> Getting rid of them is essentially impossible without huge changes in the political/legal system.

So is getting rid of intergenerational wealth transfer. So since we're already dreaming about a new system that seems irrelevant.

> legitimate use cases

Intergenerational wealth transfer also has "legitimate use cases" if one gets to define "legitimate". I'm curious what legitimate cases you have in mind.

By “raising death taxes”, I meant comprehensively, eliminating loopholes, as the sources I linked discuss more at length.

Re: irrevocable trust, a cursory search revealed no legitimate use case imo, all use cases I see are proxies to skirt taxes or hide income/wealth. What would you consider a legitimate use case for one?

Your point re: case law is well taken, but per [2] up until a few decades ago there was a cat-and-mouse game between laws and tricks regarding inheritance wealth transfer. This stopped and it’s easier than ever to transfer > 10M tax free at or death, which has massive implications for wealth inequality.

That said I agree it’s extremely unlikely and have no hope that any of this will change.