Eliminates the Estate Tax.

[nikibatts]

Trump supporters in red states actually believe that applies to them.

His plan is a death spiral to the US as we knew it.

[MineralMan]

1. Most people have no idea how the inheritance tax works.

It doesn't affect most middle class people at all, but that's rarely talked about when someone mentions it.

[exboyfil]

2. $5.45M per individual/$10.9M per couple

That should be the number on any graphic regarding the estate tax. Only estates larger than this are taxed under this tax.

That being said 40% is a pretty steep price for an inheritance tax. A lot of the gain on inheritance represents inflation on capital. I wonder if a fairer system could be structured.

One proposal would be to tax the inflation adjusted basis at the capital gains rate (this rate being comparable to the current income rate).

I don't think a spike at $5.45M is necessarily a good idea. Some graduation seems to be in order.

[unblock]

5. just for perspective, even *gifts* to family members are taxed

there is an annual exemption of $14,000 (which can be used per parent, per child; e.g., two parents of three kids could gift 2x3=6 times this amount, or $84,000 per year tax-free -- if you have that much to gift, of course!)

but other than a similar lifetime gift exemption, gifts beyond that amount are taxed. so eliminating the estate tax would make transferring wealth to an heir pretty much the only way to exchange money completely tax free.

why on earth should heirs to extremely wealthy estates uniquely benefit in this way?

[Trekologer]

6. Because DJT doesn't have that many years left

And his kids stand to inherit a boatload of money. No tax on the estate means they get an even bigger boatload.

[dmosh42]

3. Eliminating 'estate tax' has highest priority for any wealthy family! Fuck......

everyone else! Especially the veterans who 'paid the last full measure'.

[COLGATE4]

4. These doofuses really believe that when they cash out their

chips and leave the double-wide to the chilluns that them Feds are going to come in and slap a "Death Tax" on their estate. I doubt that most even comprehend that we're talking about estates that range from >$5MM for a single person or >$10MM for married taxpayers. Yep, they're all for abolishing that damned Death Tax!

[unblock]

7. no, these doofuses really believe that they'll somehow actually *have* well over $5.5mm

i learned this lesson as a child in the '70s. my father (a physics professor) introduced me to a machinist for the physics department.
he had a decent job, but of course didn't make huge money at all.

yet he was an adamant republican. my father asked him why, given that republicans (even then) were all about helping only the wealthiest at the expense of people just like this machinist.

the machinist answered, "because someday i'm gonna be rich and i don't want the government taking my money at a higher tax rate!"

no plan, of course, for how this machinist, near retirement age, was ever possibly going to become rich.

[haele]

8. When my FIL passed, my husband and his sister each got a large six-figure check and 20 acres.

The rest of FIL's estate is in a trust that is split in half dependent on their age. The 40 acres was part of a family lot of originally 150 acres from two generations up.

We checked with an estate attorney - no taxes on the check or the land, but when husband and his sister "sold" the property to an aunt with far more kids than the other siblings had so it would be part of her parcel of the family land, we had to "pay" $122 in capital gains taxes that year on the sale of that land - even though for all intents and purposes, it was just signing over property amongst close family with an eye to the least amount of tax damage to all parties (Sister in law is married to a district branch bank manager, they were able to work it out for everyone involved).

Even when husband finally gets his half of the trust, under the current laws, there would not be any taxes levied on the transfer. Now, the next year's or subsequent taxes would be a pain - once we would have to record any interest or profit off the money, but receiving the money would not affect our income - state or federal - one bit.
Since we used our check as soon as we got it to pay off medical bills and purchase outright and renovate our current double-wide home-sweet-home, there was very little interest to add as income to the 1040 for the next year...however, if we had just tossed the money into our bank account and spent it as we wanted over the year, we would have had some tax liability just due to the interest - probably around $500 worth or so, but still.

The Estate tax is for multi-millionaires, not for middle class people or small businesses. In effect, it's pretty painless to the average person to inherit even $2 million in assets from someone else.
People always forget, it's not the money, it's the capital gains at the end of the year that gets the people who inherit.

Getting rid of the estate tax itself won't make a lick of difference to the middle class or those who inherit small businesses.

Estate recipients with no business experience or poor financial or legal advice will still have to sell the family business when they inherit it because of either faulty implementation of deductibles and exemptions that businesses can take, or the capital gains and other business fees and taxes that they weren't prepared to deal with - not because of the estate taxes themselves.
In fact, most people I know who complain about having to sell the family business or family property do so either because the business was leveraged to the max and the original owner owed not only taxes but penalties and fees that had to be resolved before the estate could be released, or because a few heirs want to sell their portion of the assets for the money right off the bat, and screw it up for the other heirs. The actual estate taxes have nothing to do with having to sell the business.

Haele

[superpatriotman]

9. Linguistics win again

I've been saying this for years. Until we can control the message with the RIGHT WORDS we will lose every battle of public opinion.

The right's Death Tax tag has stuck like glue, and because we got no traction or refused to stick to the script with the Paris Hilton Tax we continue to struggle like Sisyphus.

[wiggs]

10. when has the gop done ANYTHING that doesn't further concentrate wealth and power into

the hands of fewer and fewer people? And...WHY don't dems say this every day 24/7?

[pansypoo53219]

11. grover norquist's wet dream. republicans in name only.

fiscal my ass.