Video: Estate Tax Increase a Killer for Family-owned Businesses
Curtis Dubay /
The U.S. House of Representatives will vote this week on a bill that would permanently extend the estate tax (known better as the death tax) at its current rate and exemption level. This extension would prevent the death tax from expiring as scheduled on January 1, 2010. As such it would be a significant tax increase.
Before voting to extend the death tax, Congress should consider the devastating impact it has on family-owned businesses. Reliable Contracting, a family-owned business in Millersville, Maryland, for example, had to pay a death tax liability over a ten year period. During that decade span, the money they had to dedicate to pay the tax greatly weakened the business and it struggled to survive. As the video below shows, if the death tax hit Reliable once more the business might not make it through the ordeal again:
[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ImxWWLEcMiI[/youtube]
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