Law Commons^™

Standing On The Shoulders Of Llcs: Tax Entity Status And Decentralized Autonomous Organizations, Samuel D. Brunson

Georgia Law Review

Since the formation of the first decentralized autonomous organization in 2016, their use has exploded. Thousands of DAOs now try to take advantage of smart contracts to solve a problem that plagues business entities: the gulf between ownership and management. Armed with smart contracts and requiring token-holders to vote on any change in strategy, DAOs dispense with the management layer so necessary in traditional business entities.

DAOs owe their existence to technology. Without blockchain, without cryptocurrency, and without smart contracts, there would be no DAOs. But they owe their explosive to something much more unexpected: Treasury regulations.

In the wake …

Stay Schemin’: Tax Court’S Recent Ruling On Credit Card Rewards And The Impact This Ruling Has On Future Rewards Programs, Hunter Davis

Georgia Law Review

Beyond the utility of actual “credit,” the most important perk cardholders seek to capitalize on are the rewards that each cardholder’s particular credit card offers. Cardholders look for the most bang for their buck in terms of rewards and points. Ranging from frequent flyer miles to cash back to everything in between, rewards programs have expanded and diversified rapidly over the past several decades, and consumers cannot get enough. So much so that the question of whether, and when, consumer loyalty rewards should be taxable has arisen and persists today. The Internal Revenue Service (IRS) and the Tax Court have …

The Implications For Australian Businesses Of Recent Developments In Us State Taxation Of Online Cross-Border Sales, Walter Hellerstein

Popular Media

Although there is no broad-based national consumption tax in the United States, 45 of the 50 states and the District of Columbia, as well as thousands of local jurisdictions, impose general retail sales taxes. For the twelve-month period ending in September 2020, sales taxes yielded USD 333 billion or 31.1 per cent of state tax revenues.

The US Supreme Court’s 2018 decision in South Dakota v. Wayfair, Inc. dramatically expanded the US states’ power to require remote suppliers to collect taxes on in-bound sales to local consumers. The decision repudiated the pre-existing, judicially created constitutional rule limiting the states’ …

Does Tax Matter? Evidence On Executive Compensation After 162(M)'S Repeal, Gregg Polsky, Brian Galle, Andrew Lund

Scholarly Works

As part of the most sweeping federal tax reform in a generation, the Tax Cuts and Jobs Act (“TCJA”) radically altered the tax treatment of compensation paid to senior executives of public companies. Prior to the TCJA, payment of such compensation in excess of one million dollars was non-deductible except to the extent the compensation was performance-based. The TCJA eliminated the exception so that all senior executive compensation above one million dollars is now non-deductible regardless of whether it is performance-based or not.

This reform provides a natural experiment to study the role of tax law in influencing managerial pay …

How The State And Federal Tax Systems Operate To Deny Educational Opportunities To Minorities And Other Lower Income Students, Camilla E. Watson

Scholarly Works

The importance of education cannot be overstated. Education is a core principle of the American Dream, and as such, it is the ticket to a better paying job, homeownership, financial security, and a better way of life. Education is the key factor in reducing poverty and inequality and promoting sustained national economic growth. But while the U.S. Supreme Court has referred to education as "perhaps the most important function of the state and local governments," it has nevertheless stopped short of declaring education a fundamental right guaranteed under the Constitution. As a consequence, because education is not considered a fundamental …

The Impact Of The 2017 Tax Act On Certain Personal Injury Plaintiffs, Gregg Polsky

Scholarly Works

The 2017 Tax Act was the most sweeping federal tax legislation in over a generation. While many of its reforms, from dramatically lowering the corporate tax rate to altering the international tax rules, have already received significant attention, little attention has been paid to the 2017 Tax Act’s effects on personal injury plaintiffs. This Article explores these impacts.

The 2017 Tax Act added a new provision that indirectly affects plaintiffs who allege sexual harassment or abuse. The new provision disallows the defendants’ deductions in these cases if the parties enter into a nondisclosure agreement. While targeted at defendants, the provision …

How Not To Read International Harvester: A Response, Walter Hellerstein

Scholarly Works

In this article, Hellerstein examines a recent article by Alysse McLoughlin and Kathleen Quinn and seeks to clear up the confusion surrounding International Harvester.

Reforming The Tax Incentives For Higher Education, Camilla E. Watson

Scholarly Works

Federal spending on higher education has long been controversial, primarily because it has grown exponentially since the 1950s but it has produced a system which many regard as too expensive and grossly inefficient. The soaring costs are placing higher education beyond the reach of many Americans, and of those who enter college, less than half complete their degrees. Particular criticism has been directed toward the education tax incentives, enacted mostly in the late 1990s, which shifted federalfunding for higher education from direct benefits to students in the form of grants, loans and work-study programs to indirect benefits through the tax …

Book Review: International Tax Planning. By Barry Spitz. London, England: Butterworth & Co. Ltd., 1972. Pp. Xxiii, 159. $12.15 (U.S.)., Donald O. Clark

Georgia Journal of International & Comparative Law

No abstract provided.

Tax Treaties-Reciprocal Exchange Of Information-Summons Power Contained In Irc Section 7602 May Be Used To Obtain Information From Domestic Sources For Use By Canadian Authorities In Investigating The Canadian Tax Liability Of A Canadian Company, Tim J. Floyd

Georgia Journal of International & Comparative Law

No abstract provided.

The Impact Of The United States Tax Laws On International Technology Transfer: An Overview And Some Suggestion For Minimizing The Bite, Marcus B. Finnegan, Robert E. Mccarthy

Georgia Journal of International & Comparative Law

No abstract provided.

Tax Incentives To Exportation: Alternatives To Disc, Timothy A. Peterson

Georgia Journal of International & Comparative Law

No abstract provided.

Through The Antiboycott Morass To An Export Priority, Mark D. Menefee, Don Samuel

Georgia Journal of International & Comparative Law

No abstract provided.

Deciphering The Supreme Court's Opinion In Wynne, Walter Hellerstein

Scholarly Works

In Wynne, the Supreme Court held that Maryland's personal income tax regime violated the dormant Commerce Clause because It taxed income on a residence and source basis without giving a credit to residents for in· come taxed on a source basis by other states. The Court suggested, how· ever, that a state may tax residents on all their Income without providing a credit for taxes paid by other states if the state did not tax nonresidents on income from sources within the state, even though such a taxing regime might result in double taxation of interstate commerce.

Income Tax - Foreign Earned Income Exclusion - Effect Of The Economic Recovery Tax Act Of 1981 On Citizens Or Residents Of The United States Living Abroad, Jonathan M. Engram

Georgia Journal of International & Comparative Law

No abstract provided.

Tax Planning: Foreign Investment In United States Real Property, William H. Newton Iii

Georgia Journal of International & Comparative Law

No abstract provided.

Income Tax - Deductions For Facilitating Payments To Foreign Government Officials, Birney Bull

Georgia Journal of International & Comparative Law

No abstract provided.

Foreign Oil And Taxation: The Need For A Coordinated Energy Policy, E.C. Lashbrooke Jr.

Georgia Journal of International & Comparative Law

No abstract provided.

Book Review: Bibliography On Taxation Of Foreign Operations And Foreigners. Elisabeth A. Owens And Gretchen A. Hovemeyer. Cambridge, Massachusetts: International Tax Program, The Law School Of Harvard University, 1983., John C. O'Byrne

Georgia Journal of International & Comparative Law

No abstract provided.

Taxing Compensatory Stock Rights Transferred In Divorce, Gregg Polsky, Kathleen Delaney Thomas

Scholarly Works

Stock-based compensation has become increasingly prevalent in recent years. As a result, many high net worth divorces now result in the transfer of compensatory stock rights from the employee spouse to the nonemployee spouse as part of the marital settlement. Despite this growing trend, the tax consequences of these transfers have not yet been explored fully. This Article endeavors to fill this void and explain both the planning opportunities and potential pitfalls in transferring compensatory stock rights in divorce. These transfers can shift ordinary income from a high-bracket spouse to a lower-bracket spouse, creating a tax surplus that enlarges the …

Structural Tax Exceptionalism, James M. Puckett

Georgia Law Review

Following the Supreme Court's landmark decision in Mayo Foundation for Medical Education and Research v. United States, many scholars of tax law have declared that Mayo marks the death of tax exceptionalism. The tax exceptionalist view holds that because tax is different or special, generally applicable administrative law procedural rules and doctrines do not apply in the tax context. In Mayo, however, the Supreme Court held that generally applicable administrative law rules and doctrines do apply to the Treasury Department and the IRS. Contrary to the prevailing narrative that proclaims the death of tax exceptionalism, this Article posits that the …

The End Of Cash, The Income Tax, And The Next 100 Years, Gregg D. Polsky, Jeffery H. Kahn

Scholarly Works

The income tax is technologically very similar to the way it was in its early years, and technological developments have been at the margins of the income tax and have not affected its core elements. Still, technological improvements have made third-party reporting and withholding more efficient, which has allowed these mechanisms to become more pervasively used. Technology has also made it easier for taxpayers to substantiate their activities. These changes have facilitated the evolution of the incometax from its original class tax to the mass tax it is today.

While further technological advances might improve the federal income tax, it …

Rationally Cutting Tax Expenditures, Gregg D, Polsky

Scholarly Works

This article illustrates the differences between the two types of tax expenditures by examining the child tax credit (a distributional expenditure), the charitable deduction (an allocative expenditure), and taxfree saving accounts and the mortgage deduction (both of which are-usually defended on allocative grounds but probably have mainly distributional impacts). These differences should be well understood by policymakers as they consider tax expenditure reform as part of a deficit reduction plan.

Fiscal Federalism In The United States, Walter Hellerstein

Presentations and Speeches

This presentation explores the fiscal powers of U.S. Federal and State governments with respect to taxation and spending.

What Are We - Laborers, Factories, Or Spare Parts? The Tax Treatment Of Transfers Of Human Body Materials, Lisa Milot

Scholarly Works

Transfers of human body materials are ubiquitous. From surrogacy arrangements, to sales of eggs, sperm and plasma to clinics, to black markets for kidneys, to pleas for donations of body materials, these transfers are covered and debated daily in popular and academic discourse. The associated philosophical and legal issues have been explored by a wide range of commentators. The appropriate tax treatment of these transactions, however, is mostly unexamined.

Current law is unclear about what the tax consequences of these transfers are. There are no statutory provisions directly on point, Internal Revenue Service guidance is outdated and conflicting, and the …

Taxing Emotional Distress Recoveries: Does Murphy Show The Way?, Kaushal P. Mahaseth

LLM Theses and Essays

The taxability of recoveries of damages on account of emotional distress remains a complicated issue under the American federal income tax law. Recent developments due to a controversial decision by the D.C. Circuit Court of Appeals have further added fuel to this debate. Even if one were to argue the justifications of exempting such recoveries from income taxation, courts do not appear to be the very appropriate kind of forum. Congress can, and in fact does tax such recoveries and the constitutional basis of such power can hardly be doubted. As a result, appropriate changes in the statute only can …

A Consumption Tax Versus A Federal Income Tax In The United States, Shelly-Ann R. Tomlinson

LLM Theses and Essays

This thesis makes a comparison between a consumption tax and the current Federal Income Tax in order to establish which would be fairer, simpler, more efficient and feasible for the United States. Issues such as which of the two tax systems would be easier to apply, and which would yield enough revenue for the fiscal budget are addressed. The thesis argues that a consumption tax would be more suitable for the United States and in particular makes reference to the Fair Tax plan which is a proposal to replace the current federal income tax with a national retail sales tax. …

Can Treasury Overrule The Supreme Court?, Gregg D. Polsky

Scholarly Works

This article considers whether the Treasury's check-the-box regulations, which have been widely praised by tax practitioners, are valid. These regulations generally allow any unincorporated entity to elect whether it will be treated as a corporation or a partnership for tax purposes. When these regulations were first proposed, there was some debate as to whether such an elective regime was foreclosed by the statutory scheme, which requires that "associations" be taxed as corporations. This article argues that the focus of this debate was misplaced because, even assuming that the statutory scheme itself was sufficiently ambiguous as to permit an elective regime, …

Legislating Morality: The Duty To The Tax System Reconsidered, Watson

Scholarly Works

Four years ago, I presented a paper at a symposium on professionalism jointly sponsored by the University of Kansas Law School and the Kansas Bar Association. That paper espoused the view (contrary to what appears to be the popular view among tax scholars) that tax lawyers owe no special duty to the "tax system" other than to abide by the law and the applicable standards of professional conduct. During the four-year interim since my last visit to Kansas, however, we have witnessed the deleterious effect of the IRS Restructuring and Reform Act of 1998 (RRA '98) on IRS enforcement and …

Race-Conscious Affirmative Action By Tax Exempt 501(C)(3) Corporations After Grutter And Gratz, David A. Brennen

Scholarly Works

Part I of this Article examines how the Equal Protection Clause limits the government's ability to engage in race-based affirmative action. Part I focuses on how constitutional law analysis has evolved in light of the Supreme Court's recent decisions in Grutter v. Bollinger and Gratz v. Bollinger. Part II provides a brief description of tax law's public policy limitation. This part shows how the IRS, though not required to do so, has generally followed Equal Protection Clause jurisprudence when applying the public policy limitation to race-based activity by private tax exempt 501(c)(3) institutions. Part III discusses how the Supreme …