Posted on 02/04/2008 12:08:29 PM PST by Dr. Zzyzx
The family of Utah inventor and billionaire philanthropist James LeVoy Sorenson said today that he willed his entire personal fortune to charity.
Sorenson died of cancer last month at age 86.
Last year, Forbes Magazine estimated his wealth to be approximately $4.5 billion.
Sorenson was known for his numerous medical inventions and successful business endeavors, in addition to his dedication to charitable causes. His son, James Lee Sorenson, said his father had talked about leaving his vast fortune behind to help various worthy causes.
"Over time, particularly the last 10 to 20 years having been successful, he asked himself, 'What is it that I can do with my wealth?' And he came to this conclusion."
James Lee Sorenson said the Sorenson Legacy Foundation will administer and choose which deserving organizations will receive gifts from his father's estate. Previous beneficiaries of gifts from the foundation have included Gallaudet University in Washington, D.C., a college for deaf and hard of hearing students, and the University of Utah.
I have made it repeatedly in plain English on this thread.
I need all the help I...I mean the cat, needs all the help it can get ;)
Whatever the going rate is for the Estate tax. What is it? 50-60%?
That’s pretty much the way it goes. The kooks do follow the money. Ever see a gay takeover of a poor church in the slums? Nope. They go after the churches with endowments.
Okay, then feel free to leave your 4.5 Billion to anyone you choose.
St. Mark's Episcopal Cathedral in Seattle is a classic example of this. It started with a gay Dean and eventually they ended up with a black, lesbian Director of Faith Formation who converted to Islam while still a member of the clergy there. They didn't even fire her (the Episcopal Bishop of Western Washington apparently saw no contradiction between Islam and Christianity). Eventually some Bishop from the East Coast (from whom the woman received her ordination) stepped in and "suspended" her in order to stanch the embarassing fallout arising from this travesty.
Feel free to learn nothing.
If so, it is a way the wealthy get out of paying estate taxes, and pass their wealth on to their progeny.
The John M. Olin Foundation was a grant-making foundation established in 1953 by John M. Olin, president of the Olin Industries chemical and munitions manufacturing businesses. The general purpose of the John M. Olin Foundation was to provide support for projects that reflected or were intended to strengthen the economic, political and cultural institutions upon which the American heritage of constitutional government and private enterprise is based. The Foundation also sought to promote a general understanding of these institutions by encouraging the thoughtful study of the connections between economic and political freedoms, and the cultural heritage that sustains them. Unlike most non-profit foundations, the John M. Olin Foundation was charged to spend all of its assets within a generation of Olin's death, for fear of mission drift over time. It made its last grant in the summer of 2005 and officially disbanded on November 29 of that year after having disbursed over $370 million in funding, primarily to conservative think tanks, media outlets, and law programs at influential universities. The Foundation is most notable for its early support and funding of the law and economics movement.
It’s about 50 depending on which state could be more or less. But is that true if the money is given to charity? I think if the money is given to charity then the taxes are much less or not at all.
The perversity of the Universe tends towards a maximum. And so also does the greed of the US Government.
Though I have no facts to back it up, my suspicion is that the Estate tax is applied before ANYONE gets their hands on that dough.
In my opinion, the Estate tax levied by the Federal Government is the most obscene of all the taxes. It taxes monies that have already been taxed. Sometimes 4 and 5 times over.
Besides that, why do they think for one second they are entitled to any of it? And at such an obscene rate. What is the justification for this tax?
I could go on but I'm not supposed to let my blood pressure elevate.
No large ones, that’s for sure. Except Huntsman’s efforts, but I don’t think that counts, since the original prime movers are still alive. I don’t know if you can count the LDS church, since it is actually micromanaged at over 50,000 distinct locations.
I was only replying to the tag line on the previous post.
If the idea was to keep as much in the family as possible he would have just structured it that way. Even if the government got 50% of the 4.5 billion, it would be billions more than the family will get now. Some people are simply good people.
Ping
Looks like the Olin Foundation did some good. Better yet, it was money that did not go to the Feds to be wasted.
Today, we have the Gates and Dell foundations, each will do better work with their money then the Feds.
Strike three.
Green shag?
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