Death & Taxes

Death & Taxes is a feature documentary about family, wealth, inequality and the American Dream, viewed through the lens of the estate tax and the very personal story of a father and son at odds over what kind of inheritance we want to leave our kids and our country. Filmmaker Justin Schein’s father, Harvey Schein, liked to say he lived the so-called “American Dream” - rising from poverty in Depression-era Brooklyn to great financial success as one of America’s top CEOs of the 1970s. But Harvey Schein, who ran the American arm of Sony for many years, also spent the last 20 years of his life fixated on trying to keep his hard-earned wealth from the taxman—an obsession that almost broke the Schein family apart. More broadly, inherited wealth and the tax system that shields it have badly distorted American democracy, perpetuating racial and economic inequity in the country. Filmed over more than 20 years and weaving intimate family footage with interviews with prominent experts from all sides of the debate, Death & Taxes tells this crucial story through the tale of one American family.