Death and Death Taxes

'Tis impossible to be sure of any thing but Death and Taxes.
— Christopher Bullock, The Cobbler of Preston, 1716

Small-business owners, particularly minority owners, suffer anxious moments wondering whether the businesses they hope to hand down to their children will be destroyed by the death tax bill.
— William Beach, "Time to Repeal Federal Death Taxes: The Nightmare of the American Dream," The Heritage Foundation, April 4, 2001

"We view this as a moral issue," said Senator Phil Gramm, Republican of Texas, the co-author of the Senate bill. "We think death taxes are fundamentally wrong. We think death should not be a taxable event." Opponents of the repeal say inheritances, not death, are taxed.

[Senator Tom Daschle, Democrat of South Dakota] said it was "no coincidence" that he brought the issue to the floor the same day that the Senate voted to increase the federal debt ceiling by $450 billion. "So while we increase the debt limit $450 billion right now, the question before the Senate immediately following that is, do we want to benefit the top one-half of one percent of taxpayers in this country with a $600 billion tax cut?" "I can't imagine that the answer for any senator would be yes."

— CARL HULSE, New York Times, June 12, 2002

The most remarkable example of how politics has shifted in favor of the wealthy is the drive to repeal the estate tax. In 1999, only the top 2 percent of estates paid any tax at all, and half the estate tax was paid by only 3,300 estates, 0.16 percent of the total, with a minimum value of $5 million and an average value of $17 million.
— Paul Krugman, The New York Times, October 20, 2002