Tax Law Commons^™

Tax Coordination, Blaine G. Saito

Georgia State University Law Review

The United States implements much of its social policy through its income tax laws. The Code is rife with tax expenditures for education, housing, community economic development, retirement savings, and health care to name a few. But the IRS is not an agency with expertise in any of these areas and developing such expertise would draw resources away from its core tax administration mission. Commentators have thus called for a series of changes from turning these tax expenditures into outlays for these programs to divesting the IRS/Treasury of most of the administration of social policy tax expenditures. Yet, given American …

Sb 6: The Review, Creation, And Extension Of Georgia Tax Credits And Deductions, Richard Hardeman, Aidan Zafar

Georgia State University Law Review

The Act provides for the review of tax credits and deductions while extending or creating various tax credits and deductions. First, the Act allows certain government officials to request a review of up to five tax credits or deductions per year to evaluate their economic efficiency. Second, the Act creates or extends tax credits and deductions for medical and pharmaceutical manufacturers, high-impact aerospace defense projects, short-line railroads, ticket sales for fine arts performances, rehabilitation of historic structures, yacht maintenance, and projects of regional significance.

The Irs’S Voluntary Disclosure Program: Need For Codification, Jay A. Soled

Georgia State University Law Review

For more than a century, the Internal Revenue Service (IRS) has had a voluntary disclosure program in place. Its purpose is to coax into tax compliance those wayward taxpayers who have committed criminal acts or have been remiss in fulfilling their civic tax-filing obligations. Historically, the voluntary disclosure program has had to strike a difficult balance between being attractive enough to entice tax scofflaws to participate and not being too attractive lest ordinary taxpayers feel that their compliance efforts were for naught.

A unique feature of the voluntary disclosure program is that it is entirely administrative in origin. The commissioner …

Borrowing From Millennials To Pay Boomers: Can Tax Policy Create Sustainable Intergenerational Equity?, Jonathan B. Forman, Roberta F. Mann

Georgia State University Law Review

At the outset, Part I of the Article provides an overview of sustainable intergenerational justice and tax policy. Part II then provides an overview of the U.S. tax system, deficits, and public debt. Part III then considers how taxes can influence the level of resources that are available to future generations, and Part IV considers how taxes can influence the mix of resources that are available to future generations.

Bearing Hospital Tax Breaks: How Non-Profits Benefit From Your Surprise Medical Bills, Taylor N. Armstrong

Georgia State University Law Review

This Note addresses the growing issue of surprise medical bills and how the United States Tax Code can be used to prevent many patients from receiving these bills. Part I provides a background on surprise billing and market factors that have led to an increase in the bills as well as current legislative solutions to the problem. Part II analyzes the role that hospitals play in the insurance market, the current standards for nonprofit hospitals to receive tax exemption under Internal Revenue Code (IRC) § 501, and how these legal standards fall short of accomplishing the goals of the tax …

Hb 61 - Revenue And Taxation, Taylor N. Armstrong, Caitlin E. Correa

Georgia State University Law Review

The Act amends Georgia’s sales tax statute to shift the burden for the collection of sales taxes on online sales from the purchaser to the retailer.

Tax Compliance In A Decentralizing Economy, Manoj Viswanathan

Georgia State University Law Review

Tax compliance in the United States has long relied on information from centralized intermediaries—the financial institutions,employers, and brokers that help ensure income is reported and taxes are paid. Yet while the IRS remains tied to these centralized entities,consumers and businesses are not. New technologies, such as sharing economy platforms (companies such as Airbnb, Uber, and Instacart)and the blockchain (the platform on which various cryptocurrencies are based) are providing new, decentralized options for exchanging goods and services.

Without legislative and agency intervention, these technologies pose a critical threat to the reporting system underlying domestic and international tax compliance. Until now, legal …

How Special Is The Special Timing Rule? Analyzing The Timing Of Fica Taxation In Nonqualified Deferred Compensation Plans, Alan J. Ponce

Georgia State University Law Review

Many employers offer nonqualified deferred compensation plans as a benefit to select employees, and those plans allow the employees to prepare for retirement in a tax-efficient manner. For employers,designing and administering such plans in compliance with federal law represents a paramount concern in order to achieve the tax advantages such plans entail. However, for these employers, there remains an inherent ambiguity in the tax code regarding how and when employers should withhold Federal Insurance Contribution Act (FICA) taxes—that is, Social Security and Medicare taxes—on deferred compensation in nonqualified retirement plans.

Tax regulations provide two distinct methods for withholding FICA taxes …

Taxing Marijuana: Earmarking Tax Revenue From Legalized Marijuana, Armikka R. Bryant

Georgia State University Law Review

This Article provides an overview of the legal, political, and societal landscapes in states that have legalized marijuana and imposed taxes on its sale. The article begins by summarizing the War on Drugs’ origins, its fiscal expenditures, and the social policies that ultimately led to its failure.

Part I briefly details the history of marijuana regulation starting from the early twentieth century up to the Obama administration’s decision to permit recreational marijuana laws to stand in Washington state and Colorado. Part II dives deeper into the social costs of the War on Drugs and outlines the hardships faced by those …

The Estate Planner's Income Tax Playbook, Samuel A. Donaldson

Faculty Publications By Year

No abstract provided.

A Market For Tax Compliance, W Edward Afield

Faculty Publications By Year

It is becoming increasingly clear that, due to political realities and budgetary constraints, the IRS is going to have to attempt to enforce the tax laws by doing more with less. Current enforcement efforts have yielded a tax gap (i.e., the difference between the amount of taxes that should be paid and the amount that are collected) of roughly $450 billion annually. Faced with this task, one of the steps that the IRS has recently taken is to try to improve the quality in services performed by paid tax preparers, a group that historically has been subject to little IRS …

Contributor, Cassady V. Brewer

Faculty Publications By Year

No abstract provided.

Pro & Con: Should Congress Adopt A New Tax Credit For Buying A Home? Yes: No Recovery Is Possible If Homeowners Lose Their Homes, Jessica D. Gabel

Faculty Publications By Year

No abstract provided.

A Proposal For An Elective Tax Benefits Transfer System, Ronald W. Blasi

Faculty Publications By Year

This article proposes an elective tax benefit transfer system to be available to lessors of property they use in their trade or business. It describes why the current linkage of tax benefits to property ownership is economically inefficient, causing it to have several significant disadvantages to the parties and to the economy, as a whole. The article discusses how the current system reduces a firm’s cash flow and reported earnings, diminishes the intended effect of tax incentive legislation, distorts competition and decision making, and inhibits investment in efficient business assets. It is submitted that the proposed system corrects all of …

Agency Activism As A New Way Of Life: Administrative Modification Of The Internal Revenue Code Through Limited Issue Focused Examinations, W Edward Afield

Faculty Publications By Year

In the name of increasing efficiency and better utilizing limited resources, the IRS has begun to adopt audit policies that overly favor taxpayers and greatly hinder the IRS’s ability to perform thorough audits. Highlighting this trend is a relatively new audit technique used by the Large to Mid-Size Business Division (LMSB), known as the Limited Issue Focused Examination (LIFE) Process. Under LIFE, the LMSB has attempted to involve taxpayers in the audit process by sharing responsibility for timely completion of the audit and has attempted to streamline the audit by reducing the scope of issues examined and applying materiality thresholds …

The Easy Case Against Tax Simplification, Samuel A. Donaldson

Faculty Publications By Year

There is growing political momentum to simplify the Internal Revenue Code. While the federal tax laws should be no more complex than necessary, this Article demonstrates that tax complexity is not as bad as political rhetoric leads us to believe. The Article makes four arguments in support of this thesis. First, the forces comprising tax complexity are either inevitable or net beneficial, so calls for simplification are ultimately pointless. Second, the alleged harms of tax complexity are either unproven or overstated, so the need for simplification is questionable. Third, significant proposals for simplification are flawed because they either overcorrect for …

National Bankruptcy Review Commission Tax Recommendations: Notice, Jurisdiction, And Corporate Debtors, Jack F. Williams

Faculty Publications By Year

Pursuant to congressional mandate, the National Bankruptcy Review Commission (NBRC) reported its recommendations for modification of the Bankruptcy Reform Act of 1978, as amended (the Bankruptcy Code), to the President, Congress, and Chief Justice of the Supreme Court on October 20, 1997. This Article, the second and final installment analyzing the tax recommendations of the NBRC, focuses on the proposed revisions relating to, among other things, taxation of corporate and partnership debtor estates. In particular, this Article discusses the requirement of reasonable notice to the government, bankruptcy court jurisdiction over tax controversies, bankruptcy administration affecting tax matters, chapter 11 plan …

National Bankruptcy Review Commission Tax Recommendations: Individual Debtors, Discharge, And Priority Of Claims, Jack F. Williams

Faculty Publications By Year

No abstract provided.

The Tax Consequences Of Abandonment Under The Bankruptcy Code, Jack F. Williams

Faculty Publications By Year

No abstract provided.