Taxation & Estate Planning

More on The Redemption Puzzle

Posted on September 07, 2010
Jeffrey M. Trinklein & David A. Siffert (both of Gibson Dunn, New York) respond to Reuven S. Avi-Yonah (Michigan), The Redemption Puzzle, 128 Tax Notes 853 (Aug. 23, 2010), in this week's Tax Notes (128 Tax Notes 1082 (Sept. 6, 2010)): In his article, Prof...

Law School Employment Data Under Fire

Posted on September 07, 2010
Following up on my prior posts: Did 16 Law Schools Commit Rankings Malpractice? (May 12, 2010) U.S. News Responds to TaxProf Blog Post by Preventing Law Schools From Gaming Employed at Graduation Data (May 21, 2010) In the September 2010 National Jurist issue: Employment Data Under Fire: U...

Colloquium on Jurisprudential Perspectives of Tax Law

Posted on September 07, 2010
The Grapperhause Colloquium on Jurisprudential Perspectives of Taxation Law kicks off today in Ferrara, Italy, convened by John Prebble (Victoria University of Wellington) and Marco Greggi (L?Universita? degli Studi di Ferrara): The colloquium will test the conveners? hypothesis that studying tax law with the tools of legal philosophy sheds light...

TaxProf Blog Holiday Weekend Roundup

Posted on September 07, 2010
Saturday: More on Rubin & Robertson, Bring Back the Estate Tax, Retroactive to Jan. 1 'Unemployed J.D.' Says She's Ended Her Hunger Strike After 24 Days The Inconsistent Application of the Tax Law to Professional Gamblers Sunday: Top 5 Tax Paper Downloads Resolving the Circuit Split Over the Application of...

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Why John Grisham Abandoned His Plans to be a Tax Lawyer

Posted on September 07, 2010
New York Times, Boxers, Briefs and Books, by John Grisham: I wasn't always a lawyer or a novelist, and I?ve had my share of hard, dead-end jobs. ... Halfway through college, and still drifting, I decided to become a high-powered tax lawyer. The plan was sailing along until I took...

NY Times: The End of Tenure?

Posted on September 07, 2010
New York Times Sunday Book Review, The End of Tenure?, by Christopher Shea: In tough economic times, it?s easy to gin up anger against elites. The bashing of bankers is already so robust that the economist William Easterly has compared it, with perhaps a touch of hyperbole, to genocidal racism...

A Bold Tax Plan: 'People Should Smoke and Drink More?

Posted on September 07, 2010
The Telegraph, 'People Should Smoke and Drink More?, Says Russian Finance Minister: Russia?s finance minister has told people to smoke and drink more, explaining that higher consumption would help lift tax revenues for spending on social services. Speaking as the Russian government announces plan to raise duty on alcohol and...

NY Times: Politization of Supreme Court Law Clerks

Posted on September 07, 2010
New York Times, Politization of Supreme Court Is Reflected in Justices Clerks, by Adam Liptak: Supreme Court justices generally hire clerks who have worked for federal appeals court judges. The conservative half of the court overwhelmingly hires clerks who served judges appointed by Republican presidents, while the liberal half of...

Borden: The Allure and Illusion of Partners? Interests in a Partnership

Posted on September 07, 2010
Bradley T. Borden (Brooklyn) has posted The Allure and Illusion of Partners? Interests in a Partnership, 79 U. Cin. L. Rev. ___ (2010), on SSRN. Here is the abstract: Favorable tax treatment and management flexibility make tax partnerships very popular...

NPR: Allowance Economics -- Candy, Taxes And Potty Training

Posted on September 06, 2010
NPR All Things Considered, Allowance Economics: Candy, Taxes And Potty Training, by Chana Joffe-Walt: Joshua Gans [an economics professor at the University of Melbourne in Australia] came up with a special incentive plan for candy. If [his daughter] B...

A Realization-Based Capital Gains Tax

Posted on September 06, 2010
Chye-Ching Huang & Craig Elliffe (both of the University of Auckland, Business School) have posted Is New Zealand Smarter than Other Countries or Simply Special? Reconsidering a Realization-Based Capital Gains Tax in Light of South Africa?s Experience on SSRN...

NY Times: Congressional 'Charities' Rake in Millions from Business

Posted on September 06, 2010
New York Times, Congressional Charities Pulling In Corporate Cash, by Eric Lipton: A review by The New York Times of federal tax records and House and Senate disclosure reports found at least two dozen charities that lawmakers or their families helped create or run that routinely accept donations from businesses...

Resolving the Circuit Split Over the Application of FICA Taxes to Early Retirement Payments to Tenured Faculty

Posted on September 05, 2010
S. Scott Wick (LL.M. 2011, Florida) has published Note, A Question of Purpose: Early Retirement Payments to Tenured Professors Constitute Wages Subject to FICA Taxation, 58 Clev. St. L. Rev. 217 (2010). Here is the Introduction: Currently, there is a circuit split on the issue of whether early retirement payments...

Risky Human Capital and Deferred Capital Income Taxation

Posted on September 05, 2010
Borys Grochulski (University of Minnesota, Department of Economics) & Tomasz Piskorski (Columbia Business School) have published Risky Human Capital and Deferred Capital Income Taxation, 145 J. Econ. Theory 908 (2010). Here is the abstract: We study the structure of optimal wedges and capital taxes in a dynamic Mirrlees economy with...

Top 5 Tax Paper Downloads

Posted on September 05, 2010
This week's list of the Top 5 Recent Tax Paper Downloads is the same as last week's list: 1. [1032 Downloads] Social Security Benefits Formula 101: A Practical Primer, by Francine J. Lipman (Chapman) & James E. Williamson (San Diego State University, College of Business Administration) 2...

More on Rubin & Robertson, Bring Back the Estate Tax, Retroactive to Jan. 1

Posted on September 04, 2010
Following up on Wednesday's post, Rubin & Robertson: Bring Back the Estate Tax, Retroactive to Jan. 1: 24/7 Wall Street, Don?t Believe The Nonsense About The Estate Tax Future of Capitalism, Rubin and Robertson on Estate Tax Future of Capitalism, More on Robertson, Rubin, and the Estate Tax Reuters, When...

'Unemployed J.D.' Says She's Ended Her Hunger Strike After 24 Days

Posted on September 04, 2010
Following up on my prior posts: Unemployed J.D. Begins Hunger Strike Aimed at 10 Law Schools (Aug. 6, 2010) More on 'Unemployed JD's' Hunger Strike (Aug. 9, 2010) 'Unemployed J.D.? Hunger Striker Reveals Identity in USA Today (Aug. 24, 2010) In a statement, Zenovia Evans announced that she ended the...

The Inconsistent Application of the Tax Law to Professional Gamblers

Posted on September 04, 2010
George Remennik (J.D. 2010, Cardozo) has published Note, Mrs. Tschetschot's Busted Hand, Poker, and Taxes: The Inconsistent Application of Tax Laws on a Game of Skill, 8 Cardozo Pub. L. Pol'y & Ethics J. 485 (2010). Here is part of the Introduction: Section 162(a) allows a deduction for ?all the...

Green Law School Rankings

Posted on September 03, 2010
The September 2010 National Jurist has published a list of the "greenist" law schools, based on curriculum, campus environment, and building trends, with additional weight "given to those schools with a strong green focus in their classes, faculty and other academic offerings, such as externships, legal journals and summer programs...

Tax Profs for the Ground Zero Mosque

Posted on September 03, 2010
Tax Prof George Yin (Virginia) asked that I post this letter: This is not a request to sign a joint letter. We thought, as a community, we could raise our voices instead by pledging financial support for the Islamic Center, a center modeled on and supported by the Jewish Community...

Ventry: Intuit?s Nine Lies Kill State E-Filing Programs

Posted on September 03, 2010
Dennis J. Ventry, Jr. (UC-Davis) has published Intuit?s Nine Lies Kill State E-Filing Programs and Keep ?Free? File Alive, 57 Tax Notes 555 (2010). Here is the abstract: Under the auspices of the Free File Alliance (FFA), Intuit, manufacturer of TurboTax, has been attacking state-run, free e-filing services for several...

The 97% Fallacy

Posted on September 03, 2010
Wall Street Journal op-ed, The 97% Fallacy, by Kevin A. Hassett & Alan D. Viard (both of the American Enterprise Institute): When Congress returns from its summer recess, members will face a pivotal decision about the expiring Bush tax cuts. President Barack Obama has called for their permanent extension for...

Striking Graphic on Student Loans

Posted on September 03, 2010
Here. (Hat Tip: Above the Law.)

AMA Opposes Trial Lawyer Tax Break

Posted on September 03, 2010
Following up on my prior post, $1.6b Tax Break for Trial Lawyers: the AMA on Wednesday sent this letter (press release here) to the Treasury Department opposing pending legilsation in Congress that would permit plaintiffs' lawyers to immediately deduct loans to clients to cover litigation expenses (rather than at the...

Questions Raised About Tax-Exempt Status for Ground Zero Imam Wife's Apartment

Posted on September 03, 2010
Washington Examiner, New York Imam?s Nonexistent Mosque: Feisal Abdul Rauf, the New York imam and State Department envoy who wants to build a controversial new mosque at Ground Zero, applied for ? and received ? tax-exempt status from the IRS in 1998 for another mosque about 10 blocks from the...

SOI Releases Summer 2010 SOI Bulletin

Posted on September 02, 2010
The IRS's Statistics of Income Division yesterday released the Summer 2010 SOI Bulletin (Vol. 30, No. 1) with these four articles: Sole Proprietorship Returns, 2008, by Adrian Dungan Foreign-Controlled Domestic Corporations, 2007, by James R. Hobbs Corporate Foreign Tax Credit, 2006, by Nuria E...

Marty Ginsburg's Last Speech

Posted on September 02, 2010
Law Week Colorado, Justice Ginsburg Reads Late Husband?s Funny, Heart-Warming Speech: Martin Ginsburg?s speech recounted how an obscure 10th Circuit tax case, which the Ginsburgs handled pro bono, led to a Supreme Court appearance for his wife and to a host of other gender-discrimination cases...

UNH Hosts Intellectual Property Tax Challenge

Posted on September 02, 2010
The University of New Hampshire School of Law (formerly the Franklin Pierce Law Center) is hosting its first Intellectual Property Tax Challenge: The tax challenges associated with intellectual property have become increasingly complex as intellectual property has become more important to business worldwide...

Kahng: Investment Income Withholding in the U.S. and Germany

Posted on September 02, 2010
Lily Kahng (Seattle) has published Investment Income Withholding in the United States and Germany, 10 Fla. Tax Rev. 315 (2010). Here is the abstract: In a reversal from its historical roots, the United States income tax system now taxes income from labor significantly more heavily than income from capital...

Al Sharpton Channels Rod Blagojevich

Posted on September 02, 2010
Rod Blagojevich: President Obama's senate seat ?is a f?-ing valuable thing, you just don?t give it away for nothing,? Al Sharpton: On the anniversary of Martin Luther King's I Have a Dream speech: "This is our day and we ain't giving it away."

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