Wednesday, November 22, 2006

I'm Still Here

I know, I know, I haven't posted in forever! I could make excuses, but I won't bother.

My dad (John Earle) posted recently about the passing of his mother, my grandmother. While she was alive, I had no idea how much money she was worth nor did it occur to me that she might leave me something when she died.

Upon her passing, I was informed that there was in fact a sizeable estate which was to be divided between Grandma's son , daughter and 6 grandchildren. Well, OK, I guess this is alright. How does this work, I ask.

Then I found out how much money the government takes off the top in the name of "inheritance tax." Then, on top of that, they take even more tax from money left to grandchildren in the name of the "generation skipping tax."

I'm not kidding! Maybe you all knew this already, but I had no clue. Don't get me wrong, it's not that I'm upset about getting less money. I don't care about that. It's just, where does the government get off taking that much money from one's estate? No matter that you work and pay taxes all your life, they just think they are entitled to half of your money simply because you die? Crazy.

Anyway...

Plans for Thanksgiving. A friend from Key West has a property on the bank of a river about an hour North of where I live. It is a very pretty peaceful spot. He is throwing a little get together for family and friends with tons of food, beverage, music and good company. Since we don't live near enough to family, or have enough money and time off to travel, we will be celebrating with friends on the river.

This weekend we will put up our Christmas tree! I have a really cool, different kind of tree - I will post a picture of it next week.

I'm off to read all your blogs now...

HAPPY THANKSGIVING!!!

-

4 comments:

Anonymous said...

Hi Christina, first thing, sorry about your Grandmother passing, second; that tax thing sucks, especially the generation skipping tax, better to leave your money to your children and have them pass some on.
We don't have death duties here in Australia so that's one thing we don't need to worry about.
Have a Happy Thanksgiving on the river.

Anonymous said...

Christina, hope you and yours enjoy the holiday.

Karyn Lyndon said...

Happy Thanksgiving, Christina. I'm sorry for your loss but happy for you about the inheritance! And I had no idea about the skip-a-generation thing. But you will notice every time a large amount of money changes hands, Uncle Sam has a paw out for his share.

Land of the free is a misnomer. It costs at least 30%.

Emmy Ellis said...

Sorry to hear about Grandma. Shit, I've been so lax with blogging I had no idea.

Yes, they take a mass chunk out of an estate. I decided long ago if I have any money to leave near my end I'd let my family have it before I died.

:o)