Re: Figures where for 2000, current rate is lower.
For farmers, business assets made up a much larger proportion
of estates\ufffd wealth: 51 percent in 1999 and 43 percent
in 2000. Liquid assets made up a smaller, but still
substantial, share of their estates: just over 40 percent in
both years. That smaller proportion of liquid assets suggests
that estate taxes may be more likely to exceed liquid
assets for estates of farmers, potentially requiring estates
to liquidate other assets. However, farm estates are generally
small, and the estate tax therefore consumes a smaller
percentage of the gross estate (an average of 11 percent
and a median of 9 percent in 2000). In fact, tax data
show that in 1999, about 12 percent of farmers\ufffd estates
that owed estate taxes faced a liability greater than their
liquid assets. In 2000, the corresponding figure was 8
percent.
That situation is more pronounced for estates claiming
the QFOBI deduction. Business assets made up at least
75 percent of those estates\ufffd wealth, on average.30 In addition,
the average tax owed was a higher percentage of the
gross estate for those estates than for estates in general (14
percent compared with 13 percent for all estates filing
returns). As a consequence, one-third of estates claiming
the QFOBI deduction and owing taxes in 2000 could
not pay the estate tax out of their reported liquid assets.
As before, the fact that liquid assets do not include some
trusts means that that figure represents the maximum
number of estates with insufficient liquid assets to pay the
estate tax.
So, of those farmers forced to file, about 10% of them were charged taxes IN EXCESS of liquid assets.
And for small business, that number was 33%.
Of course, soften the effect for the readers by saying "Maybe they had money socked away somewhere else to soften the blow".
This is lifted straight out of the report.
So, if you are a small business and you happen to be in the valuation range...1 in 3 shot puts you in the "forced sale" category.
