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Simple English definitions for legal terms
apportionment
Read a random definition: judicial discretion
A quick definition of apportionment:
Apportionment is the act of dividing things fairly between different people or groups. This can include dividing money or expenses in a certain way, dividing seats in government based on population, or dividing the responsibility for paying taxes on an estate among the people who inherit it. It's important to make sure that things are apportioned fairly so that everyone gets what they deserve.
A more thorough explanation:
Definition: The act of dividing something into proportionate shares, such as rights, liabilities, or expenses, between two or more people or entities. It can also refer to the distribution of legislative seats among districts based on population.
- When a group of friends rent a vacation home, they may use appportionment to divide the cost of the rental and other expenses equally among all the participants.
- In tax law, appportionment can be used to allocate profits to a specific tax year or to attribute the use of a personal asset to a business.
- The allocation of congressional representatives among states based on population is an example of legislative appportionment.
- When a person dies and leaves an estate, the estate-tax liability may be divided among the beneficiaries according to the testator's instructions or by statute.
These examples illustrate how appportionment is used to divide something fairly and proportionally among different parties. It can be used in various contexts, such as sharing expenses, allocating profits or taxes, or distributing political representation.