Maria Bartiromo has a stimulus plan of her own. But it's a plan to stimulate the selling of assets instead of consumer spending. If you've got stocks or homes you want to sell, you should probably sell before Barack Obama gets elected, she seems to say to Avenue.

Today Page Six reports that the Money Honey warned about higher taxes if the Democratic nominee gets elected. "He's going to take the capital gains tax at 15 percent right now all the way up to 25 to 28 percent," she says. "Sell anything, like a home or stocks, and make a profit . . . [almost] 30 percent of the profit will go to the government instead of 15."

Barack's Bite [New York Post]

We spent some time this morning talking about the myth of the always applicable Laffer curve and the supply-sideristas who always claim that tax cuts will be off-set by revenues from greater economic productivity. But we’re not Alan Greenspan—who famously doesn’t think it’s his job to think about how his comments on economic matters are perceived. So we don’t want our lack of enthusiasm for the great Republican myth to be construed as support for the great Democratic myth.

Perhaps you haven’t heard much about the great myth that seems to be the animating economic idea behind the Democratic party at the moment. You’ve heard the myth in various forms, of course, but it is rarely presented in terms on which it can be identified, analyzed and critiqued. Instead, it’s presented as nothing other than the obvious truth.

To put it succinctly, the myth is that increases in tax rates and higher tax revenues reduce budget deficits. Like the supply side faith, this one begins with a kernel of truth—that, all things being equal, higher revenues would reduce budget deficits—and then warps it into a poisonous lie. The mischief comes from the fact that all things are never equal, and there is little evidence that higher revenues results in lower deficits.

What is particularly not equal here is government spending. The myth of deficit reducing revenues depends on something that is patently untrue: the assumption that the demand for government spending is inelastic. In other words, when the government collects more revenues it tends to spend more.

What truly limits government spending is the size of the budget deficit. Or, more precisely, the political tolerance for budget deficits. It is the size of the deficit that is fixed, not the level of government spending. When you grow revenue, you grow spending, and the budget deficit chugs along.

This is not to say that it is impossible to reduce budget deficits. We’ve reduced them in the past, and even achieved something like a surplus at times. But this has been an achievement in politics—a political demand for lower deficits that overcame the demand for more spending—and not a function of revenue collection.

So before deciding that Republican proposals for tax cuts are irresponsible and Democratic proposals for tax hikes are responsible—that is, deficit reducing—ask yourself whether or not you think the demand for government spending is likely to increase or decrease when the government receives that added revenue.

The economist Murray Rothbard believed that the Laffer curve was one of the great myths of the Reaganite right, distorting Republican economic policy and distracting Republicans from the goal of reducing the size and scope of government. It was an economic idea that could be explained on a cocktail napkin, so it appealed massively to politicians and propagandists. And it contained an important kernel of truth. But there have always been serious problems with the way it was used by supply siders.

"It is true that if tax rates are 99%, and they are cut to 95%, tax revenue will go up," Rothbard wrote in Making Economic Sense. "But there is no reason to assume such simple connections at any other time…People are not going to stop working or leave the country because of a relatively small tax hike, or do the reverse because of a tax cut."

He could list off a half dozen problems with the claims of supply siders about the Laffer curve. But the most devastating was this one: they had no metric for showing where we were on the curve at any given time. And yet this never stopped them from always claiming we were on the diminishing tax-revenue side of the curve, regardless of what the marginal tax rates were at the time.

And apparently the great myth of the Laffer curve remains central to conservative orthodoxy. The long-legged and razor smart Megan McArdle of Asymetrical Information reports that she recently had a book review spiked by a conservative magazine because she had written that the Laffer curve didn't apply to American levels of taxation. "The Laffer curve and the supply siders pushing it seem to be the teacher's unions of the right," McArdle writes.

Now we're not sure that she's right when she claims that the Laffer curve doesn't apply to current levels of taxation. But we're not sure she's wrong, either. As we've said, there's never been a plausible metric for figuring this out except in the most extreme cases, which renders the Laffer curve useless as a predictive model.

More importantly, there are probably many Laffer curves operating in our economy at any point because there are many kinds of taxation. Income taxes. Corporate taxes. Capital gains taxes. Excise taxes. Sales taxes. Because these are set at different levels and hit at different points in our economy, we may well be on the left side of the curve for some taxes and the right on others.

In any case, it's distressing to see the closing of the conservative mind to economic debate. No wonder those Republican presidential hopefuls were so terrible in the Michigan debate.

I take it all back [Asymetrical Information]

Stephen Schwarzman sits in front of the breakfast table.

It's not just any breakfast table. It's the most important breakfast table in the world. It was built for John F. Kennedy by an Italian marble worker who died mysteriously during the cold war. Kennedy never ate at the table, however. He was assassinated too early. Later it was acquired by Nancy Reagan for her husband, the former President. But he also died before he could eat breakfast at the table.

It made Schwarzman happy to know that among these powerful men, only he had eaten at the table. He. Stephen Schwarzman of Philadelpha, the man who had come from nothing and become something. No, not "something." Who had become everything. And not "become" but made himself. The man who had made himself into everything.

A servant silently glides across the polished floors of the most important breakfast nook in the world. A moment of irritation passes across Schwarzman's face. He has barely touched his crab salad. There is at least $320 worth of crab still on the plate. There is also kiwi, and grapefruit and a spice from Thailand that is unavailable in the United States. It was a gift from the third most powerful man in China. If this servant touches his plate, Schwarzman will fire him. Why are they always touching his plate before he is finished?

The servant isn't here for the crab. He is carrying a phone on a silver plate. He doesn't say a word. Schwarzman lifts the phone, flicks it open. He makes a mental note to fire whoever is calling during his breakfast.

"You're reading that story in the Journal about winning another year to fight the private equity tax, right?" the voice of his chief lobbyist does not sound as happy as it should. Schwarzman was reading that story. "Look. Forget it. Although Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid has declared the private equity tax hike dead in the Senate, there's still a chance that an even harsher tax hike could work its way into a bill to reform the alternative minimum tax."

Schwarzman chews a bit of crab but doesn't say anything.

"Do you have the New York Post?" the lobbyist asks.

"Who the fuck do you think you are talking to?" Schwarzman says, tiny bits of crab escaping from his lips.

"Here's the deal. The house proposal raises the tax on carried interest to 38 percent. The Senate will have a lot of political pressure to act on this AMT patch and a carried interest bill could be one palatable way to offset the revenue hole they need to fill. We can still probably get rid of this thing. But the house is harder to fix. So many more of the buggers. We'll have to spread the love around a bit," the lobbyist says.

Schwarzman coughs. He hangs up the phone and puts it on the plate. Looking back at the crab, he quickly calculates what 38% of the government's take of his breakfast would be. Then he eats that portion in one forkful. For a moment his mind flashes back to the family store in Philadelphia, to his job folding towels. They would like that, those Democrats. They would like to see him back in Phildelphia, folding fucking towels, he thinks.

The servant turns quickly and walks across the room. There's a slight squeaking noise as his soft, rubber soled sneakers hit the the floors. Schwarzman makes a mental note to fire him.

Law Still Might Be Taxing for The Rich [New York Post]

Senator Schumer plans to introduce legislation to raise taxes on private equity executives, hedge fund managers and a slew of other rich people. “My intent is to raise the most revenue and do it in a fair way,” Chuck said. “My bill will certainly raise the taxes on people who not get 15 percent for carried interest, for sure.” Though he did not share whether or not the individuals currently privy to paying only 15 percent on carried interest would have to pay 35 like normal people, he did suggest that the political wisdom that says you can’t raise taxes on the wealthy—which Schumer referred to as “old bugaboo”—is no longer valid.

In the past, Schumer’s been against any proposals that he felt unfairly singled out minorities (women, blacks, private-equity firms, hedge funds), by stripping them of their right to keep more of their money than other people. Now he claims to want to “treat everyone across the board,” and says he isn’t afraid to raise taxes on the rich in order to level the playing field. The only thing he may be afraid of is not getting an invite to Jim Chanos’s next 4th of July clambake, the last one at which he was heard saying “I’m still thinking about it,” re: taxation on HF managers and “I’ve never gotten why people would want to eat mussels. There’s too much work involved, too labor intensive. I don't want to be breaking a sweat while I’m eating."

Schumer Says He'll Sponsor Tax Rise on Fund Managers [Bloomberg]

There’s a lot of bitching and moaning going on, of late, about how hedge fund mangers like James Simons and private equity giants like (OXYMORON ALERT:) Stephen Schwarzman* make too much money. But bitching and moaning on their own only go so far, which is why, every once in a while, there has to be a report that gives a little weight to the “it isn’t fair” argument that Schwarzman earned one hundred billion dollars last year and our compensation is one belly rub per post (and a scratch behind the ears for every “after the jump,” because page views = money, people).

Today’s (essentially) scientific study comes courtesy of the Institute for Policy Studies (IPS) and United for a Fair Economy. It found that in 2006, the top 20 hedge fund and private equity bosses (Simons, Cohen, Griffin, Schwarzman, Kravis, etc) earned an average of $657.5 million, versus the $29,544 average raked in by U.S. workers. This translates to the former making 22,255 times that of the latter. But, obviously, that’s not the best part. The report notes that the discrepancy between the two groups “dwarfs”—that’s a direct quote—the discrepancy between CEOs and workers (corporate execs, on average, earn a measly 365 times that of U.S. workers). Actually, no, that’s not the best part, which is the statistic that last year, the Top 20 earned more money in ten minutes than U.S. workers made the whole year. The blatantly passive aggressive subtext here is that there’s something wrong with this.

Douglas Lowenstein, president of the Private Equity Council reminds us that “Income disparity is an important issue, but studies driven by sound bites don't advance a national debate about how our nation should respond” and, personally, as people who are practically deaf when it comes to sound bites, we think he’s dead right. Hedge fund lobbyist John Gaine, of the Managed Funds Association, notes that HF compensation is “fee-based and directly attributable to…performance.” Also right. Sarah Anderson, a director at IPS, decidedly not assisting us in our quest for a hat trick, criticizes the gap, and argues that Congress ought to increase the tax on private equity firm’s earnings from 15% to 35%.

Rather disturbingly, there seems to be a growing contingent in this country that agrees with Ms. Anderson. Individuals and groups who take issue with what they subjectively regard as astronomically bloated pay. People (Ben Stein, the New York Times) who have a “problem” with the so-called tax “loophole” (which, if you take off your shades of cynicism for a moment, will see is actually just a “business model”), open only to managers, and not ordinary Americans.

Thankfully, an organization known as SHAME (Southampton Alliance for Monied Estates) has its head on its shoulders and knows that hedge fund and private equity managers aren’t just like you and I—they’re better, and should be compensated and taxed accordingly. Yesterday, SHAME, in association with Concerned Neighbors of Henry Kravis, took to the streets and demanded more tax breaks for private equity kings. Rallying around Kravis’s mansion, SHAME called on Congress to let the KKR boss and other buyout billionaires with homes in the Hamptons to keep the 15% tax they’ve long come to enjoy. SHAME sang slogans like “protect the emerging plutocracy.” SHAME told DealBook, “We’re out here to help save our local neighborhood billionaires.” SHAME passed around a petition and encouraged people to defend the rights of a contingent of people that so obviously cannot defend itself.

John Carney, discussing SHAME's motivations on the eve of the rally [CNBC]
Union takes LBO protest to Hamptons [Reuters]
Buyout Tax Debate Hits the Hamptons [DealBook]
Cash of the titans: Criticism of pay for fund execs grows [USA Today]

*I will be here—KILLING—all day.

Are you rich? Do you want to stay that way? You are not alone. In a groundbreaking new study, the Wall Street Journal found that the 11 private equity firms that comprise the Private Equity Council are giving more money to the leading Republican presidential candidates than the Dems. Since January, Rudy Giuliani, Mitt Romney and John McCain have received $262,000 from employees of Carlyle, KKR, Blackstone, etc, versus the $231,000 thrown at Clinton, Obama and John Edwards.

The numbers represent a reversal (since 2000) from previously pro-Dem P.E. managers. What’s the impetus behind the shift? A silent message to Hill: “Bring back the headband or we’ll light this dog on fire (/not give you money, and so forth and so on)”? A newfound respect for Mitt Romney, the Porn King of the Bay State? The realization that thing just feel “so right” between you (Schwarzman, Kravis, et al) and a guy who likes to dress in drag? The desire to elect a president who prefers the number ‘15’ to the number ‘35’? It's probably one of these things. Your guess is as good as ours (and our guess is Rudy in a mumu, if you must know).

Private Equity Gives More to Republicans [WSJ]

With regard to a House bill that would swap the much-loved 15% tax rate loophole for a staggering 35%, White House flak Tony Snow said Wednesday that Bushie will veto any and all attempts to increases taxes on hedge funds y buyout firms. Snow, never afraid to go where no one else will, noted that “This is not an administration that’s predisposed toward tax increases.” This bill is separate from the one aimed at Blackstone, Fortress, et. al., though similar in nature, and one that Treasury chief Hank Paulson believes would have “unintended consequences on capitalism,” namely that the mind-blowingly rich would have to let some of its hired help go.

Bush Attacks Tax [New York Post]

The other shoe has dropped.

Top Democratic congressmen introduced legislation that would doubled the tax rates on carried interest. The new tax treatment would treat the carry as ordinary income rather than capital gains. It hits everyone from venture capital funds to real estate funds to private equity firms to hedge funds.

Several prominent hedge fund managers could not be reached for comment. Presumably because they are busy moving their funds off-shore.

Fund Managers' Taxes to Double Under House Measure [Bloomberg]
Text of the Bill [pdf file via PE Hub]

Lawmakers supporting the bill on Capitol Hill to raise taxes on private equity firms going public claim that it’s a basic matter of tax fairness. The bill’s sponsors, Democratic Senator Max Baucus and Republican Senator Chuck Grassley, have argued that private equity companies should not be allowed to access the public capital markets without having to pay the 35% corporate income tax. But the notion that private equity firms enjoy an unfair tax advantage may actually depend on a misunderstanding of how they make money and how they pay taxes.

Most private equity firms are organized as partnerships so that they can take advantage of a provision of the tax law that exempts certain kinds of partnerships from the corporate tax. Like most parts of the tax code, these provisions are written in a convoluted loophole-within-loophole style way that would have string theory physicists scratching their heads. So don’t get too worried about the details.*

One of the reasons the partnership structure is so important for private equity firms is that they make so much of their money from owning and selling operating companies—like, say, Chrysler—that are already subject to corporate taxation. If the private equity partnerships were taxed at the corporate rate, they’d effectively be taxed twice—once at the op-co level, and once at the partnership level. To make things worse, they’d really be taxes three times, since distributions to partners are subject to capital gains taxes. It seems a bit extreme to tax the same revenue stream over and over again.

Today’s Wall Street Journal editorial page, however, says that this is exactly what the Blackstone Bill would do. “Under the Baucus-Grassley proposal, Blackstone's investment income would be taxed first at a 35% corporate tax rate on, say, American Widget Company when it earned the profits; taxed again when those profits are passed on to Blackstone at another 35% corporate income tax rate; and then taxed a third time at a 15% capital gains tax when Blackstone distributes its earnings to partners and shareholders,” the Journal says.

The Blackstone Tax [Wall Street Journal]

* If you must know, one provision says all partnerships get taxed with the corporate rate. Another provision creates a list of about fifteen different types of entities that are exempt from this treatment. Private equity partnerships fall under the exception for entities deriving income from “passive type income”—which is income from capital gains. This means that the law treats them as “pass-through” partnerships, so that the taxes don’t hit the partnerships themselves but only the owners of the partnerships. Because of this the managers of the partnerships typically pay capital gains taxes, rather than ordinary income taxes, on the profits of the firm.

Over the past few years, the business of private equity has made a tremendous amount of money for a small number of people and institutions. And, if the top lawmakers on the Senate Finance Committee get their way, the number of people who participate in the profits of private equity isn’t likely to grow by very much.

One little noted effect of the move afoot on Capitol Hill to treat private equity and hedge funds as corporations after they go private will be to prevent ordinary investors from participating in what has been one of the biggest sources of wealth on Wall Street in recent years. The “Blackstone Bill” introduced by Senate finance committee head Baucus-Grassley would force private equity firms going public to pay the corporate tax—a huge expense that may chill the desire of firms to go sell equity to the general public.

“The little guy is going to be permanently shut-out,” one expert in corporate taxes told DealBreaker.

Until some private equity firms recently began offering funds that are publicly traded, most the prosperity of private equity over the past few years had been enjoyed exclusively by wealthy individuals and institutions that invest in the funds of the firms, and the partners who own them. The decision to go public would have let ordinary investors into this exclusive club.

But lawmakers on Capitol Hill seem intent on keeping that club exclusive, all in the name of tax fairness. Even if the tax change does not prevent the PE firms from going public (Alan Abelson of Barron’s thinks it won’t), it means that the companies the public can buy into will be far less profitable after taxes than the companies owned by the Steve Schwarzmans and Henry Kravises of the world.

Perils of Going Public [Barron's]

The move to raise taxes on private equity firms going public is the bill the launched a thousand headlines. And ten-thousand blog posts. This afternoon we looked at the possibility of the bill getting enacted and answered the most fundamental question about the proposal. We’re going to send you away into the weekend with an extended write-offs section dedicated to private equity and taxes.

Private Equity, Meet Politics
Here’s the text of the bill [US Senate: pdf]

The official explanation from the finance committee says the bill is meant to address the ‘erosion of the tax base.’ [US Senate: pdf]

Holman Jenkins says the real purpose of the bill is to address the lack of political contributions coming into Washington, DC from private equity pooh-bahs. [Wall Street Journal]

And that explains why Blackstone gets the five-year break: because he’s playing the game the way the Senators and lobbying industry want him to. Membership has its privileges. [Ideoblog]

If Blackstone did buy themselves a break from the Senate, they did it on the cheap. Blackstone employees have only given $26,100 in campaign donations to members of the finance committee over the past 17 years. [Deal Journal]

Senator Grassley thinks that access to US capital markets should be contingent on paying the corporate tax. [Finance Committee Press Release: pdf]

Jenny Anderson and Andrew Ross Sorkin say the bill is going to be called The Blackstone Bill. Which is ironic, since the Blackstone Loophole may exempt Chez Schwarzman for five years. [New York Times]

Meanwhile, Blackstone itself is probably prohibited to publicly responding to any of this because it is in a pre-IPO quiet period. [Associated Press via Houston Chronicle]

The Costs
Mary Gordon says Blackstone’s tax bill could double. [Associated Press via Forbes]

And, of course, the higher tax bill may chill the appetite for going public at other private equity firms. [DealBook]

DealBreaker Commenters notice the irony that taxing the public company at the corporate rate means private equity firms in which ordinary shareholders can invest face a bigger tax burden than private equity firms open only to wealthy investors. Sticking it to the little guy!

Details: Human Interest and Otherwise
Before news of the tax hit came yesterday, Schwarzman and other ‘stoners were pitching the company's IPO to a standing-room-only crowd of about 600 investors at the Pierre Hotel. [Bloomberg]

When the news broke, Schwarzman was at the NYSE exchange getting an award from Yale. [Washington Post]

Schwarzman described the news of the bill as “a crisis.” [Wall Street Journal]

The Man Behind The Plan: Meet Victor Fleischer
The academic who is advising the Finance Committee on the tax treatment of private equity firms says the Blackstone IPO represents ‘2 and 20 on drugs.’[The Conglomerate]

And, yeah, he thinks the ‘carried interest’ capital gains break for fund managers should be brought to an end, too. [The Conglomerate]

But he also explains an even more twisted way that ordinary income tax could be avoided. [The Conglomerate]

Early Reactions
Percy Walker says he doubts the changes will ever reach down to tag fund managers individually. [Percy Walker.com]

Felix Salmon thinks that’s wishful thinking. All the tax loopholes are going to be closed soon, even the ability to move funds off-shore. Especially if the Democrats take the White House. [Portfolio]

Meta
The deal team at the Wall Street Journal gets all ‘war correspondent’ on us. Broadsides. Shots across the bow. Private equity bracing for an attack. (Also, we count no less than seven Wall Street Journal reporters attached to this one story. Talk about sending in the cavalry.) [Wall Street Journal]

News from Around the World
British parliament rips into venture capitalists on why they pay 10% capital gains tax instead of income taxes on the earnings of their partnerships. [Epicurean Dealmaker]

The grandfather clause and other fun stuff
Steve Schwarzman became a grandfather of twins yesterday. [DealBook]

Suggested ring-tones for Schwarzman. [Deal Journal]

So the Internal Revenue Service has shut down the Killer B, the tax shelter that has helped fuel the stock buyback programs of many companies with foreign earnings, proving once again that the first rule of Tax Shelter Club is “Do Not Talk About Tax Shelter Club.”

The Killer B, named for a provision of the tax code governing certain corporate reorganizations, was a tax-shelter scheme that was well-known among lawyers and corporate accountants. It’s use was thought to be fairly common among corporations with substantial foreign earnings. Essentially, companies employed it as a way of repatriating foreign profits for the benefit of shareholder without getting hit by US corporate taxes. Surprisingly, however, the Internal Revenue Service seems only to have learned of it when IBM publicly disclosed that it had employed the shelter in connection with a recent stock repurchase. And once it got word of the Killer B, the IRS acted quickly to shut it down.

[After the jump: How the Cold War gave birth to the Killer B.]

Let me get serious here for a second—circa last June, when I heard there was an opening to work under the inimitable legend-- no, god-- that is John Carney, I got excited. VERY excited. I jumped, at the chance (of a lifetime), you might say. My parents, on the other hand, while pretty huge JC fans in their own right, were less pleased. “You know how you’ve built up an aversion to starvation?” my dad asked me in a tone that I did not appreciate. “If you take a job in journalism, you’ll have to wean yourself off of that habit you have of eating three meals a day.” “Listen, asshole Dad,” I said, “That’s not going to be a problem. I’ll be able to supplement my DealBreaker income with the money I make peddling weed and the insane returns I get on meth. Plus, since it’s ‘illegal,’ I don’t have to include those earnings on my 1040. I can work with Big J AND get to eat.” The logic seemed to pacify the senior Levin, and has been working out rather well for me. Until now.

"Prohibition-era gangster Al Capone contended, 'The government can't collect legal taxes from illegal money,' but he was wrong and wound up with eight years in prison for tax evasion," reports MSN Money. As tax time comes back around, the IRS would like to remind you that ill-gotten gains are taxable:

Illegal income. Illegal income, such as money from dealing illegal drugs, must be included in your income on Form 1040, line 21, or on Schedule C or Schedule C-EZ (Form 1040) if from your self-employment activity.

Stolen property. If you steal property, you must report its fair market value in your income in the year you steal it unless, in the same year, you return it to its rightful owner.

Bribes, Theft, Freebies, and Other Taxes You Didn't Know You Owed [Reason Magazine]

DealBreaker might need to set up a Namibian branch office if things keep up like this.

Today Reuters reported that Wesley Snipes—indicted earlier this week for tax fraud—is in Namibia. You remember that place right? It’s the semi-desert African country where Kobi Alexander was discovered, arrested and eventually bailed out of jail to await his extradition treaty.

Can this really be happening? Why Namibia (a country we only really had heard of as the place where Angelina Jolie and Brad Pitt went to hatch their offspring)? At first blush, Namibia seems like a good place to flee. It doesn’t have an extradition treaty with the US, it’s got some fancy resorts and sports lots of European and Israeli ex-pats to pal around with.

Unfortunately for the fugitive types, its also got a government eager to keep the US happy. After Kobi Alexander was discovered there, the country quickly passed a law permitting extradition of alleged criminals wanted in the US.

So why did Snipes stick around when it became apparent that Namibia probably wouldn’t shield him from the long arm of US law enforcement? Well, it seems that he’s not there hiding out at all. He’s filming a movie!

"It is confirmed. He is definitely here," Edwin Kanguatjivi, chief executive officer of the Namibia Film Commission, said by telephone. "He has been in Namibia since the end of August."

Snipes, the star of the "Blade" movie series, is the lead actor in a new movie entitled "Gallowwalker" filming in the Namibian desert near the town of Swakopmund -- the same coastal resort where Hollywood superstars Angelina Jolie and Brad Pitt had their first child in May.

We’re not sure this is entirely plausible. So Snipes just happened to be hanging out in a country with no extradition treaty when his indictment came down? A little convenient, no?

“It will be interesting to see whether he waives extradition proceedings or fights it. That may hint at whether he was there as a fugitive or there for other reasons,” we were told by DealBreaker’s favorite extradition law expert, Douglas McNabb of McNabb Associates.

Indicted U.S. actor Snipes in Namibia: officials [Reuters via the Ka-Ching! blog]

Indictment: Wesley Snipes a $12M tax cheat [CNN]

Sales tax holidays, of course.

Crowded stores. Few bargains. Long lines at the register. Complicated rules about what qualifies.

Consumers look at sales tax holidays as times to find tax free bargains but since stores seem to shut down other price reduction sales during these 'holidays' they are really just a way of letting stores keep a bit more of their register sales. This is inevitable since all consumption taxes--including the sales tax--are really haphazard income taxes leveled against retailers and manufacturers.

Sales Tax Holidays [The Stalwart]

The weirdest thing about the estate tax repeal and resurrection is that the combined effect of the temporary repeal passed in 2001 and the legislation approved by the House today is that we’ll have one year—2010—with no estate taxes at all. The 2001 reforms phase out the tax through 2010, when the tax is reduced to zero.

That phase out, however, is temporary, and without today’s legislation the pre-phase out tax was scheduled to rear-up again in 2011. Congress today voted to restart the tax in 2011 with lower rates and have it only hit wealthier estates, but they’ve kept the current structure which makes 2010 a very good year to die rich if want your heirs rather than the government to get your assets.

House Approves Legislation That Limits Reach of U.S. Estate Tax [Bloomberg]