Why Did K.C. Irving Say It Was Too Expensive to Die in Canada?

Shane Parrish says K.C. Irving left Canada in 1971 because dying there had become too expensive, and a tax bill could have forced his sons to break the companies apart.

That December the federal government charged K.C. Irving Limited with criminal offenses under the Combines Investigation Act. His wife Harriet was ill, and her doctors advised a warmer climate. Tax law was changing at the same time. A new capital gains tax would apply from 1972 to increases in asset values, including at death, even if nothing had been sold, and New Brunswick intended to add succession duties of its own. Irving's fortune was not cash. It sat inside refineries, mills, ships, forests, and newspapers, nearly all of it in private companies. The tax would have to be paid in cash, and his sons could not sell a few shares on a public market. They might have had to sell businesses or bring in outside owners.

He had followed one rule for more than 50 years: keep control. On December 23, 1971, he and Harriet flew to Bermuda. His sons stayed in St. John to run the companies. There was no announcement. For three weeks he said nothing. He then said he was no longer residing in New Brunswick, that his sons were carrying on the businesses, and that he did not choose to discuss it further. He had not sold the companies. He had changed his residence.