I get the political power concern, and money = power at a certain point. But I'd rather work on getting money out of politics than putting limits on what people can decide will happen to their assets after they die.
There's so many indirect ways of influencing politics given lots of money - alternative media, buying out local news, controlling national news.. making entertainment media of your own ideology. Fund interesting groups around particular topics. Give poor Ivy League grads a job and groom them for higher office.. oh wait.
- Bob Menendez (Senator)
- Randy Cunningham (Congressman)
- William J. Jefferson (Congressman)
- James Traficant (Congressman)
And a bunch more at more "local" level...
For example, step up basis allows inherited assets to have their cost basis re-struck at the value at time of inheritance. So if there is no inheritance tax, the assets transfer to a new owner and a large chunk of value is forever untaxed, even when/if they eventually sell.
Similarly all sorts of interesting stuff that can be done with trusts. Again stuff that's only accessible / worth the hassle to 1%.
In a world with extreme outcomes due to scaling, we might accidentally be re-inventing the hereditary aristocracy if the assets can accumulate outside the tax system.
To be clear, i'm not exactly defending inheritance tax if resources are shared another way. For instance, it would make sense to let people keep a − modest − home across generations. But i'm tired of rich capitalist tech bros saying income taxes are unfair because they've worked so hard, and inheritance taxes are unfair because they've already been taxed.