^ Again I am misread.
I didn't say the lawsuit would have merit or be successful. I just said (or meant anyway) that they might try to bring one. People sue for dumber reasons all the time, and even if they don't succeed it can be a financial impact (and create family acrimony).
I disagree that the accept and gift approach is better than disclaiming. Accepting and gifting creates a different tax situation than disclaiming. By accepting, in the case of an IRA, then to gift those funds to the brother the OP (a) has to take distributions from the IRA (which may be required or desired anyway, true) but regardless create taxable income for OP which a disclaimer would not, and (b) creates gift tax filing or annual limitations, which a disclaimer would not.
Additionally, if OP is trying to gift $16K a year to brother to equalize a $100K difference, for example, that would take about 6 years. Maybe OP's brother doesn't live that long. Maybe OP doesn't live that long. Maybe OP's brother could use the money earlier. A disclaimer fixes all of these I think.
Anyway, we obviously might not agree on all this, and I'm not sure OP or anyone else is getting any value out of this discussion. So unless you or anyone else ask me a specific question, I'll let you have the last word on this thread.
