Lloyd E. Sponenburgh wrote:
Ignoramus18915 fired this volley in
:

Estate tax is an attempt to balance the pluses with minuses. Some
amout being taxed, still keeps people interested in becoming wealthy,
but curtails to some extent this resource misallocation.

Ig, the estate tax might have some small effect like that, but that's
hardly its purpose. I would love it if that were actually the case, but
that's a utopian's view.

The real reason for the tax is simply that the government saw a nice, fat
pot to skim from, and decided to take a piece. They new darned well if
they took it from the average working stiff who's widow needs the whole
estate just to buy groceries, they'd have a rebellion.

Remember too the reason the tax was removed. Real estate values grow
over time until a family farmer working his inherited section of land
would live hand to mouth and die a millionaire due to land value. Family
farms were going out of the family just to pay the taxes.