The estate tax should be eliminated.

Greetings, everyone. This is my first post on debate.org (other than a few comment responses), so hopefully this one goes well. Dan, I'm a fan of brevity. If we can keep our arguments concise and to the point, I think that might bode well for one another and the online community. I'm going to keep my arguments around 4,000 characters. Please feel free to debate as you like, of course. INTRODUCTION If I can sum up your argument, it appears as though you are against the estate tax for two reasons. First, it is a burden on the American taxpayer. Second, it is a superfluous form of income collected by the federal government. As I will show, neither of these claims are correct. Once these assertions are disproved through factual evidence, followed by a benefits explanation of the estate tax in the same regard, the only logical conclusion will be to favor it instead. BURDEN ON THE TAXPAYER The estate tax, as you've defined, is essentially correct (though "property" is a loose word). Additionally, most reasonable people would agree with your point that too much taxation on the American public is a bad thing. However, your interchangeable use of the words "American(s)" and "American public" in your argument imply *all* Americans, when you actually should describe "affluent Americans." The estate tax presently affects only those estates of considerable size - over $2M for individuals and over $4M for couples (http://www.irs.gov...). Since the majority of Americans do not own such estates, it is unfair and inaccurate to imply that all Americans are being burdened by the estate tax when in fact, it is only a very small percentage. The majority of Americans do not feel this burden whatsoever. SUPERFLUOUS FORM OF INCOME You claim that the estate tax will not be missed [by the government] if removed and further, that America (the nation and its people) can afford to lose it. This argument is incorrect for two reasons. 1. There is a wealth of evidence indicating that the repeal of the wealth tax would cost over $1T (yes, trillion) over the first ten years of implementation (Center on Budget and Policy Priorities, March 16, 2005). This revenue loss of full repeal would dwarf the total amount we currently spend annually on homeland security ($38 billion), K-12 education ($36 billion), health care for veterans ($29 billion), and student financial assistance ($14 billion) (Budget of the United States Government, Fiscal Year 2006, Historical Tables). It is many times the size of all cuts to entitlement programs combined in the 2006 federal budget ($35 billion over 5 years) (Robert Greenstein, "The Tough Fiscal Challenges that Lie Ahead," Center on Budget and Policy Priorities). 2. If we were to opt for spending cuts and other tax measures to curtail the $1T loss instead, the results would also be unfortunate and certainly missed by Americans. Setting aside the nation's need for things like greater health care coverage and education which would suffer greatly via spending cuts, this regressive tax cut would shift a greater share of taxes onto the middle class, while benefiting only the small percentage of America, specifically the most affluent individuals. ESTATE TAX BENEFITS The benefits of an estate tax are many, but for the purposes of being succinct, I will list two: 1. Promotes charitable giving - According to a 2004 Congressional Budget Office (CBO) report, charities received between $13 billion and $25 billion in additional donations in 2000 because of the estate tax. 2. Strengthens our nation's fiscal health and the programs needed to support it in order to be effective (ironically, you note that this point is also important). CONCLUSION The evidence clearly indicates that the estate tax is neither a burden on most Americans nor something that can treated superfluously. The estate tax is a significant form of income to this nation and benefits many at the expense of few. In fact, not only is the estate tax a good thing, but it also reinforces our values of fairness and our belief in a meritocracy - individuals should not have economic power as a sole consequence of an "accident of birth." In the words of President Franklin D. Roosevelt, "Such inherited economic power is as inconsistent with the ideals of this generation as inherited political power was inconsistent with the ideals of the generation which established our government."