Dying to Save Taxes: Evidence from Estate Tax Returns on the Death Elasticity

No 8158, NBER Working Papers from National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc

Abstract: This paper examines data from U.S. federal tax returns to shed light on whether the timing of death is responsive to its tax consequences. We investigate the temporal pattern of deaths around the time of changes in the estate tax system periods when living longer, or dying sooner, could significantly affect estate tax liability. We find some evidence that there is a small death elasticity, although we cannot rule out that what we have uncovered is ex post doctoring of the reported date of death. However, the fact that we find that postponement, rather than acceleration, of death is more likely to occur suggests that this phenomenon is at last partly a real (albeit timing) response to taxation.

JEL-codes: H2 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2001-03
Note: PE
References: Add references at CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (18)

Published as Review of Economics and Statistics, 2003, 85(2), 256-265.

Downloads: (external link)
http://www.nber.org/papers/w8158.pdf (application/pdf)

Related works:
Journal Article: Dying to Save Taxes: Evidence from Estate-Tax Returns on the Death Elasticity (2003)
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:nbr:nberwo:8158

Ordering information: This working paper can be ordered from
http://www.nber.org/papers/w8158

Access Statistics for this paper

More papers in NBER Working Papers from National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc National Bureau of Economic Research, 1050 Massachusetts Avenue Cambridge, MA 02138, U.S.A.. Contact information at EDIRC.
Bibliographic data for series maintained by ().