No Stupid Questions

I'm okay with not giving someone with disabilities and inheritance if it'll fuck with any government money they're getting for their disabilities. You have to handle money in that kind of situation very carefully. My mom is my life insurance beneficiary or whatever it's called, but the money would be going to my sister. My sister is intellectually and physically disabled and cannot work. My parents handle her finances so she doesn't lose her disability income, so my mom would be in charge of keeping that money for my sister and using it appropriately. When I make a will, most, if not all, of my shit (my house, car, etc) will go to my mom legally, but my mom knows my sister is the intended recipient and would help figure shit out.

could make a special needs trust.

It's going to happen to me. When I was homeless, I was a waste to help because I'm doomed. Now that I am decently off with a great career, I am a waste to give anything to, because I have it handled. I have this feeling my parents don't like me lol.

If that's the attitude, I don't think it's right. If it's going into a trust or something, to prevent the recipient from harming themselves, I don't see a problem.

Sometimes it's a legal necessity! I have a child with severe disability and if they ever posses 10k in value they'll be disqualified from their many thousands of dollars in mental health supports.

What we've done is set up things to go into a trust where their advocate can use money for ongoing support (my child is also extremely irresponsible with spending and used to always immediately spend Xmas gifts on impulse spending including a lot of scratch tickets). While their government support is great it may not always be there so the trust is there if there's a break or support or to try and support them if they become disqualified from disability (it'd be fucking awful though, we're well-ish off and our life savings could support our child's support for about half a year max).

Structuring it to avoid having benefits clawed back does seem unethical but I would honestly do the same.

I don't think there's anything wrong with leaving everything in the hands of the most capable child along with the clear understanding that they're now the one who is responsible for looking after the family.

Here's a tip: if you have multiple children, split everything evenly no matter what. It doesn't matter how good your reasoning is. It doesn't matter if one kid is an addict, it doesn't matter if one kid needs the money more. It doesn't matter if one cares for you in your old age and the other disappeared.

No matter what.

You are inviting nothing but misery into ALL of your children's lives by dividing it unevenly. No matter how reasonable it is to do something else, they will always tend to think that dividing the inheritance unevenly means that you loved them unequally.

You can give people cash with limits on it instead of just giving a lump sum.

For someone with a drug addiction or gambling addiction giving a lump sum would be death.

Put that money in a trust fund with limits on how often they can withdraw and what they can spend it on.

It may not be fool proof but better then just not giving anything at all.

I would think a disabled person would need more money to survive in this world than someone not disabled.

Well, I have certainly seen the opposite. I have seen a number of cases where a parent has chosen to leave a significantly bigger portion of their estate to a disabled child because that child would need it.

Ethics is not an area in which there are right and wrong answers -- just ethical principles that do or don't appeal to you. For me, I think parents should have the right to decide how their wealth should be distributed without any "must be even for all children" constraints. But I would never choose to leave my least able-bodied child less for that reason.

trying to not give too much away but this happened in my family. a relative who has quite severe autism and has been on benefits for something like 30 years (they are in their 60s) is not being given any money by their parents. the parents willed all their physical assets to their other child (with special clauses that the person should still be able to utilise them if they wish) and put any money they would have gotten into a trust that pays out monthly. the reasoning for this in that the person in question is unable to gauge the worth of money, and because they are constantly getting suckered into niche religious groups that want tithes (until they tire of their mannerisms and throw them out).

while it does sound ableist to say, i do really think this is for their own good. it falls on the rest of the family to look out for them now and we do try. both children did agree to this arrangement by the way.

That's absolutely ableist.

Depends on the disability, e.g. someone with a gambling addition will just spend the money, or sell the house. If its like autism spectrum disabilities than it can be considered unethical. (If the inheritance is a house, than put it in trust so they can't sell it for any reason.) If they're saying that the person will "just get disability payments" shows that they don't care and would rather play favorites than have all their children to succeed.

I think a lot of it depends on the asset.

Cash and stock is easy to split amongst children, but a lot of families with generational wealth usually have wealth generated from ownership of a company.

I can see some parents choosing to keep the company together under streamlined ownership rather than breaking it up across several children. If you are choosing inheritance based on who would be the best person to run a company, you're going to self select for certain personality traits.

No one is entitled to anyone’s inheritance. The ethics of the situation really depend on the details. Did one child look after the parents in their old age? Doe one child have more needs? Was there a promise to distribute everything evenly?

If the only reason for exclusion is because one child has depression or anxiety and isn’t the smartest, then that sounds pretty ableist and shitty. If the person really can’t manage the money, why not set up a trust designed to help them out without just handing over lump sums of cash? The one case where exclusion makes sense is if they require long term in patient care since at least in the US, all your money is eaten up by the medical bills before you default to Medicare (unless you have a stupid amount of money and can pay out of pocket for premium care forever)

If I were the parent, knowing exactly how little disability actually covers, as both my father and my wife are/were on it. I would help that kid more, and hope I raised my other kids to appreciate that they just needed more help.

If we're not talking actual cognitive disability, like needing to live with some form of caretaker. Then that's kinda fucked up.

My brother is very smart, but he has other disabilities that nobody can see. My mom has already planned on willing his house to me so he can continue to live there.

On paper it may not look fair, but the alternative would lead to him being homeless, so it would be unethical to do otherwise.

There are some circumstances where it makes sense. If you have a disability in the US, you cannot have money or you’ll lose your benefits

The inheritance can be put into a special needs trust, to be used for the benefit of the child.

I didn't for a second read that and think you were the parent.

There's no one size fits all answer here, it's going to depend on how much money, how severe the childs disabilities are and what their care needs are, and what other sort of inheritance might be on the table ( for example one child gets the money and another child gets the house)

If the child is able to live on their own, then yeah, it's a dick move and the parents are just playing favorites and being ableist.

If they have significant care needs- nursing home, psychiatric treatment, home health aides, visiting nurses, etc. then there might be some logical arguments to be made. If they're already qualifying for some sort of government assistance then a large windfall of cash could potentially disrupt those benefits since they now have too much money to qualify.

That can be a real headache to navigate, they may need to arrange all new care for themselves, maybe switch doctors, find new housing, etc. which may be a lot for them to manage depending on the extent of their disabilities, and unless that inheritance is incredibly large it will probably run out at some point and leave them in a position where they need to navigate the system to get back on those government benefits, which is often no small feat.

So there could potentially be situations where it's better for them to not leave them money and cause significant disruptions to their care and living arrangements.

This is all totally hypothetical without knowing the specifics of the situation. There's a million different things to consider here and everyone's situation is unique, and at best we're getting one side of this story and don't really know what the parents thoughts and reasoning are since we haven't heard in directly from them (and it could very well be that their reason is just as shitty as it appears on the surface, I won't discount that possibility)

Whatever the issue is, it clearly manifested long before the topic of inheritance came up

Yes it's ethical.

Family business : you want the steward to keep it going, maintain reputations, and support the family.

Large sums of money: look at lottery winners, many, many of them have really bad lives because they are not ready for the responsibility of managing it. If the child isn't ready for it....

There are options for children who arnt ready to inherit. Trusts, disbursements over time, annuities

It’s not ethical or unethical—but your framing makes it inherently from POV of some assholes, so it kinda renders the whole hypothetical moot.

People can allocate their assets as they please. Every situation is unique. In your situation, it sounds like the parents were narcissistic assholes with a disabled child.

I don't think that is OK and the parents I've known in situations like that would never have thought of it.

If you're cool with that kid killing themselves in your name then yeah.

Otherwise what the absolute fuck is wrong with you (not you, OP)? No. This 100% makes you a horrible human being who should have never procreated to begin with and you're a failure as a parent.

Maybe with better framing, but with the way you're explaining this (or maybe it's just that clear cut) the only realistic answer is "no".

If I may answer with an example. My sibling is very emotional and not as good as studying and has therefore received a decent amount of money for not only their entire education but also living expenses. Because I got a scholarship and work other jobs, I was on my own. I've always resented it as being punished for working harder.

IDK how I would handle it with my children because I want to give fair opportunities but from the child's perspective it is hard. Giving the same money would be best.

It being "ethical" and it being "okay" are two seperate things. Ethics is mostly subjective. Most people would say it is unethical though. It isn't illegal, you have the right to divide your assets as you wish, so that would make it "okay".

Differentiating based on mental illness and your perceived value of a person based on their mental health struggles is plain wrong and not based in reality, unless said person is at a point of needing a caretaker to get by. Especially since a bunch of illnesses are hereditary. Stuff like ADHD can manifest in different ways. My brother is both hyperactive and has attention deficit. I only have the attention deficit part. Both of us lead normal lives. Our parents dividing assets based on the fact that he has it worse on that front, and giving more to me, would be plain wrong and nonsensical. Especially since I'm absolutely shit with money, and he isn't.