Tax Law Commons^™

A Timely Proposal To Eliminate The Student Loan Interest Deduction, Victoria J. Haneman

Victoria J. Haneman

No abstract provided.

Macroeconomic Modeling Of Tax Policy: A Comparison Of Current Methodologies, Itai Grinberg, Alan J. Auerbach, Thomas A. Barthold, Nicholas Bull, W. Gavin Elkins, Pamela J. Moomau, Rachel Moore, Benjamin Page, Brandon Pecoraro, Kyle Pomerleau

Alan J. Auerbach

The macroeconomic effects of tax reform are a subject of significant discussion and controversy. In 2015, the House of Representatives adopted a new “dynamic scoring” rule requiring a point estimate within the budget window of the deficit effect due to the macroeconomic response to certain proposed tax legislation. The revenue estimates provided by the staff of the Joint Committee on Taxation (JCT) for major tax bills often play a critical role in Congressional deliberations and public discussion of those bills. The JCT has long had macroeconomic analytic capability, and in recent years, responding to Congress’ interest in macrodynamic estimates for …

Taxing Wealth Seriously, Edward J. Mccaffery

Edward J McCaffery

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 …

Meaningless Comparisons: Corporate Tax Reform Discourse In The United States, Omri Y. Marian

Omri Y Marian

This article examines the role that international comparisons play in current corporate tax reform discourse in the United States. Citing the need to make the U.S. corporate tax system more competitive, comparisons are frequently used to assess other jurisdictions' tax-competitiveness, and many legislative proposals are supported by such comparative arguments. Examining such discourse against the background of several theoretical approaches to comparative law, this article argues that, to the extent that comparisons are aimed at providing guidance for prospective reform, this purpose is not well served. Participants in the corporate tax reform discourse, from both sides of the aisle, lack …

Breaking The Glass Slipper: Reflections On The Self-Employment Tax, Patricia E. Dilley

Patricia E Dilley

Lawmakers and their staffs, in drafting tax legislation, often resemble Prince Charming looking for Cinderella with that glass slipper in hand -- rather than start from scratch and draft a completely new tax provision. It is frequently easier, faster, and more reassuring to taxpayers and tax practitioners to use an existing statute or approach and simply amend it slightly to make it fit the need of the new provision. However, problems can arise from this approach.

In the original Grimm Brothers' version of the Cinderella story, for example, the wicked stepsisters were each so anxious to be the chosen one …

The Death Of The Income Tax: A Progressive Consumption Tax And The Path To Fiscal Reform, Daniel Goldberg

Daniel S. Goldberg

The Death of the Income Tax explains how the current income tax is needlessly complex, contains perverse incentives against saving and investment, fails to use modern technology to ease compliance and collection burdens, and is subject to micromanaging and mismanaging by Congress. Daniel Goldberg proposes that the solution to the problems of the current income tax is completely replacing it with a progressive consumption tax collected electronically at the point of sale.

E Tax: The Flat Tax As An Electronic Credit Vat, Daniel S. Goldberg

Daniel S. Goldberg

The article builds on the Hall-Rabushka Flat Tax and proposes a consumption tax called the “E Tax,” which is an electronically collected credit invoice VAT. The Hall-Rabushka Flat Tax is a two-tier consumption tax that is based on a subtraction method VAT. The Hall-Rabushka nuance, however, allows a deduction for wages as if they were purchases of materials by the employer. Wage earners would be taxed on those wages at rates that could be set as graduated or flat, with or without a zero rate or bracket amount and with or without personal exemptions and deductions. Hall and Rabushka proposed …

The Aches And Pains Of Transition To A Consumption Tax: Can We Get There From Here?, Daniel S. Goldberg

Daniel S. Goldberg

This article discusses probably the most significant obstacle to the adoption of a consumption tax: the negative effects on existing wealth that the transition from the income tax to most forms of a consumption tax would have. The Congressional Budget Office in its 1997 study posed the question, “How to Get There from Here.” The difficulty with transition and the changes in the tax law since the CBO study, however, prompt the more basic question: “Can we get there from here?” This article deals with this question by examining the effects of transition on existing wealth under a variety of …