Just three white men ‒ Jeff Bezos of Amazon, investor Warren Buffett and Microsoft’s Bill Gates ‒ own as much wealth as the whole bottom half of America. An astonishing $2.9 trillion is in the hands of just 400 people. The top 1%, meanwhile, control 40% of the wealth in our country.2,3 This unequal wealth hoarding starves public services and kills job creation, leaving America sicker, less educated and less prosperous. The estate tax was meant to prevent this kind of wealth from being passed down from generation to generation and stop the creation of a new oligarchy.
The For the 99.8 Percent Act would fight massive inequality and inherited wealth by:4
- Raising taxes on the ultra-wealthy few, starting with estates worth more than $3.5 million and rising to a 77% tax on inherited wealth over $1 billion.
- Closing the loopholes that allow many ultra-wealthy families to dodge inheritance taxes altogether.
- Defying Republican attacks on the estate tax by exempting family farms, most of which are worth less than $1 million, and taxing wealth that rich families gathered through other tax loopholes for the first time.
Senate Republicans are now proposing to eliminate the estate tax completely in yet another giveaway to their wealthy donors.
