Upon dying, a person's wealth should NOT be taken by the government.

"However Con was noting that my wording was illogical -- I disagree -- but I do feel the need to clarify. When I stated, "I believe that an individual has the right to do as they please with their own money" I was referring to after their death. I continued to say, "I can invest it [my money] any way that I choose while living, and thanks to the legal documentation known as wills, I can even invest that money any way that I choose after my death!"" You kind of missed the point of my argument, but I'll return to it later. You bring up another illogical point here. Why do you suddenly have more rights to do what you want with your money when you're dead? I want to know your justification for supporting giving dead people more rights than the living. "1. By this logic, if my mom bakes me cookies just because she felt like it, I should be forced to share some of those cookies because I did nothing to earn them. " Once again, the estate tax only taxes the first $2 million. So, prove that your mother's cookies are worth $2 million dollars, and you may have an argument. "2. My opponent is assuming that one did nothing to earn that inheritance. Often times a child will inherit their parent's business/money/estate after working hard with their parents prior to the death." I can give you that point. However, not completely. Once again, this only actually happens in less than 2% of all cases. Furthermore, the entire estate is not taxed. The first $2 million is protected, and then it's only taxed at less than 50%. Furthermore, one would think that this scenario wouldn't even come into play as in most situations where a child works that closely in a family business, they are just as big of a legal partner as the parent. At least this is true with bigger estatesm which is the only scenario where the estate tax would ever come into play. "Okay so suppose I am away at college and my parents wish to send me money in the mail. They send me a check for $100. Well the postage for that transfer of wealth DID cost some money (about 35 cents); however, it was not a fraction of the amount being transfered but rather a set amount of money that is to be paid by everyone who wishes to transfer wealth via mail." Your parents weren't giving you a $2,000,000+ bonus. And you're miscunderstanding the point I was makig. Part of the point of the estate tax is to keep this transfer of wealth from simply crossing generations. We want the younger generation to work just as hard as the older, rather than simply inhereting wealth and contributing nothing to society. This is what is meant by taxing the "transfer of wealth". "Well playing the lottery is a form of gambling, and in fact the lottery was specifically designed to raise money for the government. Gambling and winning money verses receiving an inheritance are completely different things, and should not be subjected to the same rules of taxation." Why are they completely different? You've given no reason why they are different in any way. In both scenarios we're talking about rather large bonuses. And even if you want to accept that they're different, you have given no valid reason why an estate shouldn't be taxed. "Consider a father founding a company and working hard to sustain it. Upon his death, his child expects to receive the wealth that his father worked so hard for and left behind for his family. Why should the government be allowed to take half of his father's earnings? Especially since the father already pays what he owes the government via his INCOME TAXES. If he hadn't yet for that year, then like I said - one final payment on his behalf could be paid on the following April 15th after his death." I addressed this earlier. This scenario would almost never actually occur because of the way that the estate tax is set up and because of the way large and welathy family businesses are often set up. If you want to keep running this point, I'll ask that you present some actual examples of this occurring. And even if you do present some examples, the vote should still belong to the CON based on a cost-benefit analysis, because this would only happen toa fraction of that 2%. "To support his point, Con mentions that only estates worth over 2 million dollars are subjected to estate taxation. This only proves my point that estate taxes are unfair; they only impose a ridiculously high tax rate upon the wealthy. Con argues that because $2 million is a large sum of money, it is okay to subject citizens to unfair taxation (unfair for all of the reasons I have provided in my argument). He points out that in the year 2,000, "ONLY" 52,000 estates were subjected to the tax. In my opinion, that's 52,000 estates too many." Even if it is too many (which it isn't), I should still win on a cost-benefit analysis. And it's not unfair to the wealthy. It's protecting smaller estates, protecting those "heirlooms", and at the same time keeping unearned the transfer of wealth to a minimum. Obviously, no system is perfect. But the estate tax gives a very good way of balancing these two issues. "My opponent's same New York Times source mentions that once the estate tax is fully repealed, the treasury would lose $70 BILLION DOLLARS IN ONE YEAR. That $70 billion/year is money that could be pumped back into feeding the economy (instead of funding an unjust war, but I digress :P). Anyway, just because the number of estates being taxed since 2,000 has decreased, doesn't mean that an estate tax is the right thing to do as my opponent wrongfully suggests." That $70 billion dollars is pumped back into the economy. You see, the governemnt spends that money. It doesn't matter who's spending the money, it's still going back into the economy. You make a completely null point here. And even if you accept eh "unjust war" thing (which is really irrelevant), the money alos goes to fund schools, law enforcement, various public safety institutions, and other worthy causes. Moreover, you're also assuming that the individual will spend the money better than the government. Isn't it entirely possible that if that money wasn't taxed, it would go to be supporting something worse than an unjust war? You can't prove a better spender either way, so what the government spends this money on isn't really a point for you. "To conclude his argument, Con again brings up taxation in general, and how the government ultimately decides where our tax dollars are dispersed. As I've mentioned, I do not denounce all forms of taxation. However my point was not about the problems of dispersing tax dollars in general. My contention is that the government *already receives* tax money to disperse via income taxes and various other forms of taxation - sales tax, property taxes, etc. Thus upon one's death, the government is actually the one receiving a bonus (a $70 billion dollars a year bonus to be precise), and that bonus is not justified." No. You stated quite clearly that you have a problem witht he money taken by the government being spent on programs that you don't want it spent on. Here, it doens't matter whether you're living or dead. This is a non-unique problem to the estate tax. If you want to carryt hrough with your objections as to how the government uses your money unjustly, you have to denounce all taxation. Otherwise, you are a hypocrite, especially considering that you have given no justification as to why you have more rights over your money whne you are dead than when you are living. This is a glaring contradiction in your case. I urge a CON vote.