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Full-Text Articles in Law
Unseating Privilege: Rawls, Equality Of Opportunity, And Wealth Transfer Taxation, Jennifer Bird-Pollan
Unseating Privilege: Rawls, Equality Of Opportunity, And Wealth Transfer Taxation, Jennifer Bird-Pollan
Law Faculty Scholarly Articles
This Article is the second in a series that examines the estate tax from a particular philosophical position in order to demonstrate the relevance and importance of the wealth transfer taxes to that position. In this Article, I explore Rawlsian equality of opportunity, a philosophical position that is at the heart of much American thought. Equality of opportunity requires not only ensuring that sufficient opportunities are available to the least well-off members of society but also that opportunities are not available to other members merely because of their wealth or other arbitrary advantages. Therefore, an income tax alone, even one …
Death, Taxes, And Property (Rights): Nozick, Libertarianism, And The Estate Tax, Jennifer Bird-Pollan
Death, Taxes, And Property (Rights): Nozick, Libertarianism, And The Estate Tax, Jennifer Bird-Pollan
Law Faculty Scholarly Articles
The primary purpose of this Article is to dispute the moral claims to post-death property rights made by libertarians when they argue against the estate tax. As I will show later in this Article, my argument does not necessarily entail enacting an estate tax, nor does it require a particular level of tax. I am merely trying to demonstrate that those who argue that the estate tax is an immoral violation of the private property rights of the deceased are mistaken. This is not to say that the estate of the deceased should necessarily pass to the government. It is …
The Realization Requirement And Tax Avoidance, E. George Rudolph
The Realization Requirement And Tax Avoidance, E. George Rudolph
Michigan Law Review
Consider, for a moment, the plight of G. E. Hall. During 1947 Hall incurred a gambling debt to the Las Vegas Club variously estimated at between 145,000 and 478,000 dollars. The debt came into the sole ownership of one Binion, a partner in the club, and was eventually settled by Hall transferring to Binion an undivided one-half interest in certain cattle located in Arizona and Montana. Thereafter, Hall and Binion engaged in the ranching business as partners. At this point the Internal Revenue Service came forward with a claim that Hall, in the course of this disastrous chain of events, …
Taxation-Federal Income Tax-Strike Benefits May Be Gifts, Christopher Cobb
Taxation-Federal Income Tax-Strike Benefits May Be Gifts, Christopher Cobb
Michigan Law Review
Taxpayer received assistance from a labor union while he was participating in a strike called by the union. The area in which he lived had become a distressed area as a consequence of the strike, and the union had established a general program of aid for strikers with no other source of income. Both before and after he joined the union payments were made to taxpayer under this program. Taxpayer sued for a refund of the income tax he payed on the value of the assistance so received, and the jury returned a verdict in his favor, finding the payments …
Taxation - Inheritance Tax - Transfers Subject To Take Effect At Or After Death, Harvey A. Howard S.Ed.
Taxation - Inheritance Tax - Transfers Subject To Take Effect At Or After Death, Harvey A. Howard S.Ed.
Michigan Law Review
Decedent was a participant in a company profit-sharing savings and retirement trust. Under the terms of the plan, the company made deposits with a trustee on an annual basis and relinquished the right to recapture or impair the fund for its own use or benefit. The contributions were to be held for ten years with accrued interest, and then were to be distributed to the employees in three annual instalments. Should an employee leave the company, he was entitled to his share in three instalments; in the event of retirement or illness he was to receive his entire share in …
Apportionment Of The Federal State Tax In The Absence Of Statute Or An Expression Of Intention, William P. Sutter
Apportionment Of The Federal State Tax In The Absence Of Statute Or An Expression Of Intention, William P. Sutter
Michigan Law Review
Federal law now provides in sections 826 (c) and (d) of the Internal Revenue Code that life insurance and property transferred by appointment shall bear their proportionate tax burden. It does not contain similar provisions with respect to other types of non-probate property. At the present time, twenty states provide by statute for some sort of apportionment of estate taxes. Two states have statutes restricting apportionment in some degree. In the rest, the matter rests in the discretion of the courts. I propose to discuss in this article the situation in those areas where no statutory guidance exists.
Taxation - Annuity Contracts - Federal Estate Tax, Charles J. O'Laughlin
Taxation - Annuity Contracts - Federal Estate Tax, Charles J. O'Laughlin
Michigan Law Review
The decedent purchased several single-premium annuity contracts, the annuity payments to be made to her for life, and after her death to a designated second annuitant for life. The Board of Tax Appeals ruled that the policy should not be taxed as a transfer to take effect at death. Held, on appeal, the interest passing to the second anuitant at the death of the decedent should be included in decedent's gross estate under the federal estate tax, since it falls within the provision taxing transfers intended to take effect in possession and enjoyment at or after the death of …
The Impact Of The Law Of Powers Upon Our Internal Revenue Laws, Montgomery B. Angell
The Impact Of The Law Of Powers Upon Our Internal Revenue Laws, Montgomery B. Angell
Michigan Law Review
An interesting difference in view has arisen recently in the halls of the Harvard Law School on the use of powers of appointment under the federal estate tax act. One view is that the chief efficacy today of the power of appointment lies in its capacity for use in tax evasion, which should be corrected. The other view is that there is a salutary tendency toward using sensible and flexible powers of appointment, which should be encouraged in meeting changing and difficult family situations, but which would be checked were the former view accepted. Thus we find here the age-old …