| ThinkProgress noted last year that multi-millionaire movie star Tom Cruise manipulated a tax break meant to help struggling farmers in order to pay just $400 of property taxes on his $18 million Colorado estate. Cruise was able to pay so little because he allowed some sheep to graze on the estate, thus qualifying the land as agricultural and making it eligible for a big tax break.
According to the Miami Herald, Sen. Bill Nelson (D-FL) has done much the same thing, letting cows graze on a plot of land that he owns, which dramatically lowered his tax bill: Thanks to a half-dozen cows that graze Nelson's 55 acres on the Indian River, he saved $43,000 in property taxes last year"The land has a full market value of $2.7 million, but the county tax collector uses the agricultural value of $210,000. That reduced Nelson's tax bill in 2011 to $3,696. [...] |
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At thinkprogress.org
At thinkprogress.org
