The €3,000 annual small gift exemption should be abolished

This is the reality.. Government's are really only interested in raising taxes and collecting more revenue. If I thought there was merit in the suggestions off removing those tax breaks and reducing taxes on income fair enough but I'd say pig's will be flying to the moon before governments would reduce income taxes in any meaningful way.

In relation to the central banks printing money that's outside our control.. That decision was to support the whole of the EU....EU decisions may not always benefit ireland.. An example of this was the prevailing interest rates in the early 2000's didn't suit our booming construction sector..

Purple said:

So they got €6k-€8k a year spent on their education but the real value of their future earnings was halved. That's not a good trade.

Absolutely, we all benefitted but those who had houses and a pension (people like me) benefitted most. For us there was no down side. That's the point.

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I suppose that if the whole thing went belly-up, those who had most would have lost most. But even still, some people who were cash rich would have piled in and bought up assets very cheaply. That happened here to a lesser extent in the 2009, 2010 era when quite nice Dublin apartments were sold in bulk for less than 100k each.

PebbleBeach2020 said:

The dole should be 300-400 a week

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The dole (Jobseekers Benefit) is a maximum of €208 for a single adult right now.

Baby boomer said:

I suppose that if the whole thing went belly-up, those who had most would have lost most. But even still, some people who were cash rich would have piled in and bought up assets very cheaply. That happened here to a lesser extent in the 2009, 2010 era when quite nice Dublin apartments were sold in bulk for less than 100k each.

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True, but it's still happened up 'till now. It will be interesting to see what happens now that QE has stopped and Bond rates have started to increased.

Zenith63 said:

Makes sense @_OkGo_. As above I'm happy for the boffins at Revenue to figure out the details, I'm by no means an expert on it. I just want equal access to this estate planning tax exemption for all.

To be fair those examples would appear to be mostly excluded -

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As a dependent student, yes they are mostly excluded but as a graduate, you are now supposed to be a functioning adult, i.e. no longer a dependent and these living expenses are deemed as gifts

Living a lifestyle of of 40k plus while earning graduate salaries of 20-25k doesn't quiet add up and is heavily reliant on gifts from parents which which seems to be at odds with item 2.5 above from the revenues guide and also this section

However, a gift such as a car, a house or a paid holiday is still a gift for gift tax purposes,
notwithstanding the fact that it may be associated with a family occasion such as a wedding. To
the extent that any such gifts do not exceed the €3,000 small gift exemption in any year, they are
not subject to CAT.

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I think the thread is hung up on the SGE when the reality is that those able to pass on wealth at that level are going to do it anyway. Before changing the thresholds or changing the rules, it would be better to understand whether anyone has ever been cautioned over abuse of the exemption. Otherwise, all the suggestions above are moot.

If equality or fairness in the application of CAT is the main goal of Brendan's OP, then properly enforcing the current rules would be a far better policy change than revising threshold limits.