Gary Cohn: ‘Only morons pay the estate tax’

The following article by Jennifer M. Wood was posted on the Death and Taxes Magazine website August 29, 2017:

Donald Trump’s top economic adviser Gary Cohn doesn’t always see eye to eye with his boss, but when it comes to cold, hard cash, they both think that paying taxes is for suckers. According to The New York Times, Cohn managed to piss off a group of Senate Democrats when he joked that “only morons pay the estate tax.”

The comment was made earlier this year in response to a conversation Dems wanted to have about whether it might make sense — including financially — to repeal the estate tax. Cohn, the former president of Goldman Sachs, didn’t hesitate to make his opinion on the matter known. The comment was repeated by more than one person who was present, though a source close to Cohn told NYT that he never used the “m” word and that his comment was about “rich people with really bad tax planning.”

It’s also worth repeating The Times’ description of Cohn in the piece: Continue reading “Gary Cohn: ‘Only morons pay the estate tax’”