Tax Law Commons^™

Improving Tax Rules By Means-Testing: Bridging Wealth Inequality And "Ability To Pay", James M. Puckett

James Puckett

The federal income tax can and should do more to address wealth disparities and income inequality. The income tax does not directly count wealth, and the realization rule and basis "step-up" at death exclude substantial amounts of income for the wealthy. The Constitution limits Congress's ability to tax wealth. Despite these serious challenges, this Article considers how to potentially bridge the gap between wealth and the income tax. For example, asset-based phase-outs in the income tax should pass muster without apportionment, although their bite would necessarily be limited. The Article posits that the public would be more receptive to phase-outs …

Basic Federal And State Tax Relevant To Estate Planning, Samuel Donaldson, Karen Boxx

Samuel A. Donaldson

No abstract provided.

2010 Federal Tax Update, Samuel Donaldson

Samuel A. Donaldson

This update explains several developments in the substantive federal income, estate and gift tax laws affecting individual taxpayers and small businesses. It contains summaries of significant cases, rulings, regulations, legislation and other matters from August, 2009, through September, 2010. This update generally does not discuss developments in the areas of qualified plans or the taxation of business entities (except to a very limited extent).

2008 Federal Tax Update, Samuel Donaldson

Samuel A. Donaldson

This update explains several developments in the substantive federal income, estate and gift tax laws affecting individual taxpayers and small businesses. It contains summaries of significant cases, rulings, regulations, legislation and other matters from August, 2007, through August, 2008. This update generally does not discuss developments in the areas of qualified plans or the taxation of business entities (except to a very limited extent).

2009 Federal Tax Update, Samuel Donaldson

Samuel A. Donaldson

This paper examines significant developments in the federal income, gift, and estate taxation of individuals and small businesses from August, 2008, through August, 2009. It covers important cases, rulings, regulations, and legislation during this period. This paper generally does not address developments in the areas of qualified plans or the taxation of C corporations (except to limited extents).

Recent Developments - 2013, Samuel Donaldson

Samuel A. Donaldson

three of the nation’s foremost estate planning experts, will guide you through the most significant legislative, regulatory and case law developments of 2013

2006 Federal Tax Update, Samuel Donaldson

Samuel A. Donaldson

This update explains several developments in the federal income, estate and gift taxes affecting individual taxpayers and small businesses. It contains summaries of significant cases, rulings, regulations, legislation and other matters from August, 2005, through September, 2006. This update generally does not discuss developments in the areas of qualified plans or the taxation of business entities (except to very limited extents).

Recent Developments - 2012, Samuel Donaldson

Samuel A. Donaldson

three of the nation’s foremost estate planning experts, will guide you through the most significant legislative, regulatory and case law developments of 2012

2011 Federal Tax Update, Samuel Donaldson

Samuel A. Donaldson

This update explains several developments in the substantive federal income, estate and gift tax laws affecting individual taxpayers and small businesses. It contains summaries of significant cases, rulings, regulations, legislation and other matters from August, 2010, through August, 2011. This update generally does not discuss developments in the areas of qualified plans or the taxation of business entities (except to a very limited extent).

Recent Developments - 2014, Samuel Donaldson

Samuel A. Donaldson

three of the nation’s foremost estate planning experts, will guide you through the most significant legislative, regulatory and case law developments of 2014\

Questioning The Wisdom Of Patent Protection For Tax Planning, Brant J. Hellwig

Brant J. Hellwig

The topic of federal patent protection for tax planning strategies has received considerable recent attention, much of it from a tax bar whose overall incredulity concerning the patentability of tax advice has been transformed into anxiety and disgust by the prospect of infringement actions. In their article Patents, Tax Shelters, and the Firm, Dan Burk and Brett McDonnell approach the subject from a broader perspective by employing theory of the firm principles to evaluate the effects of stronger intellectual property protection in the tax planning arena. While conceding that the possible effects are complex and ambiguous, the authors predict that …

A Proposal For Integrating The Income And Transfer Taxation Of Trusts, Robert T. Danforth

Robert T. Danforth

Present law fails to integrate the income and transfer (i.e., estate and gift) taxation of trusts; a gratuitous transfer to a trust may be incomplete for income tax purposes (producing a so-called grantor trust, the income of which is taxed to the grantor), but complete for transfer tax purposes. Grantors create trusts that exploit two features of this tax law dichotomy: the grantor's income tax payments on trust income enhance the value of the trust by allowing it to appreciate in value income tax free; and present law provides no basis for subjecting this enhanced value to gift or estate …

A Comment On Unification, Grayson M.P. Mccouch

Grayson McCouch

This Article discusses recent proposals aimed at unifying the law of wills and nonprobate transfers. The author notes that default rules of construction present the strongest case for unification, but contends that distinctions between wills and nonprobate transfers remain important in the areas of formalities and restrictions affecting third-party rights. The author concludes that the policy goal should be to allow wills and nonprobate transfers to operate smoothly as complementary methods of deathtime wealth transmission.

The Moving Target Of Tax Reform, Karen C. Burke, Grayson M.P. Mccouch

Grayson McCouch

In 2000, Professor William Turnier proposed a package of three reforms to make the estate tax more “equitable” and “taxpayerfriendly.” All of his proposals—allowing a surviving spouse to inherit a deceased spouse’s unused exemption, replacing the state death tax credit with a deduction, and indexing the exemption for inflation—were eventually enacted. Today, the estate tax remains on the books, but changes in rates and exemptions have severely curtailed its role in the larger federal tax system. Income tax rate reductions for capital gains and dividends have further lightened the tax burden on capital income, and international pressure to reduce the …

The Moving Target Of Tax Reform, Karen C. Burke, Grayson M.P. Mccouch

Karen Burke

In 2000, Professor William Turnier proposed a package of three reforms to make the estate tax more “equitable” and “taxpayerfriendly.” All of his proposals—allowing a surviving spouse to inherit a deceased spouse’s unused exemption, replacing the state death tax credit with a deduction, and indexing the exemption for inflation—were eventually enacted. Today, the estate tax remains on the books, but changes in rates and exemptions have severely curtailed its role in the larger federal tax system. Income tax rate reductions for capital gains and dividends have further lightened the tax burden on capital income, and international pressure to reduce the …

The Taxation Of Cause-Related Marketing, Terri Lynn Helge

Terri L. Helge

With the economy in turmoil, charitable organizations are looking to nontraditional sources of financing to supplement contributions and fee-based revenues. One potentially lucrative source of revenue stems from cause-related marketing. Cause-related marketing is the public association of a for-profit company with a charitable organization to promote the company’s product or service in order to raise money for the charitable organization. Introduced almost twenty-five years ago, cause-related marketing has now become a $1 billion a year industry. Cause-related marketing has evolved beyond mere use of a charitable organization’s name to an apparent union for the purpose of promoting products that carry …

The Matthew Effect And Federal Taxation, Martin J. Mcmahon Jr.

Martin J. McMahon

The “Matthew Effect” is a synonym for the well-known colloquialism, “the rich get richer and the poor get poorer.” This Article is about the Matthew Effect in the distribution of incomes in the United States and the failure of the federal tax system to address the problem. There has been a strong Matthew Effect in incomes in the United States over the past few decades, with an increasing concentration of income and wealth in the top one percent. Nevertheless, there has been a continuing trend of enacting disproportionately large tax cuts for those at the top of the income pyramid. …

Family Limited Partnerships: Discounts, Options, And Disappearing Value, Karen C. Burke, Grayson M.P. Mccouch

Karen Burke

Family partnerships have been become increasingly popular as a means of avoiding estate and gift taxes. As other estate freezing techniques have been closed off by statutory anti-abuse rules, estate planners have increasingly resorted to partnerships as a vehicle for transferring assets within a family at deeply discounted values. Discounts ranging from one-third to over one-half of the value of the underlying assets are routinely claimed, and often allowed, based on lack of marketability and lack of control, even where these disabilities have no lasting or ascertainable economic effect. Nevertheless, the use of family partnerships to suppress value for transfer …

Family Limited Partnerships: Discounts, Options, And Disappearing Value, Karen C. Burke, Grayson M.P. Mccouch

Grayson McCouch

Family partnerships have been become increasingly popular as a means of avoiding estate and gift taxes. As other estate freezing techniques have been closed off by statutory anti-abuse rules, estate planners have increasingly resorted to partnerships as a vehicle for transferring assets within a family at deeply discounted values. Discounts ranging from one-third to over one-half of the value of the underlying assets are routinely claimed, and often allowed, based on lack of marketability and lack of control, even where these disabilities have no lasting or ascertainable economic effect. Nevertheless, the use of family partnerships to suppress value for transfer …

What's Wrong With A Federal Inheritance Tax?, Wendy Gerzog

Wendy Gerzog

Scholars have proposed a federal inheritance tax as an alternative to the current federal transfer tax system, but there are serious flaws with that idea. Those problems include: (1) different tax rates and exemptions based on the decedent’s relationship to the beneficiary; (2) the lack of a tax on lifetime gratuitous transfers, including gifts with retained interests or control; (3) the persistence of most current valuation distortion abuses; and (4) significantly decreased compliance rates and increased administrative costs inherent in a system that taxes transferees on transactions that may be largely unmonitored.

This article reviews common characteristics of existing inheritance …

Occupy The Tax Code: Using The Estate Tax To Reduce Inequality And Spur Economic Growth, James R. Repetti, Paul L. Caron

James R. Repetti

Inequality has been increasing in the United States. We should care about this increase because inequality contributes to a variety of adverse social consequences that persist across generations. There is also substantial empirical evidence that inequality has a long-term negative impact on economic growth. For many decades, federal tax policy has played an important role in reducing inequality, although the impact of federal taxes on inequality has waxed and waned depending on the focus of elected officials. We argue that the estate tax is a particularly apt vehicle to reduce inequality because inheritances are a major source of wealth among …

Occupy The Tax Code: Using The Estate Tax To Reduce Inequality And Spur Economic Growth, James R. Repetti, Paul L. Caron

James R. Repetti

Inequality has been increasing in the United States. We should care about this increase because inequality contributes to a variety of adverse social consequences that persist across generations. There is also substantial empirical evidence that inequality has a long-term negative impact on economic growth. For many decades, federal tax policy has played an important role in reducing inequality, although the impact of federal taxes on inequality has waxed and waned depending on the focus of elected officials. We argue that the estate tax is a particularly apt vehicle to reduce inequality because inheritances are a major source of wealth among …

Occupy The Tax Code: Using The Estate Tax To Reduce Inequality And Spur Economic Growth, James R. Repetti, Paul L. Caron

James R. Repetti

Inequality has been increasing in the United States. We should care about this increase because inequality contributes to a variety of adverse social consequences that persist across generations. There is also substantial empirical evidence that inequality has a long-term negative impact on economic growth. For many decades, federal tax policy has played an important role in reducing inequality, although the impact of federal taxes on inequality has waxed and waned depending on the focus of elected officials. We argue that the estate tax is a particularly apt vehicle to reduce inequality because inheritances are a major source of wealth among …

Occupy The Tax Code: Using The Estate Tax To Reduce Inequality And Spur Economic Growth, James R. Repetti, Paul L. Caron

James R. Repetti

The Theory And Practice Of Modern Taxation, By William R. Green, Robert Brown

Dr Robert Brown

No abstract provided.

U.S. Taxes Corporate Income At Comparatively Low Rate, Andrew Pike

Andrew Pike

This article asserts that the United States does not subject corporate profits to a relatively high nominal rate of taxation. In support of this assertion, the article analyzes the VAT, and concludes that the VAT incorporates a tax on corporate profits. The portion of the VAT that taxes corporate profit is comparable to, and at least as burdensome as, the current U.S. corporate income tax. The article concludes that the accepted wisdom that the United States imposes an exceptionally high nominal rate of tax (compared to the nominal rates of taxation imposed in other OECD countries) on corporate profits is …

E-Vat: An Electronically Collected Progressive Consumption Tax, Daniel S. Goldberg

Daniel S. Goldberg

This report proposes replacing the income tax with an electronic, progressive consumption tax that couples a credit-method VAT (modified for wages) with a progressive wage tax. I have called this proposal e-VAT (a convenient contraction for an electronic value added tax), because it is based on a business-level-credit VAT and can be collected automatically and electronically at the point of sale. The essential advantage of e-VAT over the Hall-Rabushka flat tax is that e-VAT’s use of a credit VAT as its foundation facilitates automatic and electronic collection of the tax. A credit VAT lends itself to electronic monitoring and auditing …

Lifetime Gifts - A Quantitative Approach, Roger A. Pies, Daniel S. Goldberg

Daniel S. Goldberg

No abstract provided.

Investing Trust Assets: Prudence Redefined, Mark R. Gillett

Mark R Gillett

No abstract provided.

Internet: Taxar Ou Não Taxar?, Ivo T. Gico

Ivo Teixeira Gico Jr.

O artigo demonstra a opinião do autor acerca de manifestações sobre tributação da internet, sustentando o potencial nocivo à democratização da informação. The article demonstrates the author's opinion about taxing the Internet and its potential harm to the democratization of information.