Angel of Death loophole, GRAT loophole, life insurance loophole, Family Limited Partnerships, Charitable Loophole etc etc is this tax basically a dead tax?
Is the US Estate Tax basically non existent in practice for billionaires because of how many loopholes there are for it?
byu/YogurtclosetOpen3567 intax
Posted by YogurtclosetOpen3567
4 Comments
The estate tax is almost nonexistent for everyone, not just billionaires.
If you and your wife have an estate worth $30,000,001, you owe a whopping 18 cents of tax.
No politician will do anything to change the system because (1) lobbying from the rich (2) stigma from uneducated voters who think that the “death tax” will steal all their money when they die.
It’s not a real tax! It works exactly as intended for the wealthy. Professor Ray D Madoff covers this topic in a lot of detail. She just released a book it too. I’m a CPA and see this all the time. Most people are too focused on the income tax to see the grift in estate taxes.
Here is an interesting video where she shares her thoughts : https://youtu.be/aLKacgW6YOI?si=4B1-XoVQzqN3vKi8
Why is there even an inheritance tax at all?
Yes.
My business partner always says “Rich people write the rules.” Estate tax is a perfect example of it. You can also see how they invest by seeing what the tax code incentivizes.