What is John Edwards net worth ?

[kentuck]

Just curious. Because George W Bush is no pauper either. In fact, he made about $14 million (?) off the sale of a baseball stadium in Arlington, Texas that was mostly paid for by the taxpayers of Texas? Did John Edwards ever make as much off of any case that he tried? Does anyone know?

[ayeshahaqqiqa]

1. No, but Edwards never ripped off taxpayers

like Shrub did. Ask anyone who owns a business in Arlington about that baseball deal. Shrub has been persona non grata at my brother-in-law's bar there since that happened.

[wurzel]

2. The great untold story of how Bush got his money.

He got it building a baseball stadium at public expense using "imminent domain" laws to toss people out of their homes. Typical Republican.

[AP]

3. The money Edwards made from his suits was taxed at 35-39%

and also went to paying his staff and running his office. I don't know if the expenses of litigation came out of his share of the award -- I suspect they did.

I think I read that all the suits he won added up to 250 million. Say that he got a third of that -- that's about 80 million. Take off expenses of running his office and litigation expenses -- that's anywhere from a quarter to a half of that (most firms have profit margins of only about 30%-50%, but his firm ran a little leaner than most, so we'll say his had profit margins of about 67.5%). So let's say he has 50 million lifetime after deductibel expenses. Tax that at an average of 35%, he has 32.5 mil after taxes and expenses over about 25 years of working as a lawyer.

I believe that he reports his net worth in the 15-40 mil range on his FEC forms. So, after investing that money, and including his wife's earnings and his senate salary, whatever he's made has grown beyond 40 mil, so I think my estimate must be pretty close.

George bush made 14 mil off the sale of that baseball team, which required no work by him. His only deductible expense was probably gass and mileage for driving to the baseball stadium so he could get some photo-ops setting him up for his governor run. I don't know what the cap gains tax was when he sold that team -- it's 15% now for long term cap gains.

Bush also got something like a million from selling Arbusto before it went down the tubes. The shares, apparently, were purchased by a Harvard University investment fund at the urging of GHWB, IIRC.

Arbusto and the baseball stadium make up just two days of moneymaking for Bush. The Bush family, according to Moore's F911 has gotten over 1 billion dollars invested in their projects just by the Saudis. I have no idea how that money was taxes, or how its value filtered down to the paychecks of Bush family members. But I suspect that a big chunk of that has ended up in Bush family individual bank accounts.

[SammyWinstonJack]

4. I don't remember which Corporate News I was watching

well, I wasn't actually watching, just happened to stop on this particular channel. Anyway, the Media Ho was talking about how Kerry and Edwards were perhaps the richest team to run for Pres and VP. Some "guest" was saying that their combined net worth was probably over a billion dollars. :eyes: I continued on with my channel surfing upon hearing that crap!

[AP]

6. Edwards might be the richest ever who made every penny himself.

Even LBJ got a huge chunk of his wealth from marrying Ladybird. I think it was her family that owned the TV stations.

Carter inherited the farm from his father.

OK, Reagan earned money from acting, but I think he was broke before he went into politics. After he went into politics, I think friends set him up (they definitely bought him his bel air mansion).

W definitely hasn't earned money from his own labors. He's making more money as president taxed at earned income rates than he's probably made in his entire life.

GHWB made money from drilling, but he had his father's money and political wheeling and dealing to thank for a lot of his wealth.

Gerald Ford? Don't know anything about his wealth, but he never got elected.

JFK. Inherited money.

[Poiuyt]

5. Almost 13 million

http://www.cnn.com/2003/ALLPOLITICS/06/13/senators.finances/

[kentuck]

7. So GWB made as much in one baseball deal as Edwards in a lifetime?

That sort of puts it in perspective..

[TexasSissy]

8. Documentary I saw says * made $15M on sale of the TEAM. It

It wasn't the stadium that was sold. It was the team (the Rangers?). * owned a tiny percentage, but he used his position as the President's son to get on the board. When the team was sold, a documentary I saw said he made $15M. Not a bad return on the investment.

He also made some $$$ on his oil drilling company, Arbusto (his dad and others set him up in it). Although Arbusto went bankrupt, * sold his shares before then, and he made a lot of $$$. But it was the sale of the sports team that made him wealthy enough for a Bush.

[kentuck]

9. I was under the impression....

that they had built a new stadium for the team and when the team was sold, the stadium went with it?? ANd the stadium was probably worth more than the team??