Estate tax rates and complexity have driven a vast array of support services to assist clients with a perceived eligibility for the estate tax to develop tax avoidance techniques. Many insurance companies maintain a network of life insurance agents, all providing financial planning services, guided to avoid paying estate taxes. Brokerage and financial planning firms also use estate planning, including estate tax avoidance, as a marketing technique. Many law firms also specialize in estate planning, tax avoidance, and minimization of estate taxes.The first technique many use is to combine the tax exemption limits for a husband and wife either through a will or create a living trust. Many, but not all, other techniques do not really avoid the estate tax, rather they provide an efficient and leveraged way to have liquidity to pay for the tax at the time of death. It is very important for those whose primary wealth is in a business they own, or real estate, or stocks, to seek professional advice or they may run the risk of the estate tax forcing their heirs to sell these things at an inopportune time. In one popular scheme, an irrevocable life insurance trust, the parents give their children (within the allowed yearly gift tax limit) money to buy life insurance on the parents in an irrevocable life insurance trust. Structured in this way, life insurance is free of estate tax. However, if the parents have a very high net worth and the life insurance policy would be inadequate in size due to the limits in premiums, a charitable remainder trust may be used. This is where a large asset is flagged to be donated to a charity, sold, and invested. The investment income buys life insurance but the principal goes to the charity when the parents die. Meanwhile the children get the full amount as well in life insurance proceeds. This is a large reason for many charitable gifts, and proponents of the estate tax argue the tax should be maintained to encourage this form of charity.