The upcoming one-year repeal of the federal estate tax in the U.S. creates an opportunity to reconsider the taxation of wealth transfers. This article argues that if inheritances are included in an optimal tax framework, existing evidence suggests that the ideal wealth transfer tax would be much...

The upcoming one-year repeal of the federal estate tax creates an opportunity to reconsider the taxation of wealth transfers. This paper argues that federal wealth transfer taxes should be retained and potentially expanded. The estate tax contributes importantly to the progressivity of the tax...

This testimony makes three main points. First, inheritances tend to exacerbate existing economic disparities and may be the most important barrier to intergenerational economic mobility. These tendencies are most pronounced at the top of the income distribution. While inherited income is...

Certain federal, state, and local government employees do not pay into the Social Security system, but rather pay into alternative government pension plans. For purposes of the Social Security Act, where a worker pays into an alternative government pension plan, the worker’s employment...

This study investigated the Australian private rental sector (PRS) focusing on institutional change, including formal rules (policies and regulation); organisations and structures; and informal rules (social norms and practices). It also reviewed the PRS in ten countries: Australia, Belgium,...

For more than 25 years, the Social Security Trust Fund has been projected to run out of money in 2033 (give or take a few years), potentially causing benefits to be severely reduced in the absence of corrective legislative action. Today (February 2024), projections are made by the Social...

This is a conceptual paper, the author discusses some fundamental assumptions regarding taxation. These assumptions need to be re-examined. The author has carried out a survey of fifty professionals in the field of tax administrations and based on discussions with them tried to identify the...

This paper attempts to analyze the role of taxes on property in containing asset bubbles and its consequent recessionary impact, by developing a framework, wherein the housing market is conceived as consisting of several sub-markets i.e. rental housing market, house resale market, new...

For more than 25 years, the Social Security Trust Fund has been projected to run out of money in 2033 (give or take a few years), potentially causing benefits to be severely reduced in the absence of corrective legislative action. Today (February 2024), projections are made by the Social...