H
opefully you were not waiting until President Obama’s State of the Union address on January 20 to hear about his plans to shake up the tax laws. After all, the details of his tax plan had been leaked days earlier and the entire text of his speech was posted online before the event.
Apparently we have a new State of the Union address tradition. In each of his six previous State of the Union addresses he also proposed tax hikes.
Here are the more significant tax provisions that were proposed.
In Shakespeare's most recognized tragedy, the star-crossed lover Juliet asks "What's in a name? That which we call a rose by any other name would smell as sweet." Now, that may have been true back in Juliet's day. But is it still true now in today's era of celebrity branding?
Here's the deal. Back in 2009, executors for the King of Pop, Michael Jackson, filed an estate tax return reporting the value of his assets at his death. Jackson had been famously extravagant during his life, blowing through hundreds of millions in earnings and borrowing hundreds of millions more. His 2,600-acre "Neverland" ranch in Santa Barbara that included two railroads, a petting zoo, and a Ferris wheel reportedly cost $2.5 million per month to maintain. He spent millions more on travel, entertainment, antiques, and paintings. And feeding "Bubbles," his pet chimpanzee, couldn't have been cheap, either.