I never said that taxes shouldn't happen.
All I did was ask why someone's work and life should be taxed a 2nd time when they die. Unsurprisingly, no one has answered the question.
Perhaps that's not what you meant by "why do you assume that life must be taxed?" But I did not assume that there must be an estate tax; in fact, I asked
you what about it is so bad, which answer appears to be at least largely the dreaded double taxation.
1. It's not like there aren't assets whose value has gone at least partially untaxed at the point of death. That is, after all, the entire purpose of the step up in basis, right?
2. We are arguing about the merits of this or that
form of taxation rather than the overall level of revenue the government raises, yes? So whatever taxes you propose eliminating will implicitly have to be made up with tax hikes elsewhere, and conversely raising the tax in question would allow a reduction in other forms of taxation. (Otherwise you are conflating this discussion with a discussion of the overall tax
rate; at least, that's my position, and let me know if you disagree.)
On average, then, "double taxation" is a red herring because if you were scrupulously taxed only once per dollar the said tax would be higher.
A discussion of tax
rates, of course, has little to do with the
method of taxation; with the exception of, say, discussing flat vs. progressive schemes, which would of course be highly relevant to the estate tax. (Since no one wants the utter insanity of an estate tax that starts at estates of $1.)
3. You mentioned that property taxes are assessed
every year. That's true. This is orders of magnitude worse than merely twice in a lifetime! And sales tax hits people who are of course taxed on the income they spend. I don't like double taxation either, but it's hardly special to the estate tax, and none of these other double taxes wait until I am
dead to be collected.
4. I reiterate my question about whether you find the estate tax particularly
inconvenient in its relative unpredictability (you don't know too far in advance when you'll die, usually) and the fact that is a big chunk instead of spread out over a lifetime. Specifically, whether that outweighs the
convenience of what is effectively a lifetime deferral.
In practice, it doesn't work that way at all, of course, the rich keep getting richer and get out of said taxes via lawyers and shenanigans, the poor don't have anything to tax, and the middle class gets squeezed like a tube of toothpaste in the hands of an enraged gorilla. Actually, this seems to be true of nearly all taxes and most federal programs, almost like the richest class don't want more competition.
Well, I would think this mainly applies to families whose assets are relatively non-fungible (e.g. the family farm) and whose income is relatively marginal compared to the property required to generate it. Otherwise having
much more than $12 million for individuals and $23 million for couples is, to me, stretching the definition of middle class a bit. (The tax would be relatively low on, say, an individual's $13 million estate against the total value.) I would agree with strengthening protections for families whose nominal net worth is high but whom it does not make sense for society to be taxing at that rate. And of course closing loopholes on the super-wealthy, which (let me preempt you) I am aware is easier said than done.