[SEL] Spam> Farm Welfare To Be Cut?

[P. Johns]

And; go to:
http://www.thenation.com/article/159943/tax-day-farms-owned-rich-provide-massive-tax-shelter

In part:
"Take Michael Dell, founder of Dell Computers and the second-richest Texan,
who qualified for an agricultural property tax break on his sprawling
1,757-acre residential ranch in suburban Austin and saved over $1 million
simply because his family and friends sometimes use the land as a private
hunting preserve to shoot deer. Or take billionaire publisher Steve Forbes,
who got more than a 90 percent property tax reduction on hundreds of acres
of his multimillion-dollar estate in upscale Bedminister, New Jersey, just
by putting a couple of cows out to pasture. They are not alone. All across
the country, a huge number of America’s wealthiest are tapping into
agricultural tax breaks—and none of them have to do any real farming to
qualify.

Not only are agricultural tax breaks allowing wealthy landowners to shift
their tax burden onto other less-affluent taxpayers but they are also
helping bankrupt public schools, which derive the bulk of their funding from
local property taxes. "


It is common in California for someone to have what you may consider a
country estate - frequently very close to a city - that has just a couple of
cows or other animals so it can be considered a farm.

Paul - still a city boy.