this has brought his firm, the SHG Financial Group, Mr. Goodman says he is not happy. “It’s a pain in the neck,” he said. “Even though I do this for a living, no one likes to do this.”

Those who work with the extremely rich say they, too, have been exceedingly busy, but for a different reason. The wealthiest are looking to take advantage of a short-term trust that allows people to pass money to heirs tax-free — what’s known as a grantor retained annuity trust — out of fear that the federal government could change the terms of these trusts. Cheryl E. Hader, a partner in the individual clients group at Kramer Levin Naftalis & Frankel, said she set up 30 of these trusts last month, up from six in a normal month. Daniel L. Kesten, a partner in the private client group at Davis & Gilbert, a law firm in New York, said he was working nights and weekends last month setting up the same type of trusts.

How this boon to tax advisers happened is yet another chapter in the partisan gridlock common to Washington these days. At the end of 2009, Max Baucus, the Montana Democrat who is chairman of the Senate Finance Committee, tried to extend for three months the existing estate tax laws, put in place in 2001. But when that motion failed, the estate tax expired for the first time since 1916.

What this has meant is that the heirs of wealthy people who die this year will owe no taxes. An extreme case, as detailed in an article in The New York Times on Tuesday, is that of Dan L. Duncan, who died two months ago with an estimated wealth of $9 billion. His heirs will inherit his estate without paying the 45 percent tax that was in effect in 2009, billions that would have gone to the Treasury.

IRS Launches New Global Program to Target High Wealth Individuals

IRS Commissioner Douglas Shulman spoke with the media yesterday about the IRS’s new program targeting wealthy Americans. The IRS is hoping to identify better methods to ensure compliance among these individuals, who’s returns are complicated by investment income and capital gains. You can watch a video of Commissioner Shulman’s statement here or read more about the program and what it hopes to achieve courtesy of CNS News.

The Internal Revenue Service has launched a new global program to target what it calls “high wealth individuals,” IRS Commissioner Douglas Shulman said Monday.

“Through our new global high wealth operating unit we are taking a unified look at the entire web of business and economic entities controlled by high wealth individuals so we can better assess the risk such arrangements pose to tax compliance,” Shulman said at the National Press Club on Monday.

Shulman said the IRS is using “our robust and evolving enforcement program that ensures that everyone pays what they owe.”

The IRS initiated its Global High Wealth Industry group in the Fall. Schulman told an October 26 meeting of the American Institute of Certified Public Accountants that it would be part of “the globalization of tax administration,” which he called a “game changing trend” in tax enforcement:

“This brings me to another important development--a game changing trend--the globalization of tax administration,” said Shulman.

Continue reading at CNS News.com…