Super wealthy behind estate tax repeal
According to this New York Times story:
THE watchdog group Public Citizen (citizen.org) and the advocacy group United for a Fair Economy (faireconomy.org) issued a report this week [available here] saying that 18 superwealthy families are largely responsible for financing the lobbying campaign aimed at repealing the estate tax; the Senate is scheduled to take up repeal next month.
The families, worth $185.5 billion, have financed and coordinated the campaign and have, until now, managed to hide their participation behind the trade associations and business groups they have formed to represent their interests, Public Citizen reported. The families include those behind some of the nation's biggest and best-known companies, like Wal-Mart, E.& J. Gallo Winery, Nordstrom and Koch Industries.
Of course, gay families will also be impacted favorably by this, and should support it only in principle if the US Religious Right continues to fight gay marriage from becoming legal in every state. Why should gay partners suffer when one dies and cannot leave his or her estate to the other without huge penalties.