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Articles 1 - 4 of 4
Full-Text Articles in Law
Taxation And The Constitution, Reconsidered, David Gamage, John R. Brooks
Taxation And The Constitution, Reconsidered, David Gamage, John R. Brooks
Faculty Publications
Our current income tax is unable to address growing concentrations of financial wealth and resulting economic inequality. But reforms to address these problems—such as a wealth tax or an income tax on unrealized capital gains—are stymied by fears of unconstitutionality. The basic claim is that wealth taxes and similar reforms are “direct taxes” under the Apportionment Clauses of the Constitution, and since apportionment is not feasible, these taxes are impossible. But this claim is wrong.
This Article shows that there is in fact a long history of federal taxes similar to wealth taxes—both apportioned and uniform—and a well-developed constitutional tax …
The Surveillance Gap: The Harms Of Extreme Privacy And Data Marginalization, Michele Gilman, Rebecca Green
The Surveillance Gap: The Harms Of Extreme Privacy And Data Marginalization, Michele Gilman, Rebecca Green
Faculty Publications
We live in an age of unprecedented surveillance, enhanced by modern technology, prompting some to suggest that privacy is dead. Previous scholarship suggests that no subset of the population feels this phenomenon more than marginalized communities. Those who rely on public benefits, for example, must turn over personal information and submit to government surveillance far more routinely than wealthier citizens who enjoy greater opportunity to protect their privacy and the ready funds to secure it. This article illuminates the other end of the spectrum, arguing that many individuals who may value government and nonprofit services and legal protections fail to …
Did The Sixteenth Amendment Ever Matter? Does It Matter Today?, Erik M. Jensen
Did The Sixteenth Amendment Ever Matter? Does It Matter Today?, Erik M. Jensen
Faculty Publications
This article, prepared for a symposium on the centennial of the ratification of the Sixteenth Amendment, argues that the Amendment was legally and politically necessary in 1913, if there was going to be a modern income tax, and that it remains significant today. The Amendment provides that “taxes on incomes” need not be apportioned among the states on the basis of population, as would otherwise be required for direct taxes. An apportioned income tax would be an absurdity, and, if there were no Amendment, Congress could not enact an unapportioned tax on income from property, the sort of tax that …
The Individual Mandate And The Taxing Power, Erik M. Jensen
The Individual Mandate And The Taxing Power, Erik M. Jensen
Faculty Publications
This article, prepared for a symposium at the Salmon P. Chase College of Law, Northern Kentucky University, considers whether the Taxing Clause provides an alternative constitutional basis, as some have recently argued, for the individual mandate in the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act of 21 - the requirement, going into effect in 214, that most individuals acquire satisfactory health insurance or pay a penalty. The article concludes that the Taxing Clause arguments are misguided. At best, the Clause can provide authority for the penalty, not for the mandate as a whole. Furthermore, the article questions whether the penalty will …