Ben Franklin, FTW!

[MoonRiver]

?1630035876

[Lovie777]

1. WOW, history . ..

[Klaralven]

2. If cities ran surpluses and invested them, they eventually wouldn't need taxes.

[aggiesal]

4. I remember when states used to have State Banks ...

That was a huge revenue stream for states,
yet they allowed the big banks to buy them out.

This radio commercial out of Indiana
Man: Who's your State Bank
Woman: Who's your State Bank
Man: Why, Hoosier State Bank

[COL Mustard]

32. Hoosier Daddy!

[aggiesal]

37. Well I was a

Hoosier kid, Hoosier boy & Hoosier teenager.
Moved away from Indiana, the day after I graduated from high school.

[TNNurse]

52. I am married to a Hoosier.

Moved south to get out of that winter weather.

We own property there. It took me some time to get used to those flat and never ending fields. But it does have beauty. But we do not visit in the winter.

[bucolic_frolic]

3. Must have had a good lawyer

Everything I ask lawyers is met with hedging. They can't seem to find a way to perpetuate a trust nowadays. Gotta disperse. More fees that way?

[Sgent]

5. The issue is

that trusts pay the highest marginal rates after about 12k in income (including cap gains). It's almost always better tax-wise to payout to beneficiaries (who have to pay income tax on payout) than keep it in the trust since they will be at a lower marginal rate.

If Franklin left it in a Charitable trust then its not subject to income tax, but it cannot go to descendants, family, etc. If its a private foundation (not applicable to 200yo trust) then there are additional rules.

[bucolic_frolic]

6. Oh, so that's what I miss

Not that I'll ever be that flushed, but the general questions get dodged.

And that must be why Congress clipped Roth IRA inheritances. They could have been just about tax free forever.

[Sogo]

11. Franklin died in 1790.

Did they even have such instruments as trusts and foundations then? I know they didn't have income tax.

I'm guessing he had it in an account that simply drew interest.

[Sgent]

15. They had trusts

but other than I don't know.

[FakeNoose]

20. I wonder if they even knew about inflation in those days

On the other hand, $2,000 back in 1799 (or whenever he died) was ONE HELL of a lot of money!

[COL Mustard]

33. They Certainly Had Wills

Other legal documents I don't know about. In spite of what my kids say, I wasn't alive then!!!

[bucolic_frolic]

7. Looks like Ben got around 3.6% for 230 years

Needs a new investment advisor

[lastlib]

19. Stock "market" was a different animal in his day.

I wouldn't have put money in it then either.

Heck, even banks were risky then--no FDIC insurance until FDR. More than a few went under, and more than a few depositors lost everything.

[KS Toronado]

8. Just did an internet search on the above.

Ben Franklin did do this, what foresight!

[MoonRiver]

14. He may have been the best of our Founding Fathers!

[OldBaldy1701E]

47. I'd say he was the best

Retired at 43, because he decided he was wealthy enough. (A sentiment that is sorely missing in our culture these days.) He invented many things, and did not even apply for a patent. He did not want one. He wanted the things he invented to be available to everyone regardless of wealth. (Another sentiment that is sorely needed these days.) He felt that compromise was the best way to achieve political goals. (Yet another... you get the picture?) He was not a god... no human is... but he had the right ideas for our society, and it is a freaking shame that he is so revered while his ideas are largely ignored. Sure, a few were weird to say the least, but he was constantly trying to make things better for everyone. Would that I could say that about more people these days.

[MoonRiver]

51. Well said!

I also like John Adams and Alexander Hamilton.

[Traildogbob]

9. B B B Benny and the Checks.🎹🎼

[StarryNite]

12. LOL

[evolves]

13. Excellent!

[llmart]

21. DUzy!

[Traildogbob]

26. Good to see

Some of us still know what checks are. The youngun’s would not get it, checks OR Elton reference. Cheers all!

[packman]

10. I already figured it out

If I put 2oK$ in the bank for 200 yrs., I can live comfortably in the year 2221.

[Submariner]

18. Don't you worry a bit, the late late late late grandson of Alan Greenspan,

in a fine example of his family's continued incompetence and douchebaggery, will find a way to take it from your 401(k) with a financial instrument like the 2208 Memorial Edition of the "derivative", that just like in 2008 sucks 40% of your nest egg cash away just a couple of years before retirement.

[Martin68]

16. It is rare that genius and compassion intersect so perfectly.

[MoonRiver]

17. Exactly!

[IronLionZion]

22. All about the Benjamins baby

[Farmer-Rick]

23. Shows you how corporations and the filthy rich make money

While doing absolutely nothing of value. Now, who is really lazy? The filthy rich who do absolutely nothing to earn their keep or the working poor?

This is how capitalism screws us all.

If you lived forever, you too could be filthy rich.

[SergeStorms]

24. He has vision......

when everybody else was wearing bifocals.

I think that was dialogue from Paul Newman in, 'Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid.'

I know, I know, Franklin wore glasses too.

[dflprincess]

38. Ben not only wore glasses, he invented the bifocal

And as someone who nows wears a progressive lens, I thank him for improviing my vision.

[SergeStorms]

39. Yeah, me too.

These old eyes are changing more often now. For 45 years I had 20/20 vision. Then my first pair of glasses for reading. 25 years later and things are really going to hell in a hand basket. 🤓

[dflprincess]

40. Isn't that the truth?

I almost hoping this is the year the doctor says it's time to do the cataracts. Though last year he thought I was still a "few years" away from needing anything done.

[SergeStorms]

46. I had my left eye done two years ago.

What a difference! I never knew how white, white things are. I look through my left eye only, beautiful and clear. Then my right eye only, it's like looking through a dull, yellowish sheet of plastic.

My ophthalmologist says the right eye isn't that bad yet, but I'm going to get it done as soon as I'm comfortable the delta variant has calmed down a bit.

It really makes a world of difference.

[MoonRiver]

50. Same here!

[PoindexterOglethorpe]

25. I know that these days you cannot set up a trust in perpetuity, meaning it never ends.

Back then, you could. Now a trust you set up needs to have some sort of declared end to it, such as at the death of the longest surviving trustee. I learned this when I was setting up a trust for my two sons.

[DFW]

27. In what form did he leave it?

Jefferson and Hamilton had an 8 year argument about whether to use the English system of money (Hamilton) or a decimal system (Jefferson). Jefferson eventually won out, but not until 1792, when the dollar was decided upon as a (decimal-based) national currency.

On the other hand, if he left an acre of land in the heart of Center City Philadelphia, now THAT would be worth a chunk of change these days.

[SeattleVet]

28. It was left as 1000 pounds each, to Boston and Philadelphia.

Here's a good article with a lot of the background, and how portions of the money have been spent, and the arguments that inevitably ensued:

https://www.mentalfloss.com/article/627475/200-year-old-gift-from-benjamin-franklin-to-boston-and-philadelphia

[BumRushDaShow]

34. That was a good article

It's unfortunate that they showed a pic of the Ben Franklin Institute of Technology in Boston but didn't bother to show the Franklin Institute Museum here in Philly.





One of the popular exhibits - "The Heart" (re-done from the one when I was a kid) -



There's also a locomotive down in the basement -



That is supposed to be re-done to look like this eventually -



They used to have a Boeing 707 out back (since removed) -



I remember they had one of those old AT&T video-phones (like the one in "2001: A Space Odyssey" ). Took 50 years to finally get the tech acceptable to the public.

The Fels Planetarium and an observatory is there too. Plus they originally did the "official" weather observations (temperature, pressure, wind, etc) before all of that was moved to the airport (that hadn't been built at the time).

[MoonRiver]

49. Great pics! The heart display is amazing!

Too bad about Philly though.

[BumRushDaShow]

53. It's a great museum.

The heart exhibit has been there for 67 years this year and has been patched and completely renovated recently. It had sound effects of a beating heart when you walked through. I remember going with my nieces and nephews when they were little and finally saw the "new" one (had been renovated in 2004 and recently got a touch-up renovation).

Link to tweet

TEXT

The Franklin Institute
@TheFranklin
#OnThisDay: The Giant Heart first opened to the public 67 years ago on January 29, 1954.
Image
Image
1:28 PM · Jan 29, 2021

They have really kept it updated in there over the years. Funny but the first thing that I remembered was also a giant pendulum and they show that at the end of the above video clip and show it in the below when they have the pins there for it to knock over during a day.

[MoonRiver]

55. Wow, looks fantastic!

If we're in Philly, will definitely check that out!

[DFW]

43. Very interesting

Especially that it was left in pounds. The main gold coin of England in those days was still the guinea, which was worth a pound plus a shilling. The gold sovereign as a widely circulating form of the pound wasn't introduced until 1817. But there was a wide variety of "coin of the realm" circulating in North America at the time, and I'm sure the accountants of the day had no trouble figuring it out.

I'm not from Philly, but I went to school there, and passed by the statue of Franklin (the founder) on the campus every single day.

[EarnestPutz]

29. An online inflation calculator says that $2000 in 1790 would be worth less than $60000 today, so....

.....the City of Boston, even with no doubt conservative investing, did fairly well with Ben's dough.

Just looked again, Franklin's gift was worth about $28,400 in 1990 when it became available, which tells you something about the value of a dollar over the last thirty years.

[DFW]

44. It would have been worth various amounts in various forms.

If he had converted it into $10 coins of 1795 (they were not introduced until 1795), that would have made 200 of them, more if one took into account that a pound was worth more than a dollar. Even in 1990, they would easily have been worth between $25,000 and $50,000 each on the collector market.

[Cha]

30. That made me cry it's so sweet.

[SleeplessinSoCal]

31. already lost the link, but this is worth noting...

"...In the late 90s, Boston's trust balance was $4.5 million, while the Philadelphia account was valued at $2 million. The large value difference was due to better investment handling in Boston...."

[LiberalFighter]

35. I did a research and confirmed it. Wow!

[Blue Owl]

36. K&R

[Silent3]

41. Even adjusted for inflation...

...his $2000 would have been worth about $60,000 today.

It's not really possible to be accurate about inflation across that span of time, but no matter how rough the conversion, it's an amazing value increase.

A nice bet he made too, on the stability of the country and the banking system over than span of time. Even the Civil War and the Great Depression didn't stop his investment from bearing fruit.

[pansypoo53219]

42. i read his auto-biography years ago. and my 1903 encyclopedia had like 8-12 pages for him + read

poor richard's almanac before the 2020 election. he wrote a great explanation about the julian to gregorian calendar. and i finally got the answer why February has 28 days. every month used to be 28 days.

[Sgent]

45. I still think its impressive how

his greatest scientific achievement was probably his contribution to electrical engineering, but since he had no formal education in physics, he got the + / - signs wrong. To this day if you look at a circuit drawn by a physicist vs an EE they have reverse charge signs since his way makes more sense for circuit design, but is technically incorrect.

[MoonRiver]

48. I didn't know that! Thanks!

[BumRushDaShow]

54. As a funny anecdote

there is a kite and lightning bolt near entrance to the Philly side of the Ben Franklin Bridge next to Franklin Square.



(yes he is venerated here and before I retired and was commuting to work, I drove by it every day)

I know lots of myths have prevailed about the "key and kite" but I guess it just underscored how much he liked to observe the world around him and we certainly had some wild weather here.