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Voters Can Kill the
Death Tax
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Release Date:
09/11/00
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WASHINGTON, September
11, 2000 -- With the crisp air and chilly nights
come two time-honored American traditions:
elections and football.
And as I watched
the season-openers, I couldn't help but see the
similarity between football teams fighting to
reach the goal line and this summer's battle in
Washington, DC, to repeal the death tax... and
the potential for the November 7th elections to
be the final "play" in that game.
Small
business owners this year made a long, hard
drive toward their goal of killing what they
consider to be the most unfair tax on the books.
After the Senate and House repealed the death
tax with a strong bi-partisan majority, American
small business felt like a team, first and goal,
on the five-yard line, ready to score... and
then President Clinton's veto was like a 15-yard
sack.
But that doesn't mean we won't
still score. You see, thanks to the November
elections, we have three downs left.
The
second down is re-electing a House of
Representatives that understands how punishing
the death tax is to America's family-owned
businesses and farms. The third down is
re-electing a Senate that also understands. And
the fourth down is electing a president who will
sign that bill.
A word to the wise
candidate (congressional or presidential): if
you are committed to repealing the death tax,
you need to tell small-business owners now in
order to secure their votes in
November.
I cannot emphasize enough the
importance of this issue to America's
entrepreneurs. And I have faith that one sack
will not keep them down. Because they've had
enough, and this summer they got so close to the
goal line, they could taste it.
Ask them.
They will tell you that it is just plain wrong
that the people who create the majority of new
jobs in this country must spend countless hours
and dollars preparing to face an enormous tax
that is levied for the sole reason that a family
member has died.
The death tax was
established in 1916, the era of families like
the Rockefellers, out of a fear that a few clans
would amass a majority of the nation's wealth.
It was not indexed to inflation, so it has gone
the way of so many taxes aimed at the very-rich:
the middle class must struggle to pay it... or,
in this case, lose their businesses because of
it.
President Clinton insists that this
tax only affects 2 percent of Americans because
only 2 percent pay the tax... but that statistic
completely ignores the scores of businesses that
spend so much of their valuable resources on
lawyers and life insurance in an effort to keep
the business in the family. Believe me, business
owners would much rather spend that time and
money creating jobs, expanding benefits for
their employees and giving back to their
communities.
If we succeed in these last
three downs - and I believe we will - there will
be no more stories like that of Mike Nobis,
owner of a printing business in Quincy,
Illinois, who was handed a tax bill of over
$300,000 last year because his parents were both
killed in a tragic car accident. And there will
be no more stories like that of Norman Thomas,
owner of Cumberland Paint & Wallpaper in
Fayetteville, North Carolina, who is going to
have to take out a loan this year to pay the
$100,000 -$150,000 tax on his father's
death.
Coming this close and losing was
tough... but we will remember, in November, what
that goal line looked like. And we will be
rushing toward it as we enter the voting booth.
The death tax has drawn its final
breath.
Publications are encouraged to re-print
these columns in their entirety. Please ensure
that the following credit information is
included in re-prints: "Jack Faris is president
of NFIB, the nation's largest small business
advocacy group. A non-profit, non-partisan
organization founded in 1943, NFIB represents
the consensus views of its 600,000 members in
Washington, D.C., and all 50 state capitals.
More information is available on-line at
www.nfib.com."
CONTACT: Jean Card,
NFIB Special Assistant to the President at
202.314.2018
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