Biden’s 2024 Green Book Tax Proposals What “Fair Share” Taxation Means for Estate Planning By James I. Dougherty and Marissa Dungey
James I. Dougherty and Marissa Dungey are partners and co-founders of Dungey Dougherty PLLC in Greenwich, Connecticut. This article is adapted from the authors’ article “Biden’s 2023 Green Book Proposal,” initially published by Wealthmanagement. com on March 15, 2023.
client questions prompted by the headlines on the proposed increased taxes on high-net-worth (HNW) individuals. President Biden’s third set of tax proposals builds on his first two. His first Green Book’s headliner for estate planners was a proposal to make death, lifetime giving, and exceeding maximum holding periods for assets in trust recognition events for income tax purposes. His second Green Book contained far more proposals, with much of the attention given to a new proposal to impose a minimum tax on those worth over $100 million, which the Biden administration nicknamed the misnomer the “Billionaire Minimum Income Tax,” despite the markedly lower threshold. Last year’s proposals also gave new life to proposals from the Obama administration that affected estate planning strategies, such as changes to grantor trusts and ending perpetually GST tax-exempt trusts. The 2024 Green Book continues to build
upon the prior proposals and adds further targeted attacks on common estate planning techniques for HNW individuals. The following is a summary of the key provisions affecting trust and estate planning. “Fair Share” Getting Bigger This year’s proposed budget from the administration calls for trillions of new government spending and lowering the deficit by trillions, which necessarily translates to substantially more revenue in the form of taxes. The President states in his budget message that “[w]e more than fully pay for these investments in our future by asking the wealthy and big corporations to pay their fair share.” Budget of the U.S. Government Fiscal Year 2024, Office of Management and Budget, The Budget Message of the President, p. 2 (March 2023), https://tinyurl.com/4sk3m58u. To the Biden administration, “fair”
Published in Probate & Property, Volume 37, No 5 © 2023 by the American Bar Association. Reproduced with permission. All rights reserved. This information or any portion thereof may not be copied or disseminated in any form or by any means or stored in an electronic database or retrieval system without the express written consent of the American Bar Association. 26
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n March 9, 2023, the Biden administration released its proposed budget calling for an increase of trillions in federal spending along with his proposed offsetting revenue raisers in General Explanations of the Administration’s Fiscal Year 2024 Revenue Proposals (2024 Green Book). Department of the Treasury, Green Book (March 2023), https:// tinyurl.com/5je37vvz. These tax proposals are his third since taking office and first since Republicans took control of the House of Representatives. Given the divided Congress, the chance of many or even any of these proposals becoming law now appears remote. Tax practitioners need to understand the proposals, however, to address
