Taxation & Estate Planning

Aprill Presents Tax Patents Today at San Diego

Posted on February 12, 2010
Ellen P. Aprill (Loyola-L.A.) presents Tax Patents in the IRS, Congress, and the Court at San Diego today as part of its Tax Law Speaker Series. Ellen, one of the nation's leading authority on tax strategy patents, will discuss the current state of affairs, pending the Supreme Court's decision in...

Alabama Prof Kills Three at Faculty Meeting After Being Denied Tenure

Posted on February 12, 2010
Amy Bishop, a biology professor at the University of Alabama-Huntsville, allegedly shot and killed two biology professors and a staff person during a faculty meeting this afternoon in which she learned she was denied tenure. New York Times Reuters Wall Street Journal (Hat Tip: Woody McNair...

Snow Won't Stop IRS

Posted on February 11, 2010
Wall Street Journal, Severe Weather Won't Stall US Taxpayer Services, IRS Says, by Martin Vaughan: The IRS says its ability to process tax returns and pay refunds in a timely manner will not be hampered by back-to-back snowstorms that crippled Washington and much of the U...

Tony Infanti Wins Chancellor?s Teaching Award

Posted on February 11, 2010
Tax Prof Anthony Infanti has reveived a 2010 Chancellor?s Distinguished Teaching Award from the University of Pittsburgh: In making the award, the selection committee noted his innovation in developing teaching methods appropriate to different course contexts and aligned with the professional goals of his students, as well as his significant...

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Obama's Budget Would Redistribute $112 Billion From Top 1% of Taxpayers

Posted on February 11, 2010
Tax Foundation, Obama Budget Would Increase Income Redistribution from Top 1% of Taxpayers by $112 Billion: True to his campaign promise to "spread the wealth around," President Obama's recently released budget targets high-income earners for income redistribution to low- and middle-income families, according to a new Tax Foundation report...

More on Law School Tenure

Posted on February 11, 2010
Following up on my recent posts: Ohio State President: It's Time to Rethink Tenure (Feb. 6, 2010) WSJ: Are Law Professors Just Plain Lazy? (Feb. 4, 2010) Check out yesterday's posts: Wall Street Journal Law Blog, Is The Law School Tenure System Forever With Us? PrawfsBlawg, Michael Olivas on the...

Taxation of Contingency Fees After Banks and Banaitis

Posted on February 11, 2010
Katherine D. Black (Southern Utah University), Stephen T. Black (Franklin Pierce) & Michael D. Black (Parr Waddoups Brown Gee & Loveless, Salt Lake City) have posted Taxation of Contingency Fees After Banks and Banaitis, 125 Tax Notes 983 (Nov. 30, 2009), on SSRN...

CTJ: Obama's Budget Should Raise Taxes More

Posted on February 11, 2010
Citizens for Tax Justice has released President Obama?s Fiscal Year 2011 Budget: Federal Government Should Collect at Least as Much Revenue as Obama Proposes: On February 1, President Obama submitted to Congress his proposed federal budget for fiscal year 2011...

Slemrod & Traxler: Optimal Observability in a Linear Income Tax

Posted on February 11, 2010
Joel Slemrod (University of Michigan, Ross School of Business) & Christian Traxler (Max Planck Society for the Advancement of the Sciences) have posted Optimal Observability in a Linear Income Tax on SSRN. Here is the abstract: We study the optimal observability of the tax base within the standard linear income...

The Office -- IRS Edition

Posted on February 11, 2010
Tax fans of NBC's The Office will be happy to learn that the writer (Brent Forrester) is working on a new workplace comedy show for Fox set in an IRS district office. The show is being produced by Ron Howard and will star David Krumholtz (of CBS's Numb3rs) as Spencer,...

President Obama Calls for 'Restoring Balance to the Tax Code'

Posted on February 11, 2010
The White House today released the 458-page 2010 Economic Report of the President, which includes a 4-page section on Restoring Balance to the Tax Code: The second major step the Administration is taking to address the long-run fiscal challenge is restoring balance to the tax code that has been lost...

Kysar Presents Lasting Legislation Today at UCLA

Posted on February 11, 2010
Rebecca Kysar (Brooklyn) presents Lasting Legislation at UCLA today as part of its Tax Policy and Public Finance Colloquium Series. Here is the abstract: This Article argues that, due to certain failings and pathologies of the legislative process, legislation enacted with sunset provisions lacks benefits hailed in recent scholarship, while...

Walker Presents Business Deductions in a Net Income Tax Today at NYU

Posted on February 11, 2010
David I. Walker (Boston University) presents Suitable for Framing: Business Deductions in a Net Income Tax System at NYU today as part of its Colloquium Series on Tax Policy and Public Finance. The co-convenors of the colloquium are Daniel Shaviro (NYU) & Mihir Desai (Harvard Business School)...

ABA to Study Law School and Law Firm Rankings

Posted on February 10, 2010
ABA Journal, ABA to Study How Law Firms & Schools Are Ranked: The ABA will study how a variety of organizations rank law firms and law schools. The debate in the ABA?s House of Delegates about the measure proved to be the most contentious of any resolution it considered today...

8th Cir.: § 162(k) Precludes Deduction for ESOP Distributions

Posted on February 10, 2010
The Eighth Circuit yesterday joined the Tax Court (131 T.C. 29 (2008)) in holding that § 162(k) precludes a company from deducting $9.4 million in cash distribution dividends paid on the redemption of stock held in an ESOP. Nestle Purina Petcare Co. v...

CBO: Policy Options to Boost Employment

Posted on February 10, 2010
The Congressional Budget Office yesterday released Policies for Increasing Economic Growth and Employment in the Short Term: This testimony summarizes the outlook for the labor market and assesses the potential impact that a variety of policy options would have on economic growth and employment...

DOJ Fights for Dow Chemical-Deloitte Tax Work Papers in D.C. Circuit

Posted on February 10, 2010
The Blog of Legal Times, DOJ Continues Fight for Deloitte Records on Appeal in D.C.: The Justice Department wants to convince a federal appeals court in Washington that the accounting firm Deloitte should be forced to give up tax documents stemming from auditing services provided to Dow Chemical Company...

My Last Snowman?

Posted on February 10, 2010
With my son off to college and my daughter winding down her senior year of high school, yesterday's snowstorm may have marked my last snowman:

Friedman Presents Adjustment Costs, Firm Responses, and Labor Supply Elasticities Today at Penn

Posted on February 10, 2010
John Friedman (Harvard University, Kennedy School of Government) presents Adjustment Costs, Firm Responses, and Labor Supply Elasticities: Evidence from Danish Tax Records (with Raj Chetty (Harvard University, Kennedy School of Government), Tore Olsen (Harvard University, Kennedy School of Government) & Luigi Pistaferri (Stanford University, Department of Economics)) at Pennsylvania today...

Yale Beats Harvard (in Tax-Exempt Rate)

Posted on February 10, 2010
Bloomberg, Yale Beats Harvard in 15-Year Bond Sales on Connecticut Demand: Yale University, the top-rated Ivy League school founded in 1701, won lower 15-year tax-exempt yields than Harvard University, also ranked AAA, thanks in part to demand from its home state of Connecticut...

Walker: The Dearth of Discounted Employee Stock Options

Posted on February 10, 2010
David I. Walker (Boston University) has published The Non-Option: Understanding the Dearth of Discounted Employee Stock Options, 89 B.U. L. Rev. 1505 (2009). Here is the abstract: U.S. companies are highly sensitive to the tax and accounting treatment of compensation arrangements...

Law Firms Balk at NALP's Proposed January Kick-Off Day for 2L Recruiting

Posted on February 10, 2010
Following up on my prior post, NALP Proposes January Kick-Off Day for 2L Summer Associate Offers: New York Law Journal, Large Firms Balk at Plans to Revamp Law School Recruiting Process: A proposal to revamp the law school campus recruiting process is being met with resistance among some of the...

Dagan: The Childcare Deduction in the U.S., Canada, and Israel

Posted on February 10, 2010
Tsilly Dagan (Bar-Ilan University, Israel) has posted Ordinary People, Necessary Choices: A Comparative Study of Childcare Expenses on SSRN. Here is the abstract: This Article uses comparative analysis of the issue of childcare deductions in the U.S., Canada and Israel in order to expose the non-technical nature of the business-personal...

Rahm Emanuel Apologizes

Posted on February 10, 2010

Obama's Budget 'Cheats' (by $98 Billion) in Reporting Cost of Child Tax Credit & EITC Expansion

Posted on February 09, 2010
The Committee for a Responsible Federal Budget: A few months ago, we pointed out that the Administration was cheating in its Mid-Session Review budget baseline. Essentially it was taking policies which President Obama had signed into law as temporary, under the stimulus bill, and assuming them as permanent...

New Issue of Journal of Taxation of Investments

Posted on February 09, 2010
The Journal of Taxation of Investments has published its Winter 2010 issue (Vol. 27, No. 2), with these articles: Ari J. Brandes, Financial and Tax Arbitrage in the Commercial Paper Market, 27 J. Tax'n Inv. 3 (2010) Michael Orchowski, Recent IRS Guidance on Modifications of Commercial Mortgages Held by Real...

Ring: Who Is Making International Tax Policy?

Posted on February 09, 2010
Diane M. Ring (Boston College) has posted Who Is Making International Tax Policy? International Organizations as Power Players in a High Stakes World, 33 Fordham Int'l L.J. ___ (2010), on SSRN. Here is the abstract: Who makes international tax policy in today?s world? Certainly no single body possesses that power...

Dependent Care Tax Benefits and Tax Ethics

Posted on February 09, 2010
Sheldon R. Smith, Lynn R. Smith & Katherine D. Black (all of Utah Valley University) have posted Dependent Care Tax Benefits: Ethical Issues in Taxation, 10 J. Accounting, Ethics & Pub. Pol'y 1 (2010), on SSRN. Here is the abstract: This paper, expanding on prior work, illustrates how some taxpayers...

Dennis Rodman and the Basic Tax Class

Posted on February 09, 2010
Yesterday in the basic tax class here at Cincinnati, I taught §104(a)(2) (and the wonders of the Murphy case). This film clip of former Piston bad boy Dennis Rodman kicking a courtside photographer sparked a good discussion of the tax treatment of the photographer's damage recovery in Amos v...

Fleischer Presents Regulatory Arbitrage Today at Toronto

Posted on February 09, 2010
Victor Fleischer (Colorado) presents Regulatory Arbitrage at the University of Toronto today as part of the James Hausman Tax Law and Policy Workshop Series. Here is the abstract: Most of us share a vague intuition that the rich, sophisticated, well-advised, and politically connected somehow game the system to avoid regulatory...

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