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Comment by IdeaHamster | Hacker News Reader

I'm sorry, I have zero sympathy for anyone distraught over this issue. If you're contemplating whether to live or die based on how much tax will be collected from your estate, then I have an easy answer for you: your life obviously isn't worth even a penny, so might as well get it over with.

As for the issue of the tax itself, there is something to be said for using estate taxes to prevent the establishment of an aristocracy. I wonder how strong the correlation is between the estate tax rate and the wealth divide...

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FWIW, Canada has no estate tax [1], but from what I recall, it scores better than the US in terms of wealth division and social mobility.

[1] There is no estate tax, but death does trigger the capital gains tax. So the estate pays tax as though its assets were sold on the day of death. Capital gains work differently here than in the US, but they will usually be (much) lower than 44%.

If you had children and a lot of money, were old and racked with health problems that left you bedridden, and the date of your death was by all accounts sometime in the next two years, would you actually insist on living an extra year and saddling your children with hundreds of thousands of dollars in taxes on the things you pass on to them?

There may not be a clear answer, but is it so insane to even contemplate these things? The elderly are not being greedy- they don't benefit monetarily. They are trying to care for their children in the last way they can, similar to those who choose to take out life insurance. Would you similarly condemn a parent who dies protecting their children from danger?

The danger of having .55n million rather than n million?

Those kids might not be able to bankroll their own space ships.

So you're comparing dying in order to protect a life with dying in order to avoid excess taxes?

The question is not "life == money" vs "life < money" vs "life > money", the question is why are you attempting to compare life and money in the first place?!?

I'm not equating dying to protect life with dying to avoid taxes. The first point was, it can be seen as reasonable to die to help your children. The second point is my stipulation that to say it's only ever reasonable in the case that your children are in mortal danger is silly.

If you value your life very low (for example, you are bedridden in the hospital, terminally ill, on the verge of death and will be in excruciating pain for the rest of your short life) and the well-being of your children very high, why is that so crazy? Soldiers in a country being invaded can go to war and die to protect their families from enslavement, rape, pillaging, and so forth, not just from death, and no one (well, usually) criticizes and demeans them for that. Are soldiers the only ones allowed to do that?

I can sense you're balking at the part money plays in the equation, and you do not like when money is assigned value beyond pieces of paper. Consider that the people making these decisions are likely not thinking of the dollar amount of the inheritance. I would bet they are thinking of the amount of good (whether getting lots of money = good can be debated, but let's assume it does, or at least assume they believe it does) they can do for their children when they pass. Being taxed on that money means giving up a lot of that good.

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