The Estate Tax and Inter Vivos Transfers over Time

Kathleen McGarry

American Economic Review, 2013, vol. 103, issue 3, 478-83

Abstract: The strong dislike evidenced by the American public towards the estate tax suggests that the wealthy wish to transfer resources to their heirs tax-free and would thus exploit mechanisms allowing them to reduce the tax burden whenever possible. However, I find strong evidence that the wealthy fail to utilize what is perhaps the simplest method of tax avoidance--that of making transfers to eventual heirs up to the annual exclusion. Instead they transfer far less than the amount permitted by the tax code, whether measured in cross-section or over time. In failing to give more, they forgo significant tax savings.

JEL-codes: H24 H71 K34 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2013
Note: DOI: 10.1257/aer.103.3.478
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (5)

Downloads: (external link)
http://www.aeaweb.org/articles.php?doi=10.1257/aer.103.3.478 (application/pdf)
http://www.aeaweb.org/aer/ds/may2013/P2013_4365_ds.zip (application/zip)
Access to full text is restricted to AEA members and institutional subscribers.

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:aea:aecrev:v:103:y:2013:i:3:p:478-83

Ordering information: This journal article can be ordered from
https://www.aeaweb.org/journals/subscriptions

Access Statistics for this article

American Economic Review is currently edited by Esther Duflo

More articles in American Economic Review from American Economic Association Contact information at EDIRC.
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Michael P. Albert ().