inheritance tax.

[[KMA]Avenger]

does the Govt have the right to tax any part (no matter how big or small) of any inheritance you may inherit?


personally and putting aside ALL prejudice i have of Govt...they have no right to tax any inheritance i may receive as a result of someone leaving me cash or property due to their deaths....

what do you lot think?

[RepliMagni]

I personally dislike inheritance tax - I find the whole thing distasteful and often disturbing for the people involved.....ie: having to sell the family home simply to pay the gov't a portion....

That being said, I do not know how large a proportion of gov't income it accounts for, and thus would not like to say to simply scrap it, as I'm on a gov't grant, and have had a free education and healthcare.....

[Jack]

Considering the death tax is as much as 40% or more, I'd assume it's a fairly large amount.

However, you should probably figure out what the income from the death tax is used for before saying you want it for your schooling and health care.

[Ashu]

We have a 10% for whatever here so not much to complain about i guess.

[Kit-Fox]

Death / Inheritance taxes are worked out based on the value of whatever is left to you from the estate as I recall.

As I also recall in the UK at least they pretty much rely on you telling the truth on the form. As such its glaringly easy to work out how to make sure you get lumped with a massive bill

[Guild]

seems pretty ridiculous as the money you may be getting from a dead relative, has already been taxed whislt they were earnign the money .

if you know what i mean

[Grand Admiral Martin]

Inheritance Tax is simply Gift Tax under a different name. Would we scrap Gift Tax also? No.

I cannot comment on other countries based on rates, thresholds, etc but I know Ireland.

The rate is 25% and the threshold amounts are high enough to mean that no average person will ever pay it. A child can inherit just under 415k Euro. That is per child. If the average family has 2 children and assuming not all wealth goes to children, some may go to other relatives, charities, etc. Then really only those with assets over 1mil euro will been within the scope of this tax and again anything over that is only 1 euro from 4, hardly terrible stuff now considering it is free cash.

There are certain circumstances that allow family homes to be outside of the threshold so the problem posted above of poor people having to sell their home to cover the bill should never occur. Not here anyway.

There are also a number of way, and I am sure there are similar ones in other countries that allow people to minimize the cost their children or other relatives should pay, and while most will argue that only the rich can afford the services of a consultant to get the advice required to avoid this well my response would be this is a tax only the rich have to pay.

In terms of unfairness I would argue this tax ranks at the bottom of the table.

[dark lord tacoma]

seems pretty ridiculous as the money you may be getting from a dead relative, has already been taxed whislt they were earnign the money .

if you know what i mean

got to agree with you bro

[Grand Admiral Martin]

But you didn't earn it so why would it be free?

[dark lord tacoma]

as my brother said your relative have already paid the tax it is just a double tax and disscurages people from trying to give there kids a better chance in life as it is stolen by the goverment

[Grand Admiral Martin]

Yes it is a double tax. But a legitimate one, you did not earn any of that money, why should it be free? If we were to talk about unfair double taxation then this again would be lower on the list than say sales tax, vat, etc. Taxes which impact from more heavily on giving you kids a chance at a good life than inheritance tax.

It doesn't discourage people from anything, why would it? Oh no my kid can only have 7.6mil from the 10mil I leave him. How sad that is.

Tax is also not stolen is a duty of people to pay. I would class defrauding your nation as treason, paying your taxes allows your country to run. While I do not like to see high taxes I do see the importance of tax.

[Kit-Fox]

Well arent you lucky that in Ireland you get to keep that much. Most other countries take a bigger cut you'll find however.

And as mentioned its already been taxed and its not like your not gonna get taxed on any interest or when you spend it, so it is the very essense of double dipping.

It is a tax simply to make money, its not a tax to pay for schools or roads, its to bleed money out of those too stupid to avoid it.

[[KMA]Avenger]

couldn't have said it better myself.

from a personal moral standpoint, i don't see why the Govt should be entitled to a single penny of my dads money if he was to pass away and leave it to me and my siblings, or anyone else.

[Mister Sandman]

consider the prospect, what right do they have to tax us at all?

[[KMA]Avenger]

given that everyone here knows i have a MASSIVE distrust of Govt...i'm glad you said that and not me otherwise someone would have cried "bias"