The United States has had a Federal Estate Tax in effect since 1916. It began with a top tax rate of 10 percent on estates over $5 million and hit its peak when President Franklin Roosevelt raised the top rate to 70 percent in 1935. The tax rate then reduced many times and now sits at 40 percent for estates over $5,450,000 per person, and $10,900,000 for a married couple. In 2017, the threshold will be $5,490,000 per person ($10,980,000 per couple) based upon indexing to inflation. The Federal Estate Tax is projected to affect only 5,400 estates per year in its current arrangement, which constitutes about only 0.2 percent of all deaths according to the Joint Committee on Taxation. The tax is set to raise about $269 billion over the next 10 years, which is a paltry 1 percent of all tax revenue to be received over that period.

In the recent presidential campaigns, the candidates had differing views on estate tax repeal. Secretary Hillary Clinton sought to reduce the estate threshold to $3,500,000 while raising the rate on the highest estates to 65 percent. But before the campaign, she had sought only a 45 percent top rate. She supported H.R. 4996 (114th), Sensible Estate Tax Act of 2016 (SETA) sponsored by Rep. Levin (D. Mi.). SETA contained the $3,500,000 exemption and 45 percent rate—the exemption and rate existing in 2009. SETA was never voted on after referral to the House Ways and Means Committee.

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