Inheritance tax
tax paid by a person who inherits the estate of a natural person who has died
International tax law distinguishes between an estate tax and an inheritance tax. An inheritance tax is a tax paid by a person who inherits money or property of a person who has died, whereas an estate tax is a levy on the estate (money and property) of a person who has died. However, this distinction is not always observed; for example, the UK's "inheritance tax" is a tax on the assets of the deceased, and strictly speaking is therefore an estate tax. Inheritance taxes vary widely between countries.
History
There was a steep increase in the number of countries that implemented inheritance taxes throughout the 19th and early 20th century. From 1960 onwards, inheritance taxes declined in prevalence as numerous countries repealed theirs. For historical reasons, the term "death duty" is still used colloquially (though not legally) in the UK and some Commonwealth countries. The estate tax in the United States is sometimes referred as "death tax".
Other taxation applied to inheritance
In some jurisdictions, when assets are transferred by inheritance, any unrealized increase in asset value is subject to capital gains tax, payable immediately. This is the case in Canada, which has no inheritance tax.
The public source identifies “Inheritance tax” as tax paid by a person who inherits the estate of a natural person who has died. This brief keeps that definition visible, then builds a research path around Inheritance, paid and person.
Why this record matters
A short description can identify a subject without explaining its stakes. For “Inheritance tax”, the useful work is to connect “tax paid by a person who inherits the estate of a natural person who has died” to the records capable of establishing context and consequence.
Maps, plans, fabric surveys and administrative records can establish how the site’s name, extent and function changed over time. The source revision retrieved here is dated Sep 2, 2026. The linked authority identifier is Q628413. None of the 0 selected statements returned an explicit reference. The first chronological checks are 1960.
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This entry incorporates text from “Inheritance tax” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.