I want to draw a distinction between my opposition to increased marginal tax rates in incomes which I consider to be prudentially foolish and death taxes which I consider to be immoral. As a Christian I believe that all people are worthy and that any penalty or restriction upon them should only adhere to their behavior. Thus I find it wrong to attach any penalty to their ‘status’. Status penalties are gutter Marxism. For example the Jews had their property and lives confiscated in Nazi Germany not because of their behavior but because of their status. Capitalist ‘blood suckers’ and kulaks had the same in Soviet Russia, Maoist China and Kampuchea. Inheritance taxes are essentially the same: you are saying “because some person received their inheritance in money form beyond some arbitrary limit, they should be punished for it by the confiscation of the greater part of their wealth”. If like Lebron James they received it in a different manner, well they get to keep it.
Thus there are ‘moral’ inheritances and ‘immoral’ inheritances that are driven by status, not the behavior of the inheritor.
I would have no moral problem (though I think it stupid on prudential grounds) to sumptuary or luxury taxes that tax excess display and ostentation. That goes to behavior and society has to decide what the limits are (‘party on’ is my vote). That is Christian. Only in a Nietzschean world where there is no transcendence and there is only power can people be singled out for special abuse (or reward) for merely their status. This is why I find racial quotas so immoral.
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