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Please use this identifier to cite or link to this item: http://hdl.handle.net/1959.3/151132
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- Title
- The abolition of death duties in Australia: a comparative perspective
- Author(s)
- Gilding, Michael; Glezos, Lee
- Abstract
- In 1978 Australia became the first rich country in the world to abolish death duties. In liberal circles their abolition was commonly understood as an anomaly which would soon be overtaken by history. As more countries follow Australia‟s example, the question arises whether it is more a harbinger than an anomaly. Jens Beckert‟s analysis of inheritance law in the US, Germany and France provides a framework to understand the Australian experience from an international perspective. This paper follows Beckert in tracking legislation, coding parliamentary debates, and examining public debate in Australia to identify discursive fields and their enduring influence. It argues that Australia was unusual – although not an anomaly – insofar as its distinctive discursive field made the abolition of death duties relatively uncontroversial. It was a harbinger insofar as the abolition of death duties signalled their material failure to achieve liberal objectives.
- Publication type
- Conference paper
- Research centre
- Swinburne University of Technology
- Source
- Paper presented at 'Social Causes, Private Lives', the Annual Conference of the Australian Sociological Association (TASA 2010), Sydney, Australia, 06-09 December 2010
- Publication year
- 2010
- Keyword(s)
- Death duties; Discursive fields; Estate taxes; Inheritance; Inheritance taxes; Liberalism
- Publisher
- The Australian Sociological Association
- Publisher URL
- http://www.soc.mq.edu.au/tasa-conference/
- Copyright
- Copyright © 2010 Michael Gilding and Lee Glezos. Published version of the paper reproduced with the kind permission of the publisher.
- Full text
- Peer reviewed
