WASHINGTON The federal estate tax, which is the most progressive of all the federal taxes (meaning its rate rises fastest with the amount to be taxed), is back on the radar screen of Washington politicians, according to a vice president of the American Trucking Associations.

Robert Pitcher, who tracks legal matters for the ATA, says its widely assumed that a stronger Democratic Congress will not allow the estate tax to be repealed in 2010, which is whats supposed to happen under current law.

The estate tax has long been a problem for the owners of small and medium-sized businesses, especially those that have large amounts of capital tied up in expensive movable assets, like the owners of motorcoach companies.

Theres a real danger that when the owner of such a business dies, part or all of the business will have to be sold to pay the taxes due on the owners estate.

There are ways of avoiding this result but they are complicated and can be expensive.

During the 1990s and earlier, the ATA and others argued that the minimum size of estates subject to the tax should be increased and the rate of the tax itself cut.

The so-called Bush Administration tax cuts enacted in 2001 addressed both issues.

Over the period through 2009, the tax has, in effect, been phased out for many because the amount of an estate exempt from the tax has been raised from $675,000 in 2001 to $3.5 million in 2009. At the same time, the rate of the tax for larger estates has been cut from 60 percent in 01, to 45 percent next year.

In 2010, under current law, the estate tax is repealed altogether. But only for 2010. After that, when the Bush tax cuts expire, the estate tax returns, with the exemption set at $1 million and a rate of 60 percent.

Pitcher thinks the Democrats in Congress will reverse the 2010 repeal and impose the tax that year.

Still, Pitcher sees a couple of hopeful signs.

He notes that Republican candidate for president John McCain would raise the exemption to $5 million and reduce the tax rate to 15 percent, while Democrat Barack Obama would keep the exemption at $3.5 million and the rate at 45 percent.