What is a Death Tax?
The Egyptians were the first to establish a death tax, later the concept was adopted by the Greeks and Romans. The Rise and Decline of the Estate Tax, 11 Tax L. Rev. 223 (1946). Generally, a tax placed upon property transfers at death is a death tax; more specifically, it is a tax on the power to transmit or the transmission or receipt of property by death. Also, death taxes are commonly referred to as estate, inheritance or wealth taxes. An estate tax is an excise tax (as opposed to a direct tax on property) levied on the privilege of transferring property at death. Federal Estate and Gift Taxation, John K. McNulty, 5TH Ed., West Publishing Co., St. Paul , Minnesota , p.1. (1994). The estate tax is usually measured by the size of the decedents estate. In the United States the estate tax generally includes all property over which the decedent owned, possessed incidents of ownership of, or exercised control of, at death. 26, U.S.C. 2036. An inheritance tax, is also an excise tax levied
A death tax is a tax that may be levied on your estate after your death. The U.S. Internal Revenue Service (IRS) calls it an estate tax. The death tax has been a source of major controversy in the United States, even though it is only levied on very large estates. Most estates are not subject to the death tax. If you bequeath your estate to your spouse or a charity, it is usually exempt from the death tax. Filing an estate tax return is only required if your estate is worth more than the applicable exclusion amount–known as the unified credit–that is in effect for the year of your death. The amount of unified credit that is available for reducing or eliminating your death tax is reduced by the total amount of unified credit you used to reduce your gift taxes during your lifetime. Your taxable estate is your gross estate less your allowable deductions. Your gross estate is all of the money and property that you owned at the time of your death, including: Life insurance proceeds payabl
Death taxes are any type of taxation placed on the assets of a decedent when those assets are redistributed to beneficiaries in accordance with the wishes expressed in a legal will and testament. One of the more common examples of a death tax is the inheritance tax. However, a death tax may take on several different forms, depending on the laws that apply in a given jurisdiction. In the United States, a death tax refers to the incidence of an estate tax that the beneficiary must pay as part of the process of assuming control of the property. Closely related is the inheritance tax, which applies taxes to any type of financial asset that is willed to the beneficiary. There is no uniform process for applying the death tax among all states within the Union. Some states have laws provisioning hefty taxes on any assets acquired as part of an inheritance, while other states require the application of modest taxes. Still other locations in the United States do not require any type of death tax
