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Before International Tax Reform, We Need To Understand Why Firms Invert, Michael S. Knoll
Before International Tax Reform, We Need To Understand Why Firms Invert, Michael S. Knoll
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A wave of corporate inversions by U.S. firms over the past two decades has generated substantial debate in academic, business, and policy circles.
The core of the debate hinges on a couple of key economic questions: Do U.S. tax laws disadvantage U.S.-domiciled companies relative to their foreign competitors? And, if so, do inversions improve the competitiveness of U.S. multinational firms both abroad and at home?
There is unfortunately little, if any, empirical work directly determining whether U.S.-based MNCs are currently tax-disadvantaged compared to their foreign rivals, or measuring the amount by which (if any) U.S.-based MNCs improve their competitive position …
The Tax Treatment Of Tokens: What Does It Betoken?, David J. Shakow
The Tax Treatment Of Tokens: What Does It Betoken?, David J. Shakow
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Digital tokens have been used to raise substantial amounts of money. But little attention has been paid to the tax consequences surrounding their issuance and sale. There are significant potential tax liabilities lurking in the use of digital tokens. But, because of the anonymity inherent in the blockchain structures used for the issuance of tokens and payments for them, there is a significant question as to whether those tax liabilities will ever be collected.
Waiting For Perseus: A Sur-Reply To Professors Graetz And Warren, Ruth Mason, Michael S. Knoll
Waiting For Perseus: A Sur-Reply To Professors Graetz And Warren, Ruth Mason, Michael S. Knoll
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This manuscript responds to Income Tax Discrimination: Still Stuck in a Labyrinth of Impossibility by Professors Michael Graetz and Alvin Warren (121 Yale L.J. 1118). In that article, Professors Graetz and Warren challenge many of the arguments we made in our own article entitled, “What is Tax Discrimination?” (121 Yale L.J. 1014). In our earlier article, we set out to accomplish two goals. First, we sought to identify the principle behind the doctrine of tax discrimination as that doctrine is applied by the U.S. Supreme Court and the Court of Justice of the European Union (ECJ) and to translate that …
Valuation Misstatement Penalties Require Valuation Misstatements, David J. Shakow
Valuation Misstatement Penalties Require Valuation Misstatements, David J. Shakow
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In this report, I argue that the valuation misstatement penalty has been misinterpreted by the IRS to apply to tax shelter transactions that have nothing to do with valuation. The penalty applies to taxpayers who claim deductions from inflated basis only when the basis was inflated as a result of an overvaluation. Properly understood, the penalty provision rarely raises the issue for which the government successfully sought certiorari in United States v. Woods.
Who’S Afraid Of The Apa?, David J. Shakow
Who’S Afraid Of The Apa?, David J. Shakow
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The Supreme Court’s decision in Mayo Foundation for Medical Education and Research v. United States means that tax practitioners must be more sensitive to administrative law and judicial deference to administrative rules. This includes gaining some familiarity with the Administrative Procedure Act (APA) and the major cases that deal with judicial deference to administrative action, starting with Chevron USA Inc. v. Natural Resources Defense Council Inc. While the Supreme Court spends a lot more time considering issues of administrative law rather than tax law, the many decisions don’t result in a clear set of rules as to how courts are …
A Preface To Neoclassical Legal Thought, Herbert J. Hovenkamp
A Preface To Neoclassical Legal Thought, Herbert J. Hovenkamp
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Most legal historians speak of the period following classical legal thought as “progressive legal thought.” That term creates an unwarranted bias in characterization, however, creating the impression that conservatives clung to an obsolete “classical” ideology, when in fact they were in many ways just as revisionist as the progressives legal thinkers whom they critiqued. The Progressives and New Deal thinkers whom we identify with progressive legal thought were nearly all neoclassical, or marginalist, in their economics, but it is hardly true that all marginalists were progressives. For example, the lawyers and policy makers in the corporate finance battles of the …
Business Taxes And International Competitiveness: Understanding How Taxes Can Distort Capital Ownership And Designing A Nondistortive International Tax System, Michael S. Knoll
Business Taxes And International Competitiveness: Understanding How Taxes Can Distort Capital Ownership And Designing A Nondistortive International Tax System, Michael S. Knoll
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Around the world, policymakers are obsessed with the competitiveness of their domestic companies and domestically based multinational corporations (MNCs). Such concerns frequently influence policy, especially tax policy. In this paper, I develop a theory of how taxes affect the international competitiveness of businesses. I then use that theory to evaluate basic tax policy decisions, such as the choice between residence- and source-based taxation and the level of tax rates, and to understand the impact various provisions in the U.S. Internal Revenue Code are likely to have on the competitiveness of U.S.-based corporations and MNCs.
Samuel Zell, The Chicago Tribune, And The Emergence Of The S Esop: Understanding The Tax Advantages And Disadvantages Of S Esops, Michael S. Knoll
Samuel Zell, The Chicago Tribune, And The Emergence Of The S Esop: Understanding The Tax Advantages And Disadvantages Of S Esops, Michael S. Knoll
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Samuel Zell’s acquisition of the Chicago Tribune Company (the Tribune) in December 2007 using a little-known type of Employee Stock Ownership Plan (ESOP) made headlines. In a complicated transaction, which took nearly a year to complete, the Tribune converted from a subchapter C corporation to a subchapter S corporation, established an ESOP that purchased 100 percent of the company’s equity, and sold Zell a call option giving him the right to purchase 40 percent of the company’s equity. Press reports claim that Zell’s novel structure enabled Zell to outbid other suitors. And financial commentators predict that many acquirers will employ …