When You’re A Billionaire, Your Hobbies Can Slash Your Tax Bill

This story first appeared at ProPublica. ProPublica is a Pulitzer Prize-winning investigative newsroom. Sign up for The Big Story newsletter to receive stories like this one in your inbox.


This is a companion discussion topic for the original entry at https://talkingpointsmemo.com/?p=1397361
1 Like

Yes, billionaires can afford better accountants than you can.

No, it doesn’t “make them smart”.

Yes, we should reform the tax code, but good luck getting the 535 incumbent toadies of the overclass to do so.

8 Likes

Admittedly OT, but i have my own Charlotte Weber racetrack story.

Back in 2006 when i worked at Gulfstream Park, Hall of Fame jockey Jerry Bailey announced his upcoming retirement: his final race would be here in a $500,000 stakes race aboard Silver Tree, owned by Peter Vegso, owner of the publishing company behind the “Chicken Soup for the Soul” series of books.

Silver Tree was the morning line favorite. The horse was being trained by Hall of Fame trainer Bill Mott, who previously saddled Horse of the Year Cigar.

Silver Tree broke sharply and dominated throughout much of the race, but in the final stretch he was outpaced by and lost to a little known horse named Miesque’s Approval, owned by Charlotte Weber, heiress to the Campbell Soup fortune.

7 Likes

My friends, it’s the Golden Rule. He who has the gold makes the rules. These jackasses have purchased the national legislature which then passes laws beneficial to these same billionaires. Tax the rich.

9 Likes

“Wheather you can hear it or not,the universe is laughing behind your back” Fluke of the Universe…National Lampoons’s Radio Dinner

1 Like

And Ty Warner is deliberately increasing his losses. He has closed his Four Seasons Santa Barbara with no reopen date.

5 Likes

Sickening lot. Hope when they die they’re allowed to be buried with all their money, maybe in a pyramid.

2 Likes

I’ve been wondering what the deal was w/this hotel. When lockdowns stopped, anyone who could afford it flocked to Santa Barbara for a quick getaway. The town’s been hopping ever since late 2020…

2 Likes

“Town’s been hopping”

Nothing like when I was in IV in 71 for the B of A bombing though.
Those were the days my friend.

2 Likes

image

3 Likes

We have the best government money can buy.

2 Likes

I had to google that! You were there???

1 Like

Yes. I was there in my official capacity as West Coast Ambassador to the Twighlight Zone.
I was escorting an Army deserter from Ft. Lewis WA in exchange for a pierced ear from his girlfriend who lived next door.
(At 13th and Union. Just a block from the Seattle CHOP cop shop)

1 Like

In Texas one can qualify for certain big tax exemptions for keeping as few as 6-12 cattle on your property or planting a certain number of trees. Corporations and wealthy people take advantage of them.

1 Like

“The well-advised, wealthy individuals have figured out ways around them.”

No, they’ve only figured out one way around them. Creat a separate firm of tax accountants, lobbyists, and lawyers to find ways around them. I would just love to see a wingnut like Michael Lindell actually make it through a 1040.

Oh, on the write-offs… us normal schlubs can’t even itemize our taxes any more, much less trying to ‘deduct’ the luxuries the 1% afford.

2 Likes

Thanks for enumerating some of the loopholes these ulta-wealthy folks take advantage of regularly.

1 Like