The Birmingham age-herald., 1914-06-20

good roads and are advertising now for bids for 10 miles of pike. It Is the pur- pose of the county commissioners to keep these machines busy every day possible for them to run on the roads of the county.
 Good seasons have been felt in this county almost in every section, in some places the rains fell in such torents that crops were badly washed. Lightning has done some damage. A barn on the Luke Pryor place was destroyed, and a mule in the barn of Sam Anderson at Tanner was killed. Crops are looking as fine as can be at this season.
 ~ estate might be of the value of eighty millions. and yet he did not know whether this were not too low an esti- mate by at least five millions or too large an estimate by like amount. He was always heavy borrower of funds and he could not tell exactly what his equities in his real property were.
 The Astor Estate
 The appraisers labored long and con scientfously in order to obtain the amount of the estate of the late John Jacob Astor upon which the estate tax could be imposed. Their final estimate fixed the amount at considerably less than the general understanding of the value of the Astor estate.
 Some of the large estates, on the other hand, have upon appraisal been found to be of even greater amount than the estimates commonly fixed of the wealth of the accumlator of the estate That was the case with the es- tate of John s. Kenndy, and notably with the estate of the late Anthony Brady.
 Computing the Incomes
 It was this difficulty which the state tax appraisers have always encountered When attempting to get at the proper amount of a decedents estate upon which a state tax can be imposed and the most invariable difference between the first estimate and the actual find- ings of the appraisers which led them to suspect that similar conditions in a general way would be established by the attempt to fix the incomes so that the federal income tax could thereby be imposed.
 Many of the very wealthy men have no idea what their actual net income is. The president of one of the largest of the American industrial organiza- tons, who Is prominent citizen of Ohio, said this morning that he thought he knew reasonably well what his in come was and had been for long ' work to establish the income upon which by law a federal tax could be imposed he discovered that he practi- cally had no income. The exemptions and the obligations of which the in- come tax takes notice and for which it gives allowance actually reduced his income so that he had a small amount to pay.
 Early in March there prevailed a strong suspicion that the presumably very large incomes of which citizens were in possession would be found to be far below the amount estimated by those who drafted the income tax bill Furthermore. the belief constantly gained ground that, relatively speak ing, much the greater part of the tax received by the income tax collector would be found to have come from that great body of American citizens who were last year. in possession of moder- ately small incomes, but in excess of the amount exempted by law by any where from three to seven or eight thouand dollars. Incomes of this kind are readily and accurately ascertainable. Many of them are obtained by salaries The possessors of them do not as a 1 general thing incur obligations which could lawfully be deducted from in- comes.
 Then, again, the belief was current | in this city that it would be found by , the government authorities that. rela- | lively speaking. the aggregate income tax collected from citizens of New York was not much greater than that col lected from citizens of other large communities and may be considerably | less This could be in part explained by the fact that some of those who have gained notoriety as the possessors of enormous incomes are not citizens of New York city. They do business here. but their legal residence is elsewhere.
 An Inaccurate Estimate The main feature. however, to be dis covered in the official statement which will soon tell the aggregate amount of taxes collected upon incomes will very likely lead to the disclosure that there | is a wider distribution of wealth than has been commonly presumed to be the case and that swollen or undue incomes are confirmed to very few persons
 These for the most part are men who are heavy borrowers. are sponsors for large obligations and whose capital Is l in considerable measure invested at this time in securities which yield lit I tle or no income. One of the wealthiest men of New York discovered when he was figuring upon his income that by reason of the falling off in dividends and the passing of dividends upon many of his securities his income had been in the past year or two reduced by more than 50 per cent.
 | If it be true, as is asserted, that the suspicion is strong in the treasury de- pertinent that this heavy falling orr or possibly $30.000,000 from the estimate made last summer of the amount which would be received on the income tax is traceable to dishonesty. false returns unlawful concealment of incomes this suspicion is not shared by the collec- tors of internal revenue. They are con fident that the great majority of those who made income returns did so In good faith after having tried to square their incomes with the requirements of the law. There is some apprehension that the attempt may be made at Wash ington to make good this discrepancy by means of an amendment by which the income tax rates would be in- creased.
 EOurfh Of Ju1v pronarafiOns