How Estate Taxes (Transfer Taxes) create Chaos in Society

During the Great Depression, President Franklin Delano Roosevelt instituted Estate Taxes through the Federal Government. The main problem with this is it was supposed to be temporary. But, he died before he fulfilled his promise to repeal the transfer or estate taxes during world War II.

So, initially at least it was intended to just be temporary during the Great Depression.

en.wikipedia.org

An estate tax is a tax levied on an heir's inherited portion of an estate if the value of the estate exceeds an exclusion limit set by law. The estate tax is mostly imposed on assets left to heirs, but it does not apply to the transfer of assets to a surviving spouse.May 16, 2018

Estate Tax - Investopedia

https://www.investopedia.com/terms/e/estatetax.asp

Estate Tax Has Fallen Considerably Since 2001
Year	Per-Person Exemption	Top Rate
2001	$675,000	55%
2002	$1 million	50%
2003	$1 million	49%
2004	$1.5 million	48%
2005	$1.5 million	47%
2006	$2 million	46%
2007	$2 million	45%
2008	$2 million	45%
2009	$3.5 million	45%
2010	None	0%
2011	$5 million	35%
2012	$5.1 million	35%
2013	$5.25 million	40%
2014	$5.34 million	40%
2015	$5.43 million	40%
2016	$5.45 million	40%
2017	$5.49 million	40%
2018	$11.18 million	40%

Source: The Internal Revenue Service (IRS)

Then on top of this States add their own estate taxes on top of this.

President Bush lessened to some degree the burden of estate taxes too by limiting the taxes on estates under 5 to 10 million dollars which was helpful to many families too.

But, still many businesses and farms are destroyed by the estate taxes in various ways because the inheritors are not knowledgeable enough to maintain the estates or businesses that serve their communities.

Another problem becomes when there are too many beneficiaries of an estate and it has to be broken up or sold to make the many beneficiaries happy. So, many farms and businesses and homes are lost to everyone because of this fact too.

So, some families make it a point to only let one person inherit an estate with the understanding that that one person will help the other members of the family in emergencies.

But, the end result of estate taxes often is communities are deprived of the benefits of those farms and businesses that could help those communities in various ways ongoing.

So, this not only creates harm to communities but also to the beneficiaries who often don't have the financial education to survive the loss of a loved one and the horrific financial details of estate taxes at the same time.

To make matters worse the beneficiaries are hit with 112% of normal taxes the first year of the death of their loved one which causes many to freak out and lose everything, especially older wives who may have no knowledge of finances at all because their husbands were the educated ones on top of the grief they are already experiencing from their significant other.

So, in all these ways and more the Estate taxes cause chaos and harm to communities all over the U.S. and cause farms and businesses to be forced to be sold even when families want to run these businesses for their own benefit and the benefit of communities.

So, what I'm saying here is that Estate taxes cause harm to our country more than they help our country. And that Franklin Delano Roosevelt never intended to cause the last 80 years of chaos and harm to our country by maintaining these taxes which were intended to be a temporary fix ONLY for ending the Great Depression and that's all at the time. But, he died before he could end Estate taxes like he promised he would.

So, the destruction of homes, businesses, farms and families well being well outweighs any positive nature to destroying these families and businesses by the government through these taxes.

Basically, unless people have a master's in business administration and Economics when they are hit with all this they are just screwed permanently and many die in grief and confusion and are killed outright by these estate taxes.

So, my point of view is that Estate Taxes have been murdering whole families since the 1930s now. It is like watching an 80 year train wreck in slow motion all across our nation destroying families and businesses and farms and homes that people grew up in sometimes in families for hundreds of years lost forever.