← All arguments

For a wealth tax political

Inheritance tax is already a wealth tax

Pointing to inheritance or estate tax as the alternative concedes the point: it is a tax on accumulated wealth, just levied once at death instead of annually. The UK's inheritance tax, the US estate tax and the inheritance duties across Europe all fall on the stock of assets a person has built up, not on income. So "tax inheritance, not wealth" is taxing wealth — only later, more avoidably, and after a lifetime of compounding has already done its work.

Backed by