TAXATION -- INSURANCE AND ANNUITY CONTRACTS UNDER THE FEDERAL ESTATE TAX -- DIFFERENTIATION AND THEORIES OF TAXATION

Authors

Charles F. Dugan, University of Michigan Law SchoolFollow

Abstract

In the taxpayer's quest for methods of avoidance of the federal estate tax, one field seems to have been generally overlooked; viz., annuity contracts that are so similar to insurance policies as to be treated like the latter for tax purposes, thus securing the benefit of the $40,000 exemption in section 302 (g). Various reasons might be suggested why this should be so, but the fact remains that there has been practically no discussion of the subject in legal publications and, until the recent case of Old Colony Trust Co. v. Commissioner of Internal Revenue, no litigation involving the problem. Perhaps the principal reason for this paucity of material is the fact that little use has been made of the annuity device until recent years. However that may be, the growth in interest in annuity contracts and combinations of annuity and insurance contracts merits a discussion of the problems they raise under the federal estate tax law.

Recommended Citation

Charles F. Dugan, TAXATION -- INSURANCE AND ANNUITY CONTRACTS UNDER THE FEDERAL ESTATE TAX -- DIFFERENTIATION AND THEORIES OF TAXATION, 38 Mich. L. Rev. 526 (1940).
Available at: https://repository.law.umich.edu/mlr/vol38/iss4/8