Congress has not yet established what the estate tax will be beyond the unsustainable "Bush tax cuts." The last year of this regime is 2010. Of particular interest to anyone who wants to plan their estate, the tax is completely abolished that year. In 2011 it comes back to levels seen in 2001 and touches those with assets that exceed $1,000.000.00.
On December 3rd, the US House of Representatives voted to keep the current, significantly less expansive system that touches a smaller group of Americans. The current exemption amount is $3,500,000.00. Since 2001, when the Bush tax cuts became law, the exemption amounts- the amount of assets a person has that is exempt from the estate tax, has gone up. As a result, the number of people filing estate tax returns has gone down. A recent IRS publication examines these returns. Among the tidbits you will find:
- The number of estate tax returns fell from 2001 to 2007, from from 108,071 to 38,031.
- The number of very wealthy estates, those the publication defines as having more then 3.5 million increased from 9,440 to 14,281.
- Limited Partnership interests increased over that time, but not as much as I would have guessed. The amounts held by decedents in limited partnerships increased from 2 billion to 6 billion. This seems like a small number given how much time the IRS seems to spend on partnerships.
Other conclusions were fairly obvious, particularly as it relates to asset values having gone down and what that means for estate tax returns. If you want to read the IRS publication yourself, check it out here.
Posted via email from Ahmed Shaikh’s stream
