What happens when a culture is driven by the need for money to make more money

Re:What happens when a culture is driven by the need for mon... by yongjik on Wednesday November 11, 2015 @02:58PM (#10548871)

American's 2014 GDP is 17.4 trillion dollars.

It seems reasonable to assume that some portion of it will accumulate among the wealthiest class and be inherited. Probably much more than ~0.1%.

[ Parent | on HN ]

Re:What happens when a culture is driven by the need for mon... by harryh on Wednesday November 11, 2015 @03:08PM (#10548926)

Rather than comparing to GDP it's probably better to compare to net worth which is about 70 trillion dollars. With an expected lifespan of ~80 years that's roughly 875 billion passed on in any given year.

Let's assume that all inheritance taxes are paid by the top 1%. They own about a third of total assets. So that's about 290 billion being passed on.

19 / 290 = 6.5% being paid in inheritance taxes. To high? To low? I dunno, but that's my best guess back of the envelope math.

[ Parent | on HN ]

Re:What happens when a culture is driven by the need for mon... by asmithmd1 on Wednesday November 11, 2015 @03:51PM (#10549185)

Nice estimates. The nominal US estate tax rate for estates $1M over the exclusion is 40% so I would say your estimate of 6.5% shows how effective the 1% have been at sheltering their wealth from estate tax. The GRAT was invented (and patented[1]) as a way to transfer money tax free after congress closed the GRIT loophole in 1990:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Grantor_retained_annuity_trust

[1] https://www.google.com/patents/US6567790

[ Parent | on HN ]

Re:What happens when a culture is driven by the need for mon... by harryh on Wednesday November 11, 2015 @03:56PM (#10549209)

Completely separate from the rest of this discussion, but I am amazed that you can patent something like that.

[ Parent | on HN ]