[vineyardmike]

> Most highly industrialised, wealthy countries would have much less income inequality with vastly higher inheritance taxes.

Its trivial for someone with lots of money to find ways to avoid dying with money but still ensure the next generation has a good life. As grandparent comment suggests. I don't think any tax or any plan that is not destructively over-burdensome can avoid people ensuring their next of kin have a good life.

[throwaway2037]

You wrote: "destructively over-burdensome"

How do you feel about my suggestion of 50% inheritance tax without loop holes and minimums? It should decrease inherited wealth by greater than a geometric rate.

If any Germans / Austrians / Taiwanese / Koreans / Japanese are reading this thread: Can you comment about how to handle inheriting a family business than is worth more than 1M EUR? (They are all famous for "Der Mittelstand"[1].) My point: When you begin to add exceptions, 1M EUR quickly becomes 10M EUR and 100M EUR! Idea: You "pay" the tax on a family business inheritance buy guaranteeing payments to national tax authority / treasury as long as the business is open. (Assume business does not go bankrupt!) You can discount the future cashflows and get a present value that appears as a debt on the company balance sheet.

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mittelstand

[vineyardmike]

> without loop holes and minimums

How does this work? There are always loopholes. I don't think it could exist, nor will exist with the incentives of politicians, frankly. It would be nice though.

> How do you feel about my suggestion of 50% inheritance tax without loop holes and minimums? It should decrease inherited wealth by greater than a geometric rate.

I have no issue, in theory with aggressive taxes. I of course don't want to lose my income if the taxes don't help society, but i have no issue with useful tax. As a not-billionaire without inter-generational wealth protect, i see inheritance taxes value. I think, realistically, that people will always prefer to protect/provide to kin, at expense of society, and we have to work around that.

Can i create a holding company, co-owned between me and next-of-kin and "invest" my money in it then let them liquidate?

Can i loan them the money? Can i gift them money? Can i store in trust? Do other nations have successful ways to do this?

> Idea: You "pay" the tax on a family business inheritance buy guaranteeing payments to national tax authority / treasury as long as the business is open.

This seems like its burdensome to the business, in a way that could be destructive to it. If you suspend payment when its not profitable, then you can act like amazon and many other corps and eternally run a deficit to avoid tax. If you don't allow that, then you're draining the cashflow of a valid business which may kill it.

Frankly, i think its backwards too. Giving cash or liquid assets to your kids? Tax the S*T out of it. Giving a successful business that employees lots of people in your local town? Don't ruin the business trying to tax an old (wo)man giving it to their kids - that's destructive. Tax the kids when they cash-out from the business (sell biz, receive income, etc). I'm not particularly biz friendly, but they have real value to people outside of the family and produce something for society.

I also don't think its unreasonable to not tax real estate transfers, especially if its a primary residence. Maybe estate that actually stays in the family multiple generations doesnt get taxed, idk. Lots of people have strong multi-generational attachment to physical places. That's what really makes this hard.

[MinorTom]

Note: I'm not the person to vote for more taxes, and I agree with you in principle. It's just that your arguments aren't ones.

> Can i create a holding company, co-owned between me and next-of-kin and "invest" my money in it then let them liquidate?

You'll always have to transfer the stock to your next-of-kin somehow. This is where a tax would apply.

> Can i loan them the money?

Yes, but they'll need to pay it back someday. That makes the debt a taxable asset. (i.e. when you inherit you inherit the "asset" = the obligation, which is taxed with 50%)

> Can i gift them money?

In Germany the gift tax is the same as the inheritance tax.

> Can i store in trust?

Yes, and that's why I agree with you. It's just not as simple to avoid inheritance tax as you make it out to be.

[vineyardmike]

> It's just not as simple to avoid inheritance tax as you make it out to be.

I'm not claiming that all those are successful ways to do it. But rich people seem to find a way to do it, probably using a combination of the above and other tricks i don't know.

Lots of ideas... no idea what works well. It's a hard issue to avoid and a harder issue to catch those avoiding.