The ABA Tax Section has submitted estate, gift, and generation-skipping transfer tax reform ideas (55 pages) to the House Ways & Means Committee and Senate Finance Committee in the following ten categories:

1. Need for Predictability and Stability in Federal Transfer Tax System
2. Unification of the Federal Estate and Gift Tax Exclusion Amounts
3. Portability of the Exemptions
4. Section 6166
5. Valuation of Interests in Closely Held Entities
6. "Clawback" or "Recapture" of Transfer Tax on Gifts Protected by Gift Tax Unified Credit
7. Annual Exclusion
8. Generation-Skipping Transfer Tax Provisions
9. Inter Vivos QTIP Elections
10. Marital Deduction and Charitable Giving

The New York State Bar Association Tax Section has released Report on Portability of the Estate Tax Exemption (13 pages)

Unless extended, portability of the estate tax exclusion will sunset on December 31, 2012. In this report, we have recommended several changes to the existing statute that we believe better serve the basic policy objectives of the current portability rules, all based on the assumption that it is extended beyond 2012. Specifically, we recommended that (i) any revised statute retain rather than modify the current definition of DSUEA, (ii) Example 3 from the 2010 JCT Explanation be revised to conform to the unmodified definition of DSUEA, and (iii) any revised statute clarify that taxable gifts on which gift tax was paid by the last deceased spouse are excluded from the Section 2010(c)(4)(B)(ii) amount. We have also recommended that any revised statute clarify certain issues a surviving spouse would face concerning the amount and use of the DSUEA if he or she were to remarry after a valid portability election is in effect.