Digital Commons Network^™

Periodic Adjustments — The Dialogue Continues, Reuven S. Avi-Yonah, Jeffery M. Kadet

Articles

Michael McDonald has continued an important dialogue that requires more attention from both taxpayers and the government. In reply to our recent article, McDonald has expressed his disagreement with a number of issues that each of us has adequately covered. We'll just have to agree to disagree on those matters, some of which will eventually play out in the courts. In this article, we will cover a few issues that McDonald has raised that we believe will be useful to this ongoing dialogue.

Coca-Cola Redux: The Problematic Absence Of Comparables, Reuven S. Avi-Yonah

Articles

On June 25 a three-judge panel of the Eleventh Circuit Court of Appeals heard oral arguments in Coca-Cola v. Commissioner. It is very hard to predict outcomes from oral arguments, but two of the judges asked questions that suggested they were open to accepting the taxpayer’s “bait and switch” argument. They also seemed receptive to the treaty argument. Interestingly, there was less focus on the taxpayer’s marketing intangibles argument, which I regard as the better one.

Data Centers As Engines Of Corporate Tax Base Restructuring, Reuven S. Avi-Yonah, Domenico Imparato, Karen Sam

Articles

Globalization has eroded the corporate income tax by undermining both source-and residence-based taxation. Before the 1980s, large capital-exporting countries could impose relatively high tax rates on multinationals and extend taxation to low-taxed foreign income earned through controlled foreign corporations, as exemplified by the U.S. adoption of subpart F in the Revenue Act of 1962. That regime supported corporate tax revenues that reached roughly 25 percent of total U.S. receipts in the mid-20th century.

Globalization changed that equilibrium. Multinational corporations gained the ability to arbitrage national tax systems by relocating and reporting profits in low-tax jurisdictions. Active income largely escaped source …

Fixed Points For Fitted Lines, David L. Farnsworth

Articles

For many fitting methods for lines in the plane, each observation possesses an associated point in the plane, or at infinity for particular observations. These associated points are called “fixed points,” because properly chosen replacement points for the originally selected observation create other fitted lines that contain the same fixed point. Simple linear regression and orthogonal least-squares regression are investigated as examples. The phenomenon has been previously noted for simple regression, where the properly selected replacement points are related to regression diagnostics and the determination of outliers. Orthogonal regression lines are fundamental to principal component analysis. Mechanical devices for simple …

Some Results About Orthogonal Least-Squares Lines, Steven J. Kilner, David L. Farnsworth

Articles

A set of quantitative bivariate data is augmented with one additional point. Orthogonal least-squares fitting is used for the original set and the augmented set. The possible locations of the two lines, the points of means of the two sets, and the augmenting point are examined.

Taxing Ai In The Wake Of The Emergence Of Agentic Ai, Reuven S. Avi-Yonah, Herbert Snitz

Articles

This article addresses taxation measures to regulate AI agents (i.e., AI that is not fully under the control of humans, including both ANI and AGI). In each case, the focus is on what the agent’s capabilities would be, not on how it becomes capable of successfully performing its tasks (though the latter would likely be relevant to important philosophical questions, e.g., might robots achieve sentience or consciousness, and if so, would they have rights?). Regarding mirroring what we human beings can do, the hallmark of AGI is that it will not be task-specific (like ANI), but will possess broad capabilities, …

D-Methionine Improves Spatial Navigation And Attenuates Oxidative Stress And Amyloid Pathology In A Sex-Specific Manner., Mackenzie R Peck, Jenelle E Chapman, Tiarra Hill, Kathleen Quinn, Erol D Ikiz, Angel Lopez, Erin R Hascup, Chilman Bae, Kevin N Hascup

Articles

Background

Oxidative stress and maladaptive neuroimmune activation contribute to cognitive decline in Alzheimer's disease (AD) and represent therapeutic targets beyond amyloid-centered approaches.

Objective

To determine whether oral D-methionine (D-Met), a redox-active amino acid, reduces amyloid pathology and lipid peroxidation and confers disease-modifying benefits in AD models.

Methods

Male and female APP/PS1 and APP^NL−Fmice with advanced AD pathology received oral D-Met or vehicle. Behavioral assessments included locomotor activity and hippocampal-dependent spatial learning and memory. Amyloid burden, lipid peroxidation, peripheral metabolic, and inflammatory markers, and hippocampal microglial phenotypes were evaluated.

Results

D-Met did not alter locomotor or exploratory behavior but …

Taxation And Birthright Citizenship, Reuven S. Avi-Yonah

Articles

Under the 14th Amendment, individuals who are born in the United States are U.S. citizens and citizens of the state where they reside if they are “subject to the jurisdiction” of the United States. The debate surrounding birthright citizenship focuses on the meaning of jurisdiction in this context. The majority view is that it just means territoriality jurisdiction, so that anyone born within the United States is automatically a citizen regardless of the immigration status of their parents. The minority view is that jurisdiction is related to political allegiance (nationality jurisdiction), which is why children born to diplomats, members of …

Abundance And The Supreme Court, Nicholas Bagley

Articles

Scarcity mars much of American life. Housing prices in our most productive cities are out of control. The nation’s transportation infrastructure is aging and obsolete because it costs so much more to build here than in other developed countries. Meanwhile, China generates nearly three times as much solar energy as the United States, with the gap growing every year.

Why does the richest nation in the history of the world struggle so mightily to get stuff done? That’s the question that propels Ezra Klein and Derek Thompson’s 2025 bestseller Abundance, which galvanized what may be the hottest and most controversial …

Emotional Intelligence And Teamwork In A Ship’S Bridge : A Proposed Training Framework For Upskilling, Sofia Kallou, Nikitas Nikitakos, Dimitrios A. Papachristos, Dimitrios Dalaklis, Momoko Kitada

Articles

The notion that computers equipped with software and artificial intelligence (AI) applications can effectively replace human intelligence is under the existing paradigm of operations. This is the leading facilitator of task automation on board a ship to fulfill various jobs and is often supported by numerous scientists/academics who contribute to gaining today’s momentum in public opinion. The discourse of Industry 4.0 in the maritime domain, however, tends to focus heavily on technological contexts and overlooks socio-economic contexts. This gap is evident in the strong emphasis on technical and digital skills for future maritime professionals. This paper, therefore, argues that the …

William K. Hartmann, Scientist, Artist, Pioneer Of Planetary Science, Adam Eisenberg

Articles

For more than six decades, William K. Hartmann has helped shape modern planetary science, from pioneering crater-count dating to developing the leading theory of the Moon's formation. He has also created some of the most enduring artistic visions of other worlds. Adam Eisenberg caught up with him on the eve of his 87th birthday.

Technology Before, During, And After Incarceration: Current Product Landscape, Sociotechnical Concerns, And Legal Considerations In The U.S. Context, Yael Eiger, Taylor Hansen, Teanna Barrett, Jevan Hutson, Bryce Clayton Newell, Franziska Roesner

Articles

Emerging technology, including AI, is proliferating throughout the U.S. carceral system. These technologies are marketed to prisons and police departments and then procured using taxpayer money. Previous investigative reporting has exposed troubling kickback schemes, unconstitutional data collection practices, and biased algorithmic outcomes in a handful of prominent technologies (e.g., Flock, Palantir, Clearview AI, COMPAS). In this work, we consider the broader ecosystem of carceral technologies: we catalog 122 products from 53 companies selling technology to carceral institutions. In a collaboration among computer science, law, and surveillance studies scholars, we surface sociotechnical, ethical, and legal concerns related to the use and …

Algorithmic Tax Ownership, Young Ran (Christine) Kim, Dmitry Erokhin

Articles

Tax ownership is a crucial concept for determining tax liabilities, compliance, and enforcement. However, neither the courts nor the IRS has provided clear guidance on how to analyze it. Since the Supreme Court first outlined a twenty-six-factor test for determining tax ownership in Frank Lyon Co. v. United States in 1978, this multifactor test has remained largely unchanged, and there has been no further guidance from the courts or the IRS to this day. Even tests with shorter lists of factors only add to the confusion regarding compliance and enforcement, as there is no clarity on which factors are most …

Ai, Medicine, And Social Determinants Of Health Data, Ryan Doyloo, Nicholson Price

Articles

This article examines how medical AI systems are incorporating SDoH data and the governance challenges that follow. The authors show that while SDoH integration can enhance clinical workflows and predictive accuracy — potentially improving outcomes for underserved populations — it also introduces acute risks of proxy discrimination, where facially neutral variables replicate protected characteristics. Surveying U.S., EU, and international frameworks, the authors argue that existing regimes lack clear ex ante guidance to distinguish beneficial from harmful uses of SDoH data. In response, they advance post-market monitoring as a pragmatic and scalable pathway: generating real-world, SDoH-stratified evidence that can support enforcement, …

How Licensing Compromised The Library, Aaron Perzanowski

Articles

Libraries are under attack on multiple fronts. Fueled by right-wing talking points, social-media misinformation, and conspiratorial fantasy, efforts to remove or restrict access to books in public and school libraries have exploded across the United States. At the same time, libraries have confronted a disturbing rise in threats of violence and harassment directed at staff and patrons. State and federal actors have targeted library budgets. And on occasion, local residents have voted to defund their own libraries.

But it gets worse. Libraries face new challenges to their basic operations. Materials are harder than ever to acquire, and many in-demand digital …

Agency Fact-Making, Haiyun Damon-Feng

Articles

Modern administrative-law scholarship, theory, and doctrine generally conceptualize agencies as engaging in three primary functions: rulemaking, enforcement, and adjudication. This understanding of agencies has informed deep debates surrounding the power, independence, and constitutional legitimacy of the administrative state. But the prevailing account is incomplete. It overlooks a fourth core function of the administrative state: its fact-making, or epistemic, function. Across the administrative state, agencies create and disseminate information in ways that are uniquely comprehensive and uniquely powerful. Agencies’ epistemic outputs include the census generated by the Census Bureau, repositories of public-health information maintained by the Centers for Disease Control and …

Vaccines, Religious Liberty, And The Gvr As Doctrinal Signal, Zalman Rothschild

Articles

This Essay proceeds in four Parts. Part I traces the doctrinal baseline, showing that vaccines have long functioned as the limit case for religious liberty. Part II briefly describes the doctrinal changes of the COVID-19 era — the Supreme Court’s expansion of religious equality doctrine, and its emergency-docket denials that left vaccine mandates formally unresolved — before explaining why the GVR in Miller signals a different move: the extension of the religious liberty framework to vaccine mandates, bypassing the comparability analysis that had allowed most courts to sustain them under the equality model. Part III turns to Miller itself and …

Joint Bank Accounts: Who Needs Them?, Reid K. Weisbord, Stewart E. Sterk

Articles

Joint bank accounts, once known as a “poor man’s will,” emerged more than a century ago as a probate avoidance device. This Article contends that joint accounts no longer serve a useful estate planning function, and they pose an unacceptably high risk to banking consumers because the legal framework governing lifetime ownership rights is deeply flawed and underdeveloped. Courts typically apply one of two prevailing models for allocating lifetime rights: (1) the traditional joint tenancy approach, which presumes equal ownership of account funds by each party; and (2) the Uniform Probate Code’s approach, which presumes ownership in proportion to each …

A Gdpr-Compliant Fatca Structure?, Michael Hatfield

Articles

A 2025 Belgian Data Protection Authority (DPA) decision and ensuing preliminary questions referred by the Belgian Market Court to the Court of Justice of the European Union (CJEU) highlights the tension between the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) and the US Foreign Account Tax Compliance Act (FATCA) structure in Europe. The FATCA structure relies on intergovernmental agreements (FATCA IGAs) between the US and EU Member States. Under these agreements, Member State tax authorities transfer personal data of their citizens and residents to the US Internal Revenue Service (IRS). It may be determined that these transfers violate some or all of …

Living To Die: Life Imprisonment Without Remission Or Parole In India, Preeti Pratishruti Dash, Rushil Batra

Articles

This article critically examines the Supreme Court of India’s use of life imprisonment without the possibility of remission or parole (LWORP) as a sentencing alternative to the death penalty. While the Constitution Bench in V Sriharan vs Union of India (2015) upheld the constitutionality of such sentences, it did not articulate principled standards governing their imposition. This article argues that the absence of such standards has produced a vacuum in LWORP sentencing. To substantiate this claim, we analyse fifty-three Supreme Court judgments delivered between 2016 and 2024 in which death sentences were commuted to LWORP. The analysis reveals widespread inconsistency …

Protecting Cultural Personality, J. Janewa Osei-Tutu

Articles

When companies use cultural symbols or cultural heritage from an indigenous or local community without their knowledge or permission, it can lead to claims of cultural appropriation, particularly in the fashion industry. Yet, the law provides little to no remedy. Trademarks and geographical indications can be used to protect collective cultural identities. However, these intellectual property laws are not helpful if the affected cultural group has not commercialized its identity by offering goods or services to the public. This Article contributes to the literature by theorizing a dignitary-based intellectual property model for protecting cultural identities. It draws on the U.S. …

How Ip Ends, Dave Fagundes, Aaron Perzanowski

Articles

Real and personal property may last forever, but intellectual property (IP) ends. Despite the doctrinal complexity and practical significance of the mechanisms that terminate IP rights, scholarship has scarcely focused on them, and none has analyzed these doctrines as a unified field. As a result, the discourse about the ways IP ends remains impoverished, with courts, legislatures, and commentators offering imprecise and inconsistent formulations that obscure the rationales for these doctrines. This Article offers the first comprehensive taxonomy of IP’s terminal mechanisms, providing much-needed conceptual and definitional coherence. It then reveals the underappreciated policy leverage these mechanisms can deliver and …

Brokering Safety, Chinmayi Sharma, Thomas E. Kadri, Sam Adler

Articles

For victims of abuse, safety means hiding. Not just hiding themselves, but also their contact details, their address, their workplace, their roommates, and any other information that could enable their abuser to target them. Yet today, no number of name changes and relocations can prevent data brokers from sharing a victim's personal information online. Thanks to brokers, abusers can find what they need with a single search, a few clicks, and a few dollars. For many victims, then, the best hope for safety lies in obscurity-that is, making themselves and their information harder to find.

This Article exposes privacy law's …

The Shame Of Mass Torts, Anthony J. Sebok

Articles

No abstract provided.

Racing To Safety: Tax Policy For Ai Safety-By-Design, Mirit Eyal, Yonathan Arbel

Articles

The White House recently announced its vision of artificial intelligence (AI) policy: AI development is a race and America must win it. To that end, a new America's AI Action Plan directs federal agencies and states to remove regulatory barriers to AI development and accelerate innovation. This approach leaves limited room for regulatory measures that would address the safety risks of powerful AI systems: their behavior in novel domains remains unpredictable, their decision-making opaqueness, and their alignment with human values is uncertain. While experts warn of large-scale accidents, policymakers find themselves in a bind: Regulate AI and cede ground to …

An Analysis Of Global And Regional Human Rights Standards On Gender-Based Violence, Tamar Ezer, Denisse R. Cordova Montes

Articles

No abstract provided.

Reimagining Legal Education: The Transformative Power Of Small-Group Instruction, Michael I. Meyerson

Articles

Legal education is failing its students. Those entering their first year of law school have greater anxiety and less developed reading and writing skills than ever before. The traditional large Socratic class, which was never the most effective teaching method, has become increasingly counterproductive.

This Article contends that small-group instruction provides the opportunity for superior teaching, especially for first-year law students. Recent scholarship in active learning, educational psychology, and students’ mental health demonstrates the limitations of the traditional large Socratic class experience. Building on that theoretical foundation and informed by sustained classroom experience, this Article argues that small-group pedagogy more …

Decorrelation, Diversity, And Emergent Intelligence: The Isomorphism Between Social Insect Colonies And Ensemble Machine Learning, Ernest Fokoue, Gregory Babbitt, Yuval Levental

Articles

Social insect colonies and ensemble machine learning methods represent two of the most successful examples of decentralized information processing in nature and computation respectively. Here we develop a rigorous mathematical framework demonstrating that ant colony decision-making and random forest learning are isomorphic under a common formalism of stochastic ensemble intelligence. We show that the mechanisms by which genetically identical ants achieve functional differentiation— through stochastic response to local cues and positive feedback—map precisely onto the bootstrap aggregation and random feature subsampling that decorrelate decision trees. Using tools from Bayesian inference, multi-armed bandit theory, and statistical learning theory, we prove that …

A General Weighting Theory For Ensemble Learning: Beyond Variance Reduction Via Spectral And Geometric Structure, Ernest Fokoue

Articles

Ensemble learning is traditionally justified as a variance-reduction strategy, explaining its strong performance for unstable predictors such as decision trees. This explanation, however, does not account for ensembles constructed from intrinsically stable estimators-including smoothing splines, kernel ridge regression, Gaussian process regression, and other regularized reproducing kernel Hilbert space (RKHS) methods whose variance is already tightly controlled by regularization and spectral shrinkage. This paper develops a general weighting theory for ensemble learning that moves beyond classical variance-reduction arguments. We formalize ensembles as linear operators acting on a hypothesis space and endow the space of weighting sequences with geometric and spectral constraints. …

On The Scientific Stature Of Data Science: The Epistemological Unicorn, Ernest Fokoue

Articles

Data Science has ignited unprecedented academic, industrial, and pedagogical fervor, yet its status as a \textit{science} in the classical sense---comparable to physics or biology---remains profoundly unsettled. This article interrogates the epistemological foundations of Data Science by examining its hybrid theoretical lineage, from the Universal Approximation Theorem to the No-Free-Lunch Theorems, with special emphasis on the fundamental Bayesian optimality results for both regression and classification. We argue that Data Science is in a vigorous \textit{gestational period}, characterized not by an absence of principles but by a creative tension between empirical pragmatism and deep mathematical theory. The Cross-Validation score emerges as the …