American society has long been defined by an intricate and unique combination of the roles of government, business and the non-profit sector. Other cultures exist with most, if not all, of their society's needs met by business and government...
Life insurance is unique among types of insurance in that it insures against an event (death) that will occur as opposed to an event that may occur. But, although death is a certainty, individuals buy life insurance to hedge against the time when...
Charitable lead annuity trusts (CLATs) have received considerable attention recently, in light of current low interest rates. If structured correctly, CLATs have the twin benefits of (1) providing payments to charity for a number of years, and (2)...
Like you, I always knew non-tax issues in estate planning were important. But I never realized how important. With the chaos in 2010 on the tax side of estate planning and the virtual inability to offer certainty, coupled with the high cost of...
Kids of wealthy parents almost always fire their parents' advisors after they inherit the money. They also tend to fail to meet their financial goals. There are many reasons why. Here are some ways to keep their business.
Waiting for Godot is a classic play in which the protagonists await the arrival of a mysterious problem solver who never arrives. For estate planners and valuation professionals, 2010 was similarly a time for waiting for tax law resolutions, for...
Waiting for Godot is a classic play in which the protagonists await the arrival of a mysterious problem solver who never arrives. For estate planners and valuation professionals, 2010 was similarly a time for waiting for tax law resolutions, for...
While multi-generational trusts have been used in the United States for many decades, they gained more notoriety when Congress passed the generation-skipping transfer (GST) tax in 1986.1 Wisely, Congress provided an exemption from the GST tax so...
When asset protection planning was in its infancy in the mid-80s, there were few developments and even fewer mentions in the estate-planning literature. Nowadays, there's nary an estate planning symposia in which asset protection planning isn't...