Kent Conrad: “It would seem to me really almost self-evident that the wiser course here would be immediate reform of the estate tax.…”

“It would seem to me really almost self-evident that the wiser course here would be immediate reform of the estate tax. Let's go to $3 million for an individual, $6 million for a couple. It would cost $33 billion over the next decade, but that is a fraction of the over $200 billion it would cost to fully repeal it. My colleague is quite correct, in estates of over $10 million, fully 56 percent of the value of those estates has never been taxed. This is according to a study by Poterba and Weisbenner, that finds that is as a result of unrealized capital gains and as a result of buildup of property values never subjected to tax at all. So the question is, what is going to be the way we share the tax burden in this country? What is the most fair and equitable way to do that? I would suggest completely eliminating the estate tax for very wealthy individuals, which is of necessity going to force others-- middle-class people, lower-middle-class people--to pay more in order to foot the bill, is not fair. It is not equitable. It would really make more sense to fundamentally change the estate tax, to give a much larger exemption than we currently have. Currently, it is $1 million. Instead, we should raise that to $3 million for an individual, $6 million for a couple, and do it immediately. It costs a fraction of repealing it all. We would still have wealthy individuals in this country who would have an opportunity to contribute and not shift that tax burden onto middle-income taxpayers.”