Tax Law

Situating Tax Experimentation: A Response to Michael Abramowicz

Written by: Sarah B. Lawsky

Abstract In Tax Experimentation, Professor Michael Abramowicz proposes that the government employ “tax experiments.” In these experiments, a subgroup of taxpayers would be treated differently than other taxpayers, for purposes of the tax law, for some period of time. The behavior of the treatment group could give the government information about tax policies. After briefly […]

Taxation Without Immunization: Exercising the Federal Taxing Power to Increase Childhood Vaccination Rates

Nicholas R. Consalvo

Abstract This Note will discuss the need to exercise the taxing power of the federal government in an effort to restore immunization rates to their historically high levels. Recent spikes in unvaccinated children have resulted in global outbreaks of diseases that were near elimination. This Note’s solution to the growing anti-vaccination movement is the implementation […]

Tax Experimentation

Michael Abramowicz

Abstract Random experiments could allow the government to test tax policies before they are enacted into general law. Such experiments can be revenue-neutral, with the tax authority ensuring ex post that average tax revenues received from taxpayers in the treatment and control groups are equal. Taxpayers might thus volunteer even for experiments that would broaden […]

Cole Barnett & Chris Weeg, Intervention in the Tax Court and the Appellate Review of Tax Court Procedural Decisions

The Tax Court is an Article I court. It resolves more than 95% of all tax-related litigation—actually nearly 97% of the total federal tax docket in 2012. Despite this substantial role in federal litigation, scholars and courts have generally put aside the issue of what standard is appropriate when a U.S. federal court of appeals […]

Lily Kahng, The Taxation of Intellectual Capital

Intellectual capital—broadly defined to include nonphysical sources of value such as patents and copyrights, computer software, organizational processes, and know-how—has a long history of being undervalued and excluded from measures of economic productivity and wealth. In recent years, however, intellectual capital has finally gained wide recognition as a central driver of economic productivity and growth. […]

Cole Barnett, United States v. Woods and the Future of the Tax Blue Book as a Means of Penalty Avoidance and Statutory Interpretation

The Blue Book is a “General Explanation” of tax law prepared by the Joint Committee on Taxation, and is commonly relied upon by both taxpayers and the Internal Revenue Service (IRS). In United States v. Woods, the U.S. Supreme Court broadly disapproved of judicial deference to the Blue Book when courts are faced with such […]

Illuminating the Dark Matter of Intellectual Capital

Charlene D. Luke

Abstract Response to Lily Kahng, The Taxation of Intellectual Capital Professor Lily Kahng’s article, The Taxation of Intellectual Capital, highlights the distortion contained in the current tax rules governing capitalization. Her article emphasizes that U.S tax law systematically fails to require capitalization for self-created, high-value intangible assets. Professor Kahng’s contribution is to situate the problem in a […]

Comments on “Taxation of Intellectual Capital:” Better than Consumption-Tax Treatment?

Karen C. Burke

Abstract Response to Lily Kahng, The Taxation of Intellectual Capital In Taxation of Intellectual Capital, Professor Lily Kahng argues that U.S. tax law is fundamentally flawed because it allows businesses to “expense” investments in self-created intangibles. The article draws on research in related areas (knowledge management, financial accounting, and national accounting) that seeks to identify and […]

Shannon Weeks McCormack, Too Close to Home: Limiting the Organizations Subsidized by the Charitable Deduction to Those in Economic Need

63 Fla. L. Rev. 857 (2011)|  | | ARTICLE :: The charitable deduction allows taxpayers to deduct amounts donated to organizations pursuing statutorily designated purposes from their otherwise taxable income. By lowering the after-tax cost of giving and encouraging taxpayers to donate more than they otherwise would, the charitable deduction subsidizes a broad variety of organizations. […]

Kimon Korres, Bankrupting Bankruptcy: Circumventing Chapter 11 Protections Through Manipulation of the Business Justification Standard in § 363 Asset Sales, and a Refined Standard to Safeguard Against Abuse

63 Fla. L. Rev. 959 (2011)|  | | NOTE :: Of the twenty largest public company bankruptcy filings from 1980 to the present, seventeen have taken place since 2001, and ten of those seventeen were filed between March of 2007 and August of 2009. One such example is In re Chrysler LLC, in which Chrysler, on […]

Christopher H. Hanna, The Real Value of Tax Deferral

61 Fla. L. Rev. 203 (2009) | | | | ABSTRACT :: A leading law professor wrote a quarter-century ago that deferral of gain “is not as serious as outright exemption, but it is the next best thing.” Few tax law academics would disagree. But how important is tax deferral in the real world, particularly […]

Bradley T. Borden, The Like-Kind Exchange Equity Conundrum

60 Fla. L. Rev. 643 (2008) | | | | ABSTRACT :: The tax-free treatment of like-kind exchanges presents one of tax law’s most compelling equity conundrums. Tax law generally does not tax property holders on the property’s appreciation but does tax gain or loss recognized by property sellers and exchangers of non-like-kind property. In […]

William A. Drennan, The Patented Loophole: How Should Congress Respond to this Judicial Invention?

59 Fla. L. Rev. 229 (2007) | | | | INTRODUCTION :: An IRS spokesperson “questioned whether the [Patent Office] staff has adequate background in tax law . . . to properly rule on those patent applications [for tax strategies].” In response, a Patent Office spokesperson said, “The [Patent Office] has a long tradition of […]

Samantha K. Graff, State Taxation of Online Tobacco Sales: Circumventing the Archaic Bright Line Penned by Quill

58 Fla. L. Rev. 375 (2006) | | | | INTRODUCTION :: Over the past decade, the Internet has become an increasingly popular shopping destination for cigarette buyers. A 1997 survey identified thirteen online cigarette vendors, and today that number has multiplied to over 700. The online market for cigarettes thrives on the anonymity and […]

Daniel J. Glassman, "It's Not a Lie if You Believe it": Tax Shelters and the Economic Substance Doctrine

58 Fla. L. Rev. 665 (2006) | | | | INTRODUCTION :: In an episode of Seinfeld, Jerry was confronted with the requirement of taking a polygraph test after denying, to a woman police-officer whom he was dating, that he watched the television show Melrose Place. Deeply concerned about his pending polygraph examination, he turned […]

George K. Yin, Dunwody Distinguished Lecture in Law: Is the Tax System Beyond Reform?

58 Fla. L. Rev. 977 (2006) | | | | TEXT :: Immediately after the 1994 election gave the Republican Party control of the U.S. House of Representatives for the first time in forty years, Congressman Bill Archer (R-Tex.) held a press conference in the Committee on Ways and Means hearing room. Archer, who was […]

Michael J. Graetz, Taxes that Work: A Simple American Plan

58 Fla. L. Rev. 1043 (2006) | | | | INTRODUCTION :: In November 2005, the President’s Advisory Panel on Tax Reform, appointed by President Bush to suggest options for reforming and simplifying the federal tax code, unanimously recommended two alternative plans: a “simplified income tax” (SIT) and a “growth and investment tax” (GIT). The […]

John D. Colombo, In Search of Private Benefit

58 Fla. L. Rev. 1063 (2006) | | | | INTRODUCTION :: For at least the past two decades, the Internal Revenue Service (IRS) has relied heavily on the private benefit doctrine to police economic transactions between tax- exempt charities and for-profit entities. The doctrine has been used to regulate the size of the charitable […]

Bryan T. Camp, Tax Administration as Inquisitorial Process and the Partial Paradigm Shift in the IRS Restructuring and Reform Act of 1998

56 Fla. L. Rev. 1 (2004) | | | | INTRODUCTION :: The tax code is a puzzle. Whether one views it as an engaging enigma or a ridiculous riddle, the tax code requires careful and considered attention to fit the statutory pieces together to form a sensible picture. The procedural pieces of the puzzle, […]

Laurie Reynolds, Taxes, Fees, Assessments, Dues, And The "Get What You Pay for" Model of Local Government

56 Fla. L. Rev. 373 (2004) | | | | INTRODUCTION :: The economic gap between affluent suburbia and the central city has recently received widespread attention in the state and local government law literature. Articles by prominent scholars representing a broad range of doctrinal approaches have coalesced around a consensus that the current concentration […]