Law Commons^™

Review: Linking The Certainty Of Death And Taxes, Browne C. Lewis

Law Faculty Articles and Essays

This is a review of "Wills for Everyone: Helping Individuals Opt Out of Intestacy" (53 B.C.L. Rev. 877 (2012)), by Reid Kress Weisbord. Lewis praises Weisbord’s attempt to simplify the testamentary process. She agrees with his assertion that in failing to execute a will, most people are not fearing their own mortality and instead are just not willing or able to navigate a complicated testamentary process. She supports his suggestion to make executing a will more like filing a simple tax return, when possible. In sum, she praises his efforts to reduce the rate of intestacy by simplifying the testamentary …

Incremental Versus Fundamental Tax Reform And The Top One Percent, Deborah A. Geier

Law Faculty Articles and Essays

This article describes the historical shift from consumption taxation at the federal level to income taxation with the enactment of the 16th amendment (the intent of which was chiefly to tax the capital income of the wealthy) and the incremental shifts since then back toward consumption taxation (which frees capital from tax) through expansion of both the payroll taxes as well as the consumption tax features of our current hybrid income/consumption tax that target the middle class.

It then addresses the issue of whether we ought to expand consumption tax treatment to the very wealthy by reviewing two recently published …

The Unconstitutionality Of Eliminating Estate And Gift Taxes, James G. Wilson

Law Faculty Articles and Essays

The recent proposal to eliminate estate and gift taxes is not only immoral and a poor allocation of resources, but also is unconstitutional. Irrespective of their ideology, virtually all American lawyers will initially dismiss this accusation as frivolous because it conflicts with their tradition of equating conceptions of "constitutionality" with United States Supreme Court opinions. The Court has long been highly deferential to Congress in federal tax law cases. It is inconceivable that the current Court would find anything "irrational" in a facially neutral law eliminating all estate and gift taxes. Indeed, if I sat on that bench, I would …