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The Optimum Marital Deduction Survives The Tax Reform Act, J. Rodney Johnson
The Optimum Marital Deduction Survives The Tax Reform Act, J. Rodney Johnson
Law Faculty Publications
Several years ago an article appeared in the pages of this journal which suggested that those attorneys who regularly focused on obtaining the maximum marital deduction in the wills they were drafting for their clients might be suffering from a form of estate planner's myopia. That is, they were losing sight of their ultimate goal of minimizing the total estate tax burden imposed on the husband's assets as they pass from him, through the wife, on to the ultimate beneficiaries. The danger foreseen was that, as an attorney employed one of the various formula clauses designed to obtain every possible …
An Attack On The Optimum Marital Deduction: Revenue Ruling 76-176, J. Rodney Johnson
An Attack On The Optimum Marital Deduction: Revenue Ruling 76-176, J. Rodney Johnson
Law Faculty Publications
A recent development in the field of estate and gift taxation-the issuance of Revenue Ruling 76-156 may be an indication of a policy decision on the part of the Internal Revenue Service to clamp down on the increasing utilization of the estate planner's most flexible tool in the ·area of post-mortem estate planning-the disclaimer. Due to the potential importance of this ruling, it seems desirable ( 1 ) to deal with the ruling, itself, in some detail, ( 2) to see how the ruling might affect an estate planning concept suggested in these pages last year, and ( 3) to …
Drafting For The Optimum Marital Deduction, J. Rodney Johnson
Drafting For The Optimum Marital Deduction, J. Rodney Johnson
Law Faculty Publications
While the marital deduction provided for by federal estate tax law may not necessarily be the controlling factor in planning the will of a married person, it is certainly one of the most important factors because of the sheer magnitude of this deduction up to 50% of the adjusted gross estate. A direct consequence of this importance is reflected in the fact that the marital deduction has become the most written-about topic in the estate planning area. Most of what has been written about this subject can be divided into the two following categories: ( 1 ) an explanation of …
A Single-Trust Marital Deduction Will, J. Rodney Johnson
A Single-Trust Marital Deduction Will, J. Rodney Johnson
Law Faculty Publications
This article will offer a basic form that can be easily altered to respond to the needs of many clients who have a moderate estate and wish to take advantage of the estate tax marital deduction. For purposes of discussion, it will be assumed that the estate is $250,000 or less and that the client has expressed the following: "I want my wife to have all of the income from my property throughout her life and then the property should pass to my children. In the event that the income from my property is insufficient to meet my wife's needs, …
Simplifying The Martial Deduction Will, J. Rodney Johnson
Simplifying The Martial Deduction Will, J. Rodney Johnson
Law Faculty Publications
One of the basic tenets of estate planning declares that there is no such thing as a typical estate and therefore there can be no such thing as a typical estate plan. Emphasis is placed on the unique character of each case and the positive need to tailor the plan to fit the client's total situation. Accepting the validity of the foregoing, however, does not mean that one must start from scratch in each case. Instead, the attorney who is trying to pare repetitious work to a safe minimum might develop a solution to the problem by having a series …