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Over the next 22 years, the largest transfer of intergenerational wealth in the history of the world will occur.

Baby boomers, born between 1946 and 1964, are projected to inherit $6 trillion during this period.

Gen X, born between 1965 and 1980, is projected to inherit $39 trillion. Millennials, born between 1981 and 1996, will inherit $46 trillion.

The federal government now allows $15 million of wealth to be transferred, by gift or inheritance, with no tax (gift or estate) paid by the transferor.

Federal tax law also provides that the recipient of a gift or an inheritance will owe no income taxes on the property received.

It gets better. Let’s say that Dad bought some Apple stock for $1 million and that stock grew to $10 million in value by his death.

Dad’s heirs can adjust the tax basis of the stock to $10 million upon inheritance. They can then sell with no capital gains tax.

Wow! Picture Scrooge McDuck in his vault filled with bags of currency and pieces of gold. If you can’t picture this, check it out on YouTube.

Tax planners try to make sure that no one in the government can rain on this parade. Plans include keeping the estate within the $15 million exclusion.

Other plans seek to protect the heirs’ ability to adjust the basis of the assets received. Sometimes the two plans can work against one another.

Planners then need to decide which is more important — avoiding the estate tax or getting that income tax basis adjustment.

New Mexico is one of nine states that have a special benefit available. This is because New Mexico is a community property state.

In olden days, which were not that old, many husbands owned and controlled all marital assets.

When the husband died, the wife and maybe the kids inherited all the assets. Since the husband owned everything, there was a basis adjustment for everything.

But there was a different system from civil, not common laws. This vested the wife with ownership of half the marital assets.

The birth of this civil system likely started with the fall of the Roman Empire in the early Middle Ages.

Germanic custom sought to protect the weaker spouse from a despotic spouse. During the Frankish period, this custom provided legal rights to the weaker spouse.

The origins of this community property system are found in German, Spanish and French laws and customs.

Civil law states in the U.S. that borrowed from these European laws adopted community property.

Returning to my dead husband story, a wife would only receive a basis adjustment for the one-half share of the assets that she did not already own.

Those in community states, which include the powerhouses of California and Texas, accounting for one-fifth of the population, were not pleased with this tax result.

The 800-pound gorillas threatened to bash Congress onto the ground unless they adopted a tax law allowing a full basis adjustment for community property.

So, a surviving spouse in New Mexico can adjust the basis of all the community assets upon the death of the first spouse.

But wait. The assets must be included in the decedent’s gross estate to allow for any basis adjustment.

Tax planning for estates not subject to the estate tax — $15 million or less; $30 million for spouses — seeks to have assets included in the estate.

But even with this careful planning, some assets just cannot get the income tax basis adjustment.

A big one is retirement plan assets. Let’s say the husband had a defined contribution retirement plan at work that accumulated $8 million at his death.

The income tax law bestows great gifts on retirement plans. The employer can deduct contributions while the employee defers income until distributions are received.

To be sure that someone pays an income tax, the tax law says no basis adjustment for those $8 million plan assets.

Whoever inherits the retirement plan will pay income tax. Whoever inherits the stock portfolio or the real estate will not pay income tax.

This forces our wealth transfer generations to consider the tax effects of assets transferred to different heirs.

I’ll give Sally the stock portfolio and name Sue the beneficiary of the retirement plan is not equitable if both shares have the same gross value.

The one certainty of death will facilitate the largest transfer of wealth in history. The other certainty of taxes will mean you need to plan for this.

Jim Hamill is the director of tax practice at Reynolds, Hix & Co. in sa���ʴ�ý������ҳ���. He can be reached at jimhamill@rhcocpa.com.