Friday, February 11, 2011

Timely Exits

There was a fun but informative article appearing in Forbes magazine last week, about the mistakes and clever moves that wealthy celebrities had made in their estate planning. One thing that can't really be planned is when you'll leave this vale of tears, but the article points out that several wealthy people made very timely exits last year, when the estate tax had disappeared for 365 days:

* George Steinbrenner, the principal owner of the New York Yankees, died on July 13th, 2011. Because there was no estate tax in effect, he was able to pass his share of the Yankees along to his sons Hal and Hank, free and clear.

* Roger Milliken, the billionaire heir to a South Carolina textile fortune, cut it very close: He passed away on December 30th of last year at the age of 95. Had he hung on for two more days, his heirs would have owed hundreds of millions of dollars in estate taxes.

* Chicken tycoon Don Tyson, on the other hand, died on January 6th of this year, six days after the estate tax was reinstated. Forbes estimates that those six days could cost his heirs $350 million.

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