Taxation & Estate Planning

A Bittersweet Day

Posted on August 17, 2009
My excitement today in teaching our Introduction to Law course to a section of our eager and talented 1Ls is tempered at having to bid farewell to my son Reed, who has left home for his freshman year of college. Reed, it was a gut-wrenching and poignant weekend, as we...

Levinson: The Vanishing Book Review in Student-Edited Law Reviews

Posted on August 17, 2009
Sanford Levinson (Texas) has published The Vanishing Book Review in Student-Edited Law Reviews and Potential Responses, 87 Tex. L. Rev. 1205 (2009): [T]he truly dismaying shrinkage of the book review issue published at the University of Michigan?which is ostensibly, almost ostentatiously, committed to the importance of the book-review enterprise?is symptomatic...

University Earmark Rankings

Posted on August 17, 2009
Inside Higher Ed: Universities Lead the Way in Earmark/Lobbying Rankings: There are some rankings colleges love to rate highly in -- like the various magazine rankings that claim to assess quality -- and others they'd rather be left out of, like those of party schools or worst colleges...

TaxProf Blog Weekend Roundup

Posted on August 17, 2009
Saturday: Saez: New Income Concentration Data Deadline Extended for AALS Junior Law Prof Call for Papers The Structured Settlement Tax Subsidy A Critique of the Proposed § 987 Currency Regs Sunday: Oscar Mayer Heir Seeks 1,000 Rich People to Sign Petition to Increase Taxes on the Wealthy Top 5 Tax...

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Morse: Qualified Intermediaries

Posted on August 17, 2009
Susan C. Morse (Santa Clara) has posted Qualified Intermediary or Bust?, 124 Tax Notes 471 (Aug. 3, 2009), on SSRN. Here is the abstract: In reaction to news about wealthy U.S. individuals hiding assets in non-U.S. bank accounts, the Obama administration has proposed statutes that would make non-qualified intermediary (NQI)...

IRS: The New Health Care Enforcer

Posted on August 17, 2009
William A. Jacobson (Cornell), IRS: The New Health Care Enforcer: People often joke that government-run health care will have the efficiency of the motor vehicle department, and the compassion of the IRS. This joke will become reality if present Democratic health restructuring proposals are enacted...

Infanti: Bringing Sexual Orientation and Gender Identity into the Tax Classroom

Posted on August 17, 2009
Anthony C. Infanti (Pittsburgh) has published Bringing Sexual Orientation and Gender Identity into the Tax Classroom, 59 J. Legal Educ. 3 (2009). Here is the abstract: A recent piece in the Journal of Legal Education analyzing student surveys by the Law School Admission Council reports that, despite improvement in the...

UBS Tax Crackdown Widens to Hong Kong

Posted on August 17, 2009
Front-page story in today's Wall Street Journal: UBS Tax Crackdown Widens to Hong Kong, by Carrick Mollenkamp: The U.S. crackdown on clients of UBS AG is widening into a global hunt, with the government detailing in court documents how the Swiss bank and outside advisers helped Americans hide money using...

Welcome (Back) to the Legal Blogosphere: CrimProf Blog

Posted on August 17, 2009
We are delighted to announce the re-launch of CrimProf Blog, edited by University of San Diego School of Law Dean Kevin Cole. With San Diego's other criminal law faculty (Larry Alexander, Donald Dripps, Yale Kamisar, Adam Kolber, and Jean Ramirez) serving as Contributing Editors, the blog promises to continue to...

Taxation and Entrepreneurship in a Welfare State

Posted on August 16, 2009
Mikael Stenkula (Research Institute of Industrial Economics) has posted Taxation and Entrepreneurship in a Welfare State on SSRN. Here is the abstract: Does tax policy affect the rate of self-employment in a modern welfare state? This question is analyzed empirically based on Swedish data for the entire post-war period...

U.S. Taxation of Foreign Athletes and Entertainers

Posted on August 16, 2009
Stephen Taylor (J.D. 2010, Villanova) has published Comment, "Are You Not Entertained? Is This Not Why You Are Here?" U.S. Taxation of Foreign Athletes and Entertainers, 16 Vill. Sports & Ent. L.J. 375 (2009). Here is the Conclusion: The IRS's compliance initiative is a ?wake-up call? to foreign artists and...

Oscar Mayer Heir Seeks 1,000 Rich People to Sign Petition to Increase Taxes on the Wealthy

Posted on August 16, 2009
Chuck Collins, heir to the Oscar Mayer fortune, is looking for 1,000 rich people to sign his online petition seeking to raise immediately reverse the Bush tax cuts and increase the top tax marginal income tax rate to 39.6% from 35% on household incomes of more than $235,000...

Top 5 Tax Paper Downloads

Posted on August 16, 2009
This week's list of the Top 5 Recent Tax Paper Downloads is the same as last week's list: 1. [357 Downloads] The Obama International Tax Plan: A Major Step Forward, by Reuven S. Avi-Yonah (Michigan) 2. [285 Downloads] Recent Developments in Federal Income Taxation: The Year 2008, by Martin J...

A Critique of the Proposed § 987 Currency Regs

Posted on August 15, 2009
Joseph Tobin (Simpson Thacher & Bartlett, New York) has published Going From the Frying Pan Into the Fire? A Critique of the U.S. Treasury's Newly Proposed Section 987 Currency Regulations, 17 U. Miami Bus. L. Rev. 211 (2008). Here is the Conclusion: The 1991 Proposed Regulations may have had some...

The Structured Settlement Tax Subsidy

Posted on August 15, 2009
Jeremy Babener (J.D. 2010, NYU) has posted Justifying the Structured Settlement Tax Subsidy: The Use of Lump Sum Settlements on SSRN. Here is the abstract: Structured settlements have been subsidized by federal, state, and local taxes for nearly three decades...

Saez: New Income Concentration Data

Posted on August 15, 2009
Emmanuel Saez (UC-Berkeley, Department of Economics) has updated his income concentration data to reflect the latest statistics from the IRS's Statistics of Income Division on August 3, 2009: Striking it Richer: The Evolution of Top Incomes in the United States (Update with 2007 Estimate): From 2006 to 2007, average real...

Deadline Extended for AALS Junior Law Prof Call for Papers

Posted on August 15, 2009
The August 15 deadline for the call for papers from the AALS New Law Professor Section for new law professors (full-time law profs for five years or less) has been extended to August 31: Four top quality papers will be selected from those submitted. The author of each of those...

Call for Tax Papers: AALS Junior Scholars Competition

Posted on August 14, 2009
Today is the deadline for the AALS's 25th Annual Call for Scholarly Papers: Those who will have been full-time law teachers at an AALS member or fee-paid school for five years or fewer on July 1, 2009 are invited to submit a paper on a topic related to or concerning...

Azam: Couples Taxation in Israel

Posted on August 14, 2009
Rifat Azam (Radzyner School of Law, Herzliya) has posted Couples Taxation in Israel: A Call for Separate Taxation on SSRN. Here is the abstract: The Article examines the joint taxation of couples in Israeli tax law and its consequences on women's rights and participation in the market field...

Livingston: A (Losing) Candidate's Perspective on Electoral Reform

Posted on August 14, 2009
Michael A. Livingston (Rutgers-Camden) has posted We Won't Vote for You If You Haven't Already Won: A (Losing) Candidate's Perspective on the Prospects for Meaningful Reform of the American Electoral System on SSRN. Here is the abstract: This essay considers the status of the American electoral system from the perspective...

From Frank Stipe (Virtual Worlds

Posted on August 14, 2009
From Frank Stipe (Virtual Worlds & Social Networking Project Manager, IRS Centralized Recruitment Office), IRS Saves Millions by Using Second Life to Market Its Employment Opportunities: In 2008, the IRS project team established a presence in the Second Life virtual world with the goal of exploring the potential use of...

The 49 Religiously-Affiliated U.S. Law Schools

Posted on August 14, 2009
Interesting article in the Back to School issue (Vol. 13, No. 1) of Pre-Law Magazine: Fostering Faith, by Karen Dybis: The nation's 49 religiously-affiliated law schools represent a spectrum of denominations and shades of belief. Some faculty incorporate this into curriculum, others do not...

WSJ: Tax-Cheat Showdown: Fess Up or Stay Quiet?

Posted on August 14, 2009
In today's Wall Street Journal: Tax-Cheat Showdown: Fess Up or Stay Quiet?, by Aura Saunders: The IRS is staging a massive poker game. It has invited 52,000 UBS AG account holders to the table. Now that the U.S. and Swiss governments have resolved a longstanding dispute about disclosing the identities...

Florida Responds to Former Law Prof's Racial and Sexual Discrimination Lawsuit Against School

Posted on August 14, 2009
I previously blogged (here, here, here, and here) the racial and sexual discrimination lawsuit filed against the University of Florida Levin College of Law and its dean,lawsuit by Sherrie L. Russell-Brown, a law professor at UF from 2001-2007, who alleges that she was forced out of her faculty position and...

Giving to Government: Voluntary Taxation

Posted on August 14, 2009
Sherry Xin Li (University of Texas, Dallas), Catherine C. Eckel (University of Texas, Dallas), Philip J. Grossman (St. Cloud State University) & Tara Larson (University of Texas, Dallas) have posted Giving to Government: Voluntary Taxation in the Lab on SSRN...

Jerry O'Connell's New Role: 1L

Posted on August 14, 2009
35-year old actor Jerry O'Connell (Crossing Jordan, Kangaroo Jack, Obsessed, Sliders, Stand by Me), husband of actress Rebecca Romijn (X-Men, Ugly Betty), has a new role: 1L at Southwestern Law School in Los Angeles. E! Online Examiner Just Jared Law School Headlines United Press International

IRS Uses Second Life in Recruitment

Posted on August 14, 2009
From Frank Stipe (Virtual Worlds & Social Networking Project Manager, IRS Centralized Recruitment Office), IRS Saves Millions by Using Second Life to Market Its Employment Opportunities: In 2008, the IRS project team established a presence in the Second Life virtual world with the goal of exploring the potential use of...

Tax Court: Overstatement of Basis Is Not Omission of Income Triggering 6-Year SOL

Posted on August 13, 2009
In Beard v. Commissioner, T.C. Memo. 2009-184 (Aug. 11, 2009), the Tax Court held that a taxpayer's overstatement of basis is not an omission of income and thus does not trigger the § 6501(e)(1)(A) six-year statute of limitations. For more, see Roth & Co...

House Eyes One-Year Stop-Gap to Prevent Estate Tax Repeal in 2010

Posted on August 13, 2009
Wall Street Journal: House Eyes Temporary Measure To Prevent Estate Tax Repeal, by Martin Vaughan: The House of Representatives is likely to propose a temporary, one-year measure to prevent repeal of the estate tax, as time is running short for a bipartisan group of senators to agree on a permanent...

Tax Tables in Statistical Abstract

Posted on August 13, 2009
Ann Murphy (Gonzaga) shared on the TaxProf Discussion Group some cool tax tables in the 2009 Statistical Abstract of the United States, including:

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