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Tax Law Commons

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Law and Politics

SelectedWorks

2015

Taxation

Articles 1 - 2 of 2

Full-Text Articles in Tax Law

Crafting A Constitutional Marijuana Tax, Nima H. Mohebbi Feb 2015

Crafting A Constitutional Marijuana Tax, Nima H. Mohebbi

Nima H. Mohebbi

Marijuana legalization and decriminalization have become important policy issues. Twenty-three states have partially legalized marijuana (generally for medicinal purposes), and four – Alaska, Colorado, Oregon, and Washington – have legalized it for general adult recreational use. Given the likely hyper-growth of the cannabis market due to widespread legalization, states might enjoy budgetary windfalls from collecting marijuana taxes. Marijuana, however, remains a federally controlled substance, the sale or use of which is subject to substantial penalties. For the states, this presents a potential problem in collecting marijuana excise taxes. If an individual user in a state where marijuana is legal pays …


Lessons In Fiscal Activism, Mirit Eyal-Cohen Feb 2015

Lessons In Fiscal Activism, Mirit Eyal-Cohen

Mirit Eyal-Cohen

This article highlights an anomaly. It shows that two tax rules aimed to achieve a similar goal were introduced at the same time. Both meant to be temporary and bring economic stimuli but received a dramatically different treatment. The economically inferior rule survived while its superior counterpart did not. The article reviews the reasons for this paradox. It shows that the causes are both political and an agency problem. The article not only enriches an important and ongoing debate that has received much attention in recent years, but also provides important lessons to policymakers.