The Center on Budget and Policy Priorities (CBPP) has released a new analysis examining a dangerous proposal to allow for an unlimited exemption within the estate tax for farmland. CBPP believes this proposal might be offered as an amendment to the Senate Finance committee markup of the farm bill. The CBPP report finds such a proposal:

• Would likely prove extremely costly because it would create strong incentives for wealthy individuals to convert large amounts of their estates into qualifying farmland.
• Could undermine its own goals. If wealthy individuals seeking to shield assets from the estate tax bid up the price of farmland, that would make it more difficult for genuine family farmers to keep their farms in their families and could discourage others of ordinary means from entering farming.

Instead, CBPP states that making the current exemption ($4 million per couple) or the 2009 exemption ($7 million per couple) permanent would more than protect farm estates and would be simpler, more administrable, and less open to abuse.