A follow-up on last week’s post, Estate Tax Musings:  more bloggers have entered the debate over estate tax repeal:

• Gary Becker:  I believe taxes on estates should be permanently abolished since they do little to reduce income or wealth inequality, benefit a vast army of lawyers and accountants whose role is to find ways to cut taxes on the estates of the wealthy, create problems for some families with smaller businesses, and do not raise a lot of tax revenue.  [Full post:  Should the Estate Tax Go?]
• Richard Posner:  I agree with Becker that inheritance taxes are preferable to estate taxes and that consumption taxes are preferable to income taxes. However, I do not share his strong opposition to the federal estate tax.  [Full post: Posner on Estate Taxation]
• Vic Fleischer: One of Posner’s key moves is to argue that while the cost of estate tax avoidance is high, so would be the avoidance costs associated with hiking up income taxes or consumption taxes necessary to make up the revenue difference. I’m not so sure.  [Full post:  Becker vs. Posner]
• Death and Taxes — The Blog:  The estate tax cure (resulting in a free-for-all involving state estate taxes, and a capital gains tax that will potentially affect a large percentage of decedent’s estates) may be worse than the disease.  [Full Post:  Federal Estate Tax Repeal, Part 6: Judge Posner and Professor Becker]
• Tax & Business Law Commentary:  By enacting an independent tax on estates, states could be playing with fire because if the well-to-do begin to abandon their (relatively high tax) domiciles with a vengeance, there will be a reduction in income tax revenues as well. On balance, the states could actually end up with reduced revenues on a net/net basis. [Full post:  The Media and Taxes]