Estate Tax in USA

Estate Tax

The estate tax was introduced as a tax on the property such as real estate, assets, stock, or cash transferred from a deceased person to their heirs. The tax only becomes due when it surpasses $5.5 million per individual with couples at $11 million. Generally, the tax touches on the wealthy class while doing nothing on the middle and low-income earners. The needs a repeal because it is unfair to the wealthy as well as government revenue.

Summary

A post by Washington post on 29th January 2019 talked about the Republican’s intention to do away with this tax. Besides calls for repeal now, The Republicans already passed a law to allow couples to pass on their estate without facing any tax in 2017; this weakened the tax. In 2018, according to the American College of Trust and Estate Counsel projected that only 5000 were supposed to file taxes while only 1700 are expected to be able to pay it annually.

Conservatives argued that the tax is unfair to the asset holders since they had already paid for the taxes when they acquired them; thus it is double-taxing. Individuals can pass on up to $ 5.5 million worth of assets without paying taxes, while couples filing together can enjoy up to $ 22.4. The estate tax revenue is slowing down to 0.6% from 1% and only 5000 US citizens are supposed to file it.

Justification

Based on reading this article, I agree that the article’s concepts are valid and a repeal is warranted. Repeal should be done to correct the tax since it aims at double-taxing a single product. Assets and other items for passing on are usually taxed during acquisition. Another justification is that the tax reduces government revenue by exempting a huge portion of people from paying estate tax.

References

Stein, J. (2019). https://www.washingtonpost.com/us-policy/2019/01/28/top-gop-senators-propose-repealing-estate-tax-which-is-expected-be-paid-by-fewer-than-americans-year/. Washington Post.

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