
As usual, Republicans are doing everything in their power to help the 1% get even richer.
Republicans on the House Ways and Means Committee, led by Paul Ryan, have voted to eliminate the estate tax entirely.
The federal estate tax is a tax on property and assets that are passed down from a deceased individual to their heirs (like how Paris Hilton gets most of her money).
See more news and opinion from Thom Hartmann at Truthout here.
The estate tax has brought in crucial revenue for our government for nearly 100 years, and Republicans have been opposed to it for nearly that long too.
They like to argue that the tax is too large, and that it’s too burdensome for small businesses and family-owned farms.
But, the facts say otherwise.
According to the Center for Budget and Policy Priorities, (CBPP) only two out of every 1,000 estates will owe federal estate tax in 2015. Only two.
In other words, 99.8 percent of estates in the US owe no estate tax at all.
Similarly, as the CBPP points out, “taxable estates generally pay less than one-sixth of their value in tax.”
So far, this tax doesn’t seem too “burdensome” at all.