Unless you regard all taxes as debt, this meant to keep people from escaping from paying taxes, not paying debts.
Here's a variation of the earlier scenario. I have a company. I give people gifts of US $40,000, with no strings attached. It happens to be that, in their free time, they volunteer at my company to help me out with my business, and spend about 35 hours a week in volunteer labor.
Is this really a "gift" that shouldn't be taxed at all? If so, it's a way to avoid employment and income taxes.
To prevent that from happening, the gift taxes are going to have to be at least as high as employment-related taxes would be.
Since the gift tax doesn't kick in until $14,000/year, which is under minimum wage, the gift tax for higher valued gifts must be much higher than employment taxes. Otherwise it will still be used to avoid employment and income taxes.
Here's a variation of the earlier scenario. I have a company. I give people gifts of US $40,000, with no strings attached. It happens to be that, in their free time, they volunteer at my company to help me out with my business, and spend about 35 hours a week in volunteer labor.
Is this really a "gift" that shouldn't be taxed at all? If so, it's a way to avoid employment and income taxes.
To prevent that from happening, the gift taxes are going to have to be at least as high as employment-related taxes would be.
Since the gift tax doesn't kick in until $14,000/year, which is under minimum wage, the gift tax for higher valued gifts must be much higher than employment taxes. Otherwise it will still be used to avoid employment and income taxes.