A number of people have asked me what I think of the NYTimes omnibus on Trump's inheritance.
In no particular order:
In no particular order:
1) Almost everyone seems to be missing that this was tax arbitrage, not tax evasion. He was converting estate taxed money into income-taxed income. The size of the net benefit is somewhat uncertain because the conversion lost the benefits of tax deferral until death.
2) How much of it was illegal, and how much of it was just "Stuff we don't think should be legal" is unclear to me, because I Am Not a Tax Lawyer". Complicated by the fact that the tax rules changed massively in 1986.
3) It does highlight how byzantine our whole taxation system is, which is why I favor eliminating the estate and corporate income taxes (or lowering them to token amounts) and taxing both capital income and inheritance at ordinary income tax rates when gains are realized.
4) One final note: my anecdotal understanding is that the connections Trump's father gave him to city hall, bankers, and the construction industry were far more important to his early success than the money--though the money was far from irrelevant.
