There are plenty of moral arguments both for and against an estate tax, but I think the economic consequences are more important. If you ask economists about th

There are plenty of moral arguments both for and against an estate tax, but I think the economic consequences are more important. If you ask economists about the desirability of estate taxes, they say, "We don't know."[1] Maybe it will hurt economic growth. Maybe it won't. But if the tax is 100%, one thing is guaranteed: Lots of people will evade it. After all, what punishment can the government exact upon a soon-to-be-deceased parent? That may not sound like a big problem, but remember what happened during alcohol prohibition. Criminal organizations made boatloads of cash from the illicit behavior of otherwise law-abiding citizens. Crime skyrocketed. Respect for the law plummeted. We see the same thing today (though on a much smaller scale) with many drug laws. There are a lot of risks that accompany the criminalization of normal behavior. 1. Economics of estate taxation: a brief review of theory and evidence: http://www.nber.org/papers/w15741.pdf http://www.nber.org/papers/w15741.pdf