Wednesday, October 5, 2022
Call For Tax Papers And Panels: Law & Society Hybrid Annual Meeting
Neil Buchanan (Florida) has issued his annual call for tax papers and panels for next year's hybrid annual meeting of the Law & Society Association in Lisbon and online (June 1 - 4, 2023):
The Law & Society Association (LSA) will host its next annual meeting from June 1 - 4, 2023, in San Juan, Puerto Rico. For the nineteenth year in a row, I am organizing sessions for the "Law, Society, and Taxation" group (Collaborative Research Network 31). For the seventh year in a row, Professors Jennifer Bird-Pollan and Mirit Eyal-Cohen are willing to work tirelessly as co-organizers to make our conference-within-a-conference a continuing success.
Under our signatures below, I've copied the Call for Papers email that LSA sent last week. Note that all sessions in San Juan will be entirely live -- that is, there will be no online sessions or virtual participation of any kind at next year's conference. Law & Society goes old school!
This year's official conference theme, "Separate and Unequal," happens to overlap with much of the work that you all have been presenting at Law & Society conferences over the years. Even so, please remember that you are not bound by the official theme of the conference, We will give full consideration to proposals in any area of tax law, tax policy, distributive justice, interdisciplinary scholarship, and so on.
The deadline for submissions is November 8, 2022 at 12 noon Eastern Standard Time (United States and Canada). That is barely more than six weeks from today!
October 5, 2022 in Conferences, Legal Education, Scholarship, Tax, Tax Conferences, Tax Scholarship | Permalink
12 Federal Judges Join Boycott, Refuse To Hire Yale Students As Law Clerks
Aaron Sibarium (Washington Free Beacon), Citing Concern for Free Speech, 12 Federal Judges Say They Won’t Take Clerks from Yale Law School:
A dozen federal judges say they are no longer hiring clerks from Yale Law School, citing a slew of scandals that they say have undermined free speech and intellectual diversity.
In addition to Fifth Circuit judge James Ho, who announced on Thursday that he would no longer hire law clerks from the nation’s top-ranked law school, 12 federal judges—both circuit and district court jurists—told the Washington Free Beacon they are joining the boycott.
"Students should be mindful that they will face diminished opportunities if they go to Yale," said a prominent circuit court judge, whose clerks have gone on to nab Supreme Court clerkships. "I have no confidence that they’re being taught anything."
October 5, 2022 in Legal Ed News, Legal Education | Permalink
Treasury Department Appoints Inaugural Members Of Advisory Committee On Racial Equity
U.S. Treasury Department, Treasury Department Announces Inaugural Members of Formal Advisory Committee on Racial Equity:
In conjunction with today’s annual Freedman’s Bank Forum, U.S. Secretary of the Treasury Janet L. Yellen announced the inaugural members of the Treasury Advisory Committee on Racial Equity. The first-of-its-kind committee will provide advice and recommendations to Secretary Yellen and Deputy Secretary Wally Adeyemo on efforts to advance racial equity in the economy and address acute disparities for communities of color.
Toward that end, the Committee will identify, monitor, and review aspects of the domestic economy that have directly and indirectly resulted in unfavorable conditions for communities of color. The Committee plans to address topics including but not limited to: financial inclusion, access to capital, housing stability, federal supplier diversity, and economic development.
“A critical piece of executing on our racial equity goals is bringing a wide set of outside perspectives and lived experiences to the decision-making table,” said Secretary of the Treasury Janet L. Yellen. “The Treasury Advisory Committee on Racial Equity, made up of members with wide-ranging backgrounds and expertise, will provide important insight and advice to leadership across the department to bolster and inform our equity efforts.”
The 25 inaugural members of the Committee come from a wide range of backgrounds including academia, advocacy, financial services, and local government. Members share a common experience with and working knowledge of the implications of economic policy decisions on communities of color, as well as a deep commitment to advancing racial equity.
Michael Nutter, the David N. Dinkins Professor of Professional Practice in Urban and Public Affairs at Columbia University and the former Mayor of Philadelphia, will serve as chair of the Committee and Felicia Wong, the President and CEO of the Roosevelt Institute, will serve as vice-chair.
Dorothy Brown (Martin D. Ginsburg Chair in Taxation and Professor of Law, Georgetown University) and Darrick Hamilton (University Professor and Henry Cohen Professor of Economics and Urban Policy, The New School) are members of the committee. The full list of the 25 members is below the fold:
October 5, 2022 in IRS News, Legal Ed News, Legal Education, Tax, Tax News | Permalink
WSJ: Tax On University Endowments Brought In Only One-Third Of Projected Revenue
Wall Street Journal, Endowment Tax on Wealthiest Universities Netted a Fraction of Predictions in 2021:
Wealthy colleges argued for years that a federal tax on their endowment income would limit their ability to provide financial aid—and represent a dangerous government overreach.
Internal Revenue Service figures show the actual impact of such a tax has so far been minimal: Last year, 33 schools paid a total of just $68 million, far short of the schools’ dire projections and the government’s official estimate, according to data recently published by the agency.
This is the first year the IRS broke out any details on payments of the tax, which was created in 2017 as politicians criticized wealthy schools for raising tuition while their endowments ballooned. It generally went into effect for the 2018-2019 school year.
The figures represent tax returns processed in calendar 2021 for schools including Princeton University, the University of Notre Dame, Duke University and Grinnell College. They are mainly based on schools’ tax returns for fiscal years that ended in mid-2020, which included poor market performance during the first few months of the pandemic that may have lowered collections.
“It’s a rounding error for the schools, a rounding error for the government, and really just a thumb in the eye more than anything,” Alex Reid, a tax lawyer and partner at BakerHostetler who represents nonprofit groups, said of the amount of taxes collected.
When Congress created the tax, the Joint Committee on Taxation estimated that it would generate about $200 million annually, but subsequent IRS guidance allowed for significant carve-outs.
October 5, 2022 in Legal Ed News, Legal Education, Tax, Tax News | Permalink
Tuesday, October 4, 2022
Fleming Presents Viewing The GILTI Rates Through A Tax Expenditure Lens Today At Vienna
Cliff Fleming (BYU; Google Scholar) presents Viewing the GILTI Rates Through a Tax Expenditure Lens (with Stephen Shay (Boston College; Google Scholar) & Robert Peroni (Texas)) at Vienna University of Economics and Business.
Before the TCJA, the outbound income tax planning of U.S. MNEs was arguably focused on maximizing the subsidy provided by deferral of U.S. residual tax (particularly when combined with cross-crediting). The TCJA rendered deferral largely irrelevant and replaced it with strategies to maximize the amount of CFC income that qualifies for preferential tax rates provided by the GILTI regime. These rates are indisputably a tax expenditure that should be subjected to the same cost/benefit analysis that applies to direct government expenditures. This conclusion is not changed by either the recently-adopted corporate minimum tax or by the remote possibility of the United States modifying the GILTI regime to make it Pillar 2 compliant.
The GILTI rates fare poorly under cost/benefit analysis. These rates are defended principally as a subsidy to offset a broad international competitiveness challenge faced by U.S. corporations. However, the existence of such a general problem is empirically unsupported and if it does exist, the GILTI rates are a poorly targeted remedy.
October 4, 2022 in Colloquia, Scholarship, Tax, Tax Scholarship, Tax Workshops | Permalink
The Miseducation Of Public Citizens
Etienne C. Toussaint (South Carolina; Google Scholar), The Miseducation of Public Citizens, 29 Geo. J. on Poverty L. & Pol'y 287 (2022):
The American Bar Association Model Rules of Professional Conduct calls upon lawyers, as public citizens, to embrace a special responsibility for the quality of justice in the legal profession and in society. Yet, some law professors adopt a formalistic and doctrinally neutral approach to law teaching that elides critical perspectives of law, avoids the intersection of law and politics, and tends to overlook the way law can construct the very social injustices that it seeks to contain. The objective, apolitical, and so-called “colorblind” jurisprudential stance in many law classrooms inflicts intellectual violence upon law students who discover a legal doctrine in conflict with their own lived experiences, yet who feel silenced and unprepared to reckon with the moral legitimacy of unjust laws. Perhaps as a result, in recent years, law schools have begun to rethink legal education altogether, devising anti-racist curricula, professional identity trainings, and novel experiential learning programs to produce a new generation of critically conscious lawyers for the crises of our modern age.
Building upon such efforts, alongside recent scholarship in legal education and philosophical legal ethics, this Essay proposes foundational pedagogical principles to teach public citizenship lawyering.
October 4, 2022 in Legal Ed Scholarship, Legal Education, Scholarship | Permalink
Seniors Are Moving From High-Tax States To Low-Tax States
Chris Edwards (Cato Institute), Taxes and Interstate Migration of Seniors:
Americans are moving from high‐tax states to low‐tax states. The smart states know this and are cutting income tax rates, as discussed in the forthcoming Fiscal Policy Report Card on America’s Governors.
One group that states want to attract with tax cuts are seniors and retirees. Just this year, 10 states cut their taxes on retirement income, which means income from Social Security, defined‐benefit (DB) plans, and defined contribution (DC) plans, such as 401(k)s. Currently, about three‐quarters of the states fully exempt Social Security benefits from taxes. About a dozen states fully exempt DB and DC benefits from taxes, and about half the states partly exempt it. ...
Seniors are moving from high‐tax to low‐tax states, as shown in the chart. On the horizontal axis is the sum of state and local sales, property, and individual income taxes as a percentage of income in 2019. On the vertical axis is the ratio of in‐migration to out‐migration for households age 65 and older, based on IRS data for 2020. The ratio is above one for states enjoying net in‐migration and below one for states suffering net out‐migration. Each state is a dot.
October 4, 2022 in Tax, Think Tank Reports | Permalink
NYU Professor Fired After Students Said His Class Was Too Hard
Robby Soave (Reason), NYU Chemistry Professor Fired After Students Said His Class Was Too Hard:
Maitland Jones Jr. was a professor of chemistry at Princeton University. In 2007, he semi-retired and began teaching organic chemistry at New York University on an adjunct basis.
Not anymore: NYU has fired Jones after students circulated a petition protesting that his class was too hard.
But according to Jones, the students weren't putting in enough effort—and had become disengaged, anxious, and indolent as a result of the pandemic.
"They weren't coming to class, that's for sure," said Jones. "They weren't watching the videos, and they weren't able to answer the questions."
Jones is profiled in a recent New York Times article that chronicles his firing. The piece also raises uncomfortable questions about elite institutions of higher learning and their utter devotion to appeasing unreasonable student demands. Organic chemistry is the bane of medical students everywhere, precisely because it is such a hard class. But many doctors would argue that that's the point: The class is designed to act as an effective gatekeeper, preventing underqualified students from entering the field of medicine.
"This article made my skin crawl," tweeted Alice Dreger, a bioethicist and former professor of medicine. "We aren't going to end up with good doctors by letting undergrad pre-meds pass organic chem because universities want to protect their US News rankings." ...
October 4, 2022 in Legal Ed News, Legal Education | Permalink
Sanchirico: Digital Services Taxes This Time Around
Chris William Sanchirico (Penn; Google Scholar), Digital Services Taxes This Time Around, 176 Tax Notes Fed. 2041 (Sept. 26, 2022):
The United States currently has an effectively exclusive taxing right on the high-tech foreign profits of its multinationals — a right it leaves largely unexercised. This has been unacceptable to U.S. trading partners for some time. On the other hand, recent reform proposals from the OECD are unacceptable to a decisive faction of U.S. legislators. This article proposes a more modest resolution to the conflict that, although far from ideal, might actually have a chance of meeting the main concerns of both skeptical U.S. lawmakers and exasperated U.S. allies.
October 4, 2022 in Scholarship, Tax, Tax Analysts, Tax Scholarship | Permalink
Pepperdine Law School Dean Is Now Speaking Openly About His Lifelong Stutter
Inside Higher Ed, Pepperdine Law School Dean Is Now Speaking Openly About His Lifelong Stutter:
Some of Paul Caron’s most vivid childhood memories are about his stutter: disappearing to the restroom whenever the server came to his family’s table at a restaurant so his parents would order for him; children laughing at him in fourth grade when the teacher asked him his name and he couldn’t say it.
Today, Caron is dean of law at Pepperdine University. He still stutters: he participated in speech therapy as a child and again at the behest of his law firm early in his career, but the speech disorder remained. What he calls the “daily terror” associated with speaking lingers, as well. But recently Caron has begun to talk openly about his stutter, in an effort to live more authentically, for his own sake and for that of students.
“I’m not doing this for attention, right?” Caron smiled during a recent interview prompted by a post he wrote, called “Deaning While Stuttering,” on his blog, TaxProf. “I’m just hoping that it’ll help folks to kind of see what struggles I have as dean and sort of how I’ve been able to overcome them.”
Academe hasn’t historically been hospitable to vulnerability. Many would say this is still the case and argue that higher education remains ableist, in particular. Perhaps that’s why there is so little available data on—and so little representation of—leaders with disabilities in higher education, as religious and disabilities studies scholar Darla Schumm pointed out in a recent opinion piece for Inside Higher Ed. “Why does higher ed need leaders with disabilities?” Schumm wrote. ...
October 4, 2022 in Faith, Legal Education, Pepperdine Legal Ed | Permalink
Monday, October 3, 2022
Avi-Yonah Presents A New Framework For Taxing Cryptocurrencies Today At Loyola-L.A.
Reuven Avi-Yonah (Michigan; Google Scholar) presents A New Framework For Taxing Cryptocurrencies, 175 Tax Notes Fed. 1391 (May 30, 2022) (with Mohanad Salaimi (S.J.D. 2022, Michigan)) at Loyola-L.A. today as part of its Tax Policy Colloquium hosted by Theodore Seto:
This Article explores the tax law challenges associated with the taxation of cryptocurrencies and offers proposals to address such challenges. The Article addresses the proper tax treatment of different cryptocurrency transactions and activities. It examines various aspects associated with the taxation of cryptocurrency through its life cycle, starting from earning cryptocurrency, through its disposal or exchange. The Article also examines the tax treatment of two special crypto events, hard forks and airdrops.
Specifically, this Article describes a proposal to tax cryptocurrencies based on their unique features. It argues that while various ways of earning or receiving crypto tokens (for example, mining in proof-of-work (PoW) protocols like Bitcoin and staking in proof-of-stake (PoS) protocols like either) generate taxable income, the tax results should take into account positive and negative externalities. The Article argues that the U.S. framework for taxing cryptocurrency is unadministrable and ignores the defining feature that distinguishes crypto from other assets: its volatility.
October 3, 2022 in Colloquia, Scholarship, Tax, Tax Scholarship, Tax Workshops | Permalink
Legal Ed News Roundup
ABA Journal, Employment Outcomes Were Great For 2021 Law School Graduates; Is That A Sign Of Caution?
- ABA Journal, Examining the Bar
- Erwin Chemerinsky (Dean, UC-Berkeley), There Are No ‘Jewish-Free’ Zones on the UC-Berkeley Campus
- Conduit News, Professor Explains Complaint Against Law School
- Jewish Journal, Berkeley Develops Jewish-Free Zones
- Law360, Yale Law Students' Retaliation Suit Reduced To One Claim
- Law.com, $15K Desks, 'Very Nice Pens' and Giant Turtle Ponds: What Law Students Plan to Splurge on Post-Graduation
- Law.com, Judge Dismisses Majority of Claims Against Yale Law, Gerken and Others
- Law.com, Law Professors Oppose Jan. 6 Immunity for Trump
October 3, 2022 in Legal Ed News, Legal Education | Permalink
Nam Presents Just Taxation of Crime Today At San Diego
Jeesoo Nam (USC; Google Scholar) presents Just Taxation of Crime: Should the Commission of Crime Change One’s Tax Liability?, 54 Ariz. St. L.J. ___ (2023), at San Diego today as part of its Tax Law Speaker Series:
The tax law treats criminals differently from non-criminals. Should it? Under the public policy doctrine, various tax deductions are disallowed if they are closely tied to criminal activity. Running a criminal enterprise is thus tax disadvantaged compared to running a non-criminal enterprise.
This Article considers a variety of possible explanations. (1) The tax disadvantage provides an incentive not to commit crime. (2) The tax disadvantage helps to bring deserved punishment to the criminal. (3) Criminals have given up their right not to be taxed. (4) Criminals have taken an unfair advantage and so must be stripped of that unfair advantage. (5) Taxpayers deserve to bear the full cost of their criminal activities with no help from others.
October 3, 2022 in Colloquia, Scholarship, Tax, Tax Scholarship, Tax Workshops | Permalink
The Supreme Court Is Blowing Up Law School, Too: Inside The Growing Furor Among Professors Who Have Had Enough
Update: David Bernstein (George Mason), Why Are Constitutional Law Professors Angry at the Supreme Court?
Khiara Bridges remembers the exact moment she lost faith in the Supreme Court. At first, at the start of Donald Trump’s presidency, Bridges—a professor who now teaches at UC–Berkeley School of Law—held out hope that the court might be “this great protector of individual civil liberties right when we desperately needed it to be.” Then came 2018. That June, the justices issued Trump v. Hawaii, which upheld the president’s entry ban for citizens of eight countries, six of them Muslim-majority. Suddenly, Bridges told me, she realized, “The court is not going to save us. It is going to let Trump do whatever he wants to do. And it’s going to help him get away with it.”
Four years later, the justices completely shattered whatever remaining optimism Bridges could muster about the court by overruling Roe v. Wade in Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health Organization. When the decision came down on June 24, she got a migraine for the first time in a decade. The image of the court as a majestic guardian of liberty was, she concluded, “a complete lie.” And it wasn’t just about her own personal feelings, either: Now she had to teach her students about the work of an institution that made her sick to contemplate.
October 3, 2022 in Legal Ed News, Legal Education | Permalink
Lesson From The Tax Court: Don’t Confuse Dummy Returns With Substitutes For Returns
The act of filing a return is central to tax administration. Section 6011 sets out the general requirement: “any person made liable for any tax imposed by this title” must file a return “according to the forms and regulations prescribed by the Secretary.” Section 6012 gets more granular and gives more specific requirements and exemptions from filing.
When a taxpayer fails to file a return, even after being reminded to do so, the IRS can simply send the taxpayer a Notice of Deficiency (NOD), and let the taxpayer either agree to the proposed tax liability or petition Tax Court. Or the IRS can follow the §6020 Substitute For Return (SFR) process whereby it creates a return for the taxpayer either with or without the taxpayer’s cooperation.
Regardless of how the IRS deals with the non-filer, an IRS employee first needs to create an account in the computer system for the relevant tax period. They do that by inputting the proper Transaction Code and preparing what is called a “dummy return” to support it. But there is one important difference between dummy returns used to set up the NOD process and dummy returns used to set up the SFR process: the §6651(a)(2) failure to pay penalties only apply to the failure to pay taxes shown on a “return.” Thus, the penalties do not apply to bare NODs. They do apply to SFRs. That’s why today’s lesson is useful.
In William T. Ashford v. Commissioner, T.C. Memo. 2022-101 (Sept. 29, 2022) (Judge Vasquez), we learn what to look for in the IRS files to see whether a dummy return used by the IRS leads to a proper SFR or not. We also learn why you cannot always trust the advice you see on the IRS website. Details below the fold.
October 3, 2022 in Bryan Camp, New Cases, Scholarship, Tax Practice And Procedure, Tax Scholarship | Permalink | Comments (1)
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October 3, 2022 in About This Blog, Legal Education, Tax | Permalink
More On Judge Ho's Proposed Boycott Of Yale Law School Grads For Judicial Clerkships
Following up on my previous posts:
-
A Prominent Federal Judge Says He Will No Longer Hire Law Clerks From Yale. Will Other Judges Follow? (Sept. 30, 2022)
- Conservatives Should Oppose Boycott Of Yale Law Students In Judicial Law Clerk Hiring (Oct. 1, 2022)
- ABA Journal, Why This Conservative Federal Appeals Judge Will No Longer Hire Clerks From Yale Law School
- Josh Blackman (South Texas), Giving Yale Law School The Heave-Ho: Another Way to Understand the Boycott of YLS Grads
- Ted Cruz, Incredibly Proud of Judge Ho’s Takedown of Cancel Culture
- Mother Jones, Mother Jones Congratulates Judge James Ho on His Decision to Boycott Yale
- David Lat, Ho No He Didn't! Pundits React to Judge Jim Ho's Yale Law Boycott
- Jack Marshall (ProEthics), Judge Ho Strikes Again! Is His Yale Law School Ban Unfair Discrimination Or Justly Utilitarian?
- National Review, Jonathan Turley: Judge Ho’s Boycott Will Not Change Yale Law
- Jonathan Turley (George Washington), Will the Call for a Judicial Boycott Change Yale? Don’t Bet On It
- Steve Vladeck (Texas), Response to Josh Blackman
- Wonkette, Federal Judge Fights Back Against Cancel Culture By Cancel Culturing Yale Law School
- Zero Hedge, Will The Call For A Yale Boycott Be A Wake-Up Call For The Woke? Don't Bet On It
October 3, 2022 in Legal Ed News, Legal Education | Permalink
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October 3, 2022 in About This Blog, Legal Education, Tax | Permalink
TaxProf Blog Weekend Roundup
Saturday:
- This Week's Ten Most Popular TaxProf Blog Posts
- Kerr: Conservatives Should Oppose Boycott Of Yale Law Students In Judicial Law Clerk Hiring
- A Re-examination Of The Capital Gains Tax Preference
- Rutgers Law School Fundraising Dean Files Gender Discrimination And Equal Pay Lawsuit
Sunday:
- NY Times: F3 (Fitness, Fellowship, Faith): A Cure For Middle-Age Male Loneliness?
- What Christian Colleges Can Glean From The Supreme Court’s ‘Yeshiva’ Case
- What Football Can Teach Us About Death: Fathers Are Fullbacks
- The Top Five New Tax Papers
October 3, 2022 in Legal Education, Tax, Weekend Roundup | Permalink
Sunday, October 2, 2022
NY Times: F3 (Fitness, Fellowship, Faith) — A Cure For Middle-Age Male Loneliness?
New York Times, For Suburban Texas Men, a Workout Craze With a Side of Faith:
By day, Glenn Ayala is a 50-something account manager who spends much of his time behind a desk. But at Rick Rice Park in the early morning darkness, doing push-ups and jogging with a 20-pound rucksack on his back, he is known as K9, and he is with his people.
One Friday in August, Mr. Ayala joined about 20 other men in what they called the predawn “gloom” for the group’s regular workout. They grunted and hooted un-self-consciously, razzing one another and shouting encouragements, using nicknames generated by the group. (Mr. Ayala got his because he trains dogs in his spare time.)
The members also often gather to pray together and talk, building friendships that have extended into their daily lives: When Mr. Ayala separated from his wife, members of the group helped him move. When his relationship with his adult son floundered, they texted him Garth Brooks songs to buoy him.
This is F3 — that’s fitness, fellowship and faith — a fast-growing network of men’s workouts that combine exercise with spiritually inflected camaraderie. After its founding in 2011 as a free, outdoor group workout, its popularity exploded during the pandemic, expanding to some 3,400 groups across the country from 1,900, aiming to solve, as John Lambert, a.k.a. Slaughter, the network’s chief executive, put it, “a problem that society at large and men definitely didn’t even know they had: middle-age male loneliness.” ...
I first heard about F3 through a few acquaintances in Texas, men who spoke about their local groups with the zeal of evangelists. It reminded me of how urban women used to talk with me about SoulCycle, only these guys were suburban fathers.
Its no-frills formula inspires fervent devotion. “F3 has changed my life,” Mr. Ayala said. He first attended last year, when a friend repeatedly nudged him to try it — or in F3’s baroque jargon, put him in an “emotional headlock.” He was hooked immediately. About a year ago, he got an F3 tattoo on his chest. ...
In F3, there are no facilities, no formal gear and no membership fees. Popular in the South, where outdoor workouts are pleasant most months of the year, the groups are ostensibly nonsectarian, in the style of Alcoholics Anonymous, though many have a Christian emphasis. Some men describe the group as complementing and expanding on their experiences in church.
F3 is also the rare setting devoted to male bonding. It means you “have guys to do life with,” said Pastor Giraud, a.k.a. Baby Shark, who works out with Mr. Ayala. “To really care for others and be cared for, to acknowledge others and be acknowledged.” ,,,
Many F3 men want to be traditionally strong providers, but also be more active and attentive in their family lives than their own fathers were.
David French (The Dispatch), A Short Story of Men:
October 2, 2022 in Book Club, Faith, Legal Education | Permalink
What Christian Colleges Can Glean From The Supreme Court’s ‘Yeshiva’ Case
Christianity Today, What Christian Colleges Can Glean from the Supreme Court’s ‘Yeshiva’ Case:
The United States Supreme Court’s decision in Yeshiva University v. YU Pride Alliance may seem like it spells trouble for Christian colleges that hold conservative positions on sexuality and gender identity.
After all, the court held that the orthodox Jewish university must formally recognize an LGBT student group. But a more complete reading of the decision forebodes a favorable outcome for Christian higher education in the future.
October 2, 2022 in Faith, Legal Education | Permalink
What Football Can Teach Us About Death: Fathers Are Fullbacks
The Federalist Op-Ed: What Football Can Teach Us About Losing A Loved One, by Mike Kerrigan (Hunton Andrews Kurth, Charlotte, NC):
Two close friends, Greg and Michael, lost their fathers earlier this summer. I never met either of their dads, but I know they were good men from the sons they raised. ... For the first time when they look up, their fullback is not out in front blocking. It’s unsettling at any age because clearing a path is what good fathers do. They quietly take the hits so their children can achieve things they never imagined for themselves. It’s what John Quincy Adams was articulating when he said, “I am a warrior, so that my son may be a merchant, so that his son may be a poet.” ...
Greg and Michael are not children anymore. They have their own families for whom they’ve sacrificed for years. ... [M]y friends are no longer running backs. They are fullbacks now, permanent blockers. A gradual, lifetime transition is made official. ... Each knows embracing their new roles is the best way to honor the legacy of their fathers.
October 2, 2022 in Faith, Legal Education | Permalink
The Top Five New Tax Papers
There is a bit of movement in this week's list of the Top 5 Recent Tax Paper Downloads, with a new paper debuting on the list at #5:
[321 Downloads] The Passthrough Entity Tax Scandal, by Daniel Hemel (NYU; Google Scholar) (reviewed by David Elkins (Netanya; visiting NYU 2021-23; Google Scholar) here)
- [189 Downloads] Standing On the Shoulders of LLCs: The Tax Entity Status and Decentralized Autonomous Organizations, by Samuel Brunson (Loyola-Chicago; Google Scholar)
- [176 Downloads] The Abandonment of International College Athletes by NIL Policy, by Victoria Haneman (Creighton; Google Scholar) & David Weber (Creighton; Google Scholar)
- [168 Downloads] International Tax Reform: Challenges to Multilateral Cooperation, by Assaf Harpaz (Drexel; Google Scholar)
- [165 Downloads] Supervisory Approval of Penalties: The Opening of a Graev Pandora's Box, by Monica Gianni (California State University Northridge)
October 2, 2022 in Scholarship, Tax, Tax Scholarship, Top 5 Downloads | Permalink
Saturday, October 1, 2022
This Week's Ten Most Popular TaxProf Blog Posts
Bryan Camp (Texas Tech), Lesson From The Tax Court: Honor The Corporate Fiction
- Evan Mandery (CUNY), What Trump Gets Right About Harvard
- Arkansas Democrat Gazette, Arkansas Law Professor Files State Claim Over Denial Of Named Professorship With $10,250 Stipend
- Wall Street Journal, If Legal Education Embraced Pay Transparency, Would Law Professors Emulate Hockey Players And Focus More On Scholarship And Less On Students?
- David Lat (Original Jurisdiction), A Prominent Federal Judge Says He Will No Longer Hire Law Clerks From Yale. Will Other Judges Follow?
- Reuters, Cardozo Law School Fights Fallout From Yeshiva University LGBT Club Case
- Reuters, Struggling San Francisco Law School Slashes Class Size, Cancels Tuition
- Paul Caron (Dean, Pepperdine), Tax Prof Moves, 2020-23
- Paul Caron (Dean, Pepperdine), Fellowships For Aspiring Law Professors (2022-23 Edition)
- Paul Caron (Dean, Pepperdine), Celebrating 50 Years Of Pepperdine's Malibu Campus
October 1, 2022 in About This Blog, Legal Education, Tax | Permalink
Kerr: Conservatives Should Oppose Boycott Of Yale Law Students In Judicial Law Clerk Hiring
Update: More On Judge Ho's Proposed Boycott Of Yale Law School Grads For Judicial Clerkships
Orin Kerr (UC-Berkeley), Boycotting Law Schools in Clerk Hiring As a Way to Influence Law School Culture:
Fifth Circuit Judge James Ho recently announced that he will be taking on cancel culture through his law clerk hiring practices. Judge Ho believes that the most significant cancel culture problems in legal education today are at Yale Law School. He has therefore decided that, in his capacity as a United States judge, he will no longer hire any Yale Law graduates as law clerks. And he is encouraging other judges to join him.
As I understand things from David Lat's useful coverage, Judge Ho's goal is to change the culture of law schools. By imposing a boycott, and by getting as many other conservative judges as he can to join him, he might discourage conservative applicants from enrolling at Yale Law School. That might pressure Yale Law School to change its culture. And that in turn might cause a shift in the culture at other schools.
This a bad idea, and I hope other judges do not adopt it. Given our blog's traditional readership among conservative judges and clerks, I thought I would take a minute here to say why. ...
October 1, 2022 in Legal Ed News, Legal Education | Permalink
A Re-examination Of The Capital Gains Tax Preference
Robin Morgan (S.J.D. 2023, Harvard), Note, Flawed Foundations: A Re-examination of the Reason and Purpose Behind the Capital Gains Tax Preference, 18 N.Y.U. J.L. & Bus. 599 (2022):
The favorable taxation of capital gains has seen extensive ex-post celebration and condemnation, but the ex-ante reason for its enactment has largely been forgotten. This Note, written one hundred years after the capital gains tax preference was first enacted in 1921, responds to this gap by re-examining legal history to ask two simple questions: why does the capital gains preference exist as a matter of law and what can be learned from why it was enacted? I find that Congress was presented with two options to address the problem of high tax rates on capital gains yielding surprisingly little revenue in the early 20th century. The first option was to adopt broader, foundational changes to the taxation of capital gains to make the tax harder to avoid, while the second was to simply enact a low, preferential tax rate that taxpayers would willingly pay. They chose the second option, and I present data from the IRS Statistics of Income to provide some empirical evidence that the lower rates did yield greater revenue.
October 1, 2022 in Scholarship, Tax, Tax Scholarship | Permalink
Rutgers Law School Fundraising Dean Files Gender Discrimination And Equal Pay Lawsuit
Law360, Ex-Rutgers Law Fundraising Exec Launches Equal Pay Suit:
A former law school fundraising executive has slammed Rutgers University with a gender discrimination and equal pay lawsuit in New Jersey state court alleging she was improperly paid less than a male counterpart and ultimately fired for complaining about the inequitable treatment.
Robin Todd, who served as assistant dean for development at the Camden campus of Rutgers Law School, said Thursday that she made such complaints for several years before being terminated in recent months under the guise of "restructuring." The university and its fundraising arm, Rutgers University Foundation, are named as defendants in the suit.
"Defendants' claim of 'restructuring' was a pretext for retaliation," the suit says. "In fact, defendants fired plaintiff because of her complaints of gender discrimination and violations of the Equal Pay Act and/or New Jersey Equal Pay Act."
The university hired Todd around November 2015 as the senior director of development for its Camden campus, primarily responsible for fundraising for the law school there, the suit says. Around April 2015, Rutgers had hired Robert Steinbaum as the associate dean for advancement at Rutgers Law School in Newark, and he was mainly responsible for fundraising for the law school at that campus, the suit says.
Todd said she had "significant experience in fundraising and development" at the time of her hiring, but Steinbaum did not when he was hired. However, Steinbaum was offered about $30,000 more in annual pay than Todd, according to the suit. ...
October 1, 2022 in Legal Ed News, Legal Ed Scholarship | Permalink
Friday, September 30, 2022
Weekly SSRN Tax Article Review And Roundup: Kim Reviews Falcão's Carbon Tax Policy And The EU Green Deal
This week, Young Ran (Christine) Kim (Cardozo; Google Scholar) reviews a new work by Tatiana Falcão (international tax consultant), Updating Carbon Tax Policy Is Crucial to the EU Green Deal, 103 Tax Notes Int'l 485 (July 26, 2021).
The 2022 Congress of the International Fiscal Association (IFA) was held in Berlin, Germany, earlier this month after the two virtual Congresses in 2020 and 2021. In this long-awaited in-person event, the OECD's tax head Pascal Saint-Amans, who led the base erosion and profit shifting (BEPS) project and brokered the two-pillar global tax deal, announced his departure. Although the successful implementation of the global tax deal is still uncertain, it is hard to deny that Saint-Amans has been at the center of the efforts to update the international tax system. Personally, I appreciate his making the international tax a more exciting and dynamic subject, not only because he led the BEPS project and the global tax deal but also because he contributed to establishing the automatic exchange of tax information systems and building the inclusive framework on BEPS. It is indeed the end of a chapter in the international tax discourse.
September 30, 2022 in Christine Kim, Scholarship, Tax, Tax Scholarship, Weekly SSRN Roundup, Weekly Tax Roundup | Permalink
Weekly Legal Education Roundup
ABC 8 News, University of Richmond Renames Law School
- Arkansas Democrat Gazette, UALR Law Professor Files Claim With State Claims Commission over Named Professorship
- Paul Caron (Dean, Pepperdine), Celebrating 50 Years Of Pepperdine's Malibu Campus
- Andrea Anne Curcio (Georgia State) & Alexis Martinez (Georgia Tech), Are Discipline Code Proceedings Another Example of Racial Disparities in Legal Education?
- Alex Erwin (Florida International), So You Want to be an Environmental Law Professor …: An Empirical Analysis of the Environmental Law Hiring Market from 2011 - 2022
- Chancellor & Dean David Faigman, Statement on Governor Signing AB 1936
- Christina John (New Jersey Appellate Division), Russell Pearce (Fordham), Aundray Jermaine Archer (Legal Aid Society of Westchester County), Sarah Medina Camiscoli (Public Counsel, Peer Defense Project, Yale) & Aron Pines (PEN America Writing for Justice), Subversive Legal Education: Reformist Steps Toward Abolitionist Visions
September 30, 2022 in Legal Education, Scott Fruehwald, Weekly Legal Ed Roundup | Permalink
Tax Policy In The Biden Administration
Bloomberg, IRS Final Regs More Than Double Enrolled Agent User Fees
- Bloomberg, Tax Write-Offs for College Athlete Pay Would Be Banned in Bill
- Daily Beast, Inside a GOP Candidate’s Tropical Island Tax Shelter
- Fortune, How the Inflation Reduction Act Imperiled the OECD’s Plans for a Global Minimum Tax on Corporations
- Inequality.org, Corporate America Suddenly OK with Paying Taxes … So Long as Those Taxes Enable Them to Lavish Mega-Millions on Their Top Executives
September 30, 2022 in Tax, Tax News, Tax Policy in the Biden Administration | Permalink
A Prominent Federal Judge Says He Will No Longer Hire Law Clerks From Yale. Will Other Judges Follow?
Update:
- Conservatives Should Oppose Boycott Of Yale Students In Judicial Law Clerk Hiring
- More On Judge Ho's Proposed Boycott Of Yale Law School Grads For Judicial Clerkships
David Lat (Original Jurisdiction), A Prominent Federal Judge Declares He Will No Longer Hire Clerks From Yale Law School:
And he's trying to get his fellow judges to join his boycott of YLS clerks—will it work?
Actions have consequences. And the problematic actions of Yale Law School when it comes to free speech, chronicled ad nauseam in these pages, could have consequences for YLS and its graduates—at least if one high-profile federal judge has his way.
This afternoon, at the Kentucky Chapters Conference of the Federalist Society, Judge James Ho of the Fifth Circuit delivered remarks about cancel culture, free speech, and intellectual diversity. After he discussed a series of distressing developments for free expression at several law schools, including but not limited to Yale Law—developments I won’t rehash here, having previously covered most of them in great detail—Judge Ho asked the audience: if cancel culture is a problem, then what can we do about it?
Judge Ho offered a few ideas. First, we should speak out against cancel culture and threats to free speech when we see them. Second, we should stop censoring ourselves, which is how cancel culture takes hold. Third, we can boycott institutions that engage in cancel culture.
To kick things off, Judge Ho announced a bold boycott of his own: starting today, he will no longer hire clerks from Yale Law School. And he explicitly invited his fellow federal judges to join him in adopting this policy. (News of Judge Ho’s boycott of YLS clerks was first reported by Nate Hochman of the National Review.) ...
Will other judges, most likely fellow conservative or Republican-appointed judges, join Judge Ho? I think it’s quite possible—because this is actually not the first time I’ve heard the idea floated. Judge Ho is the first judge to announce the anti-YLS policy publicly and to encourage others to join him. But I do know that other judges have already quietly adopted such a policy—and even privately encouraged others to join them. ...
September 30, 2022 in Legal Ed News, Legal Education | Permalink
Next Week’s Tax Workshops
Monday, October 3: Reuven Avi-Yonah (Michigan; Google Scholar) will present A New Framework For Taxing Cryptocurrencies (with Mohanad Salaimi (S.J.D. 2022, Michigan)) as part of the Loyola-L.A. Tax Policy Colloquium. If you would like to attend, please RSVP here.
Monday, October 3: Jeesoo Nam (USC; Google Scholar) will present Just Taxation of Crime as part of the San Diego Tax Law Speaker Series.
Tuesday, October 4: Cliff Fleming (BYU; Google Scholar) will present Viewing the GILTI Rates Through a Tax Expenditure Lens (with Stephen Shay (Boston College; Google Scholar) & Robert Peroni (Texas)) at the Vienna University of Economics and Business.
September 30, 2022 in Colloquia, Legal Education, Scholarship, Tax, Tax Scholarship, Tax Workshops | Permalink
Struggling San Francisco Law School Slashes Class Size, Cancels Tuition
Reuters, Struggling San Francisco Law School Slashes Class Size, Cancels Tuition:
Golden Gate University’s law school dramatically reduced the size of its first-year class and provided full scholarships to all new fulltime J.D. students this fall in a bid to improve sagging bar pass rates, reduce graduate debt loads and remain accredited.
The San Francisco law school intentionally enrolled just 21 new full-time J.D. students and 24 part-time students, down from 103 and 42, respectively, last year, law dean Colin Crawford said after the school announced the initiative on Thursday. That amounts to a 67% reduction in new students from a year ago.
All new full-time students are receiving scholarships covering three years of tuition—currently set at $52,500 a year—while about half of the new part-time students are also receiving free rides, Crawford said. He said he is unaware of any other law school that has eliminated tuition for an entire class of students.
September 30, 2022 in Legal Ed News, Legal Education | Permalink
Thursday, September 29, 2022
Raskolnikov Presents Should Only The Richest Pay More In Taxes? Today At Columbia
Alex Raskolnikov (Columbia) presents Should Only the Richest Pay More? at Columbia today as part of its Faculty Workshop:
This paper challenges the leading academic, political, and cultural narrative supporting greater redistribution. The narrative holds that redistribution should come at the expense of a very restricted group of the highest earners: the one percent, the super-rich, the billionaire class. I argue that many reasons offered in support of this view also call for redistribution from a much broader group that includes the affluent—those with incomes in the ninetieth to ninety ninth percentiles of the distribution. Whether one looks at the recent trends in income concentration, wealth concentration, social mobility, economic growth, political polarization, or the rise of populism, the affluent are as great—and sometimes greater—contributors to these problems as those in the top one percent. Remarkably, contemporary legal and economic scholarship has ignored the affluent almost completely, greatly limiting the magnitude of possible economic transfers as well the forms that these transfers may take.
September 29, 2022 in Colloquia, Scholarship, Tax, Tax Scholarship, Tax Workshops | Permalink
An Empirical Analysis Of The Environmental Law Hiring Market From 2011 - 2022
Alex Erwin (Florida International), So You Want to be an Environmental Law Professor …: An Empirical Analysis of the Environmental Law Hiring Market from 2011 - 2022, 49 Ecology L. Currents __ (2022):
Using data collected by Professor Sarah Lawsky for her annual entry level hiring report, I analyzed trends in the hiring of environmental law professors (“ELPs”) from 2011 - 2022.
Key findings include:
- 2022 was a strong year for ELP hiring – 11 ELPs were hired. This made up 9% of the total market.
- 60% of new ELPs attended a “T-14” school for their initial law degree – this is lower than the percentage of new hires from “T-14” schools across the market as a whole (75%).
- 92% of new ELPs had a fellowship and/or an additional degree.
- Additional degrees were more common among new ELPs (79%) than across the market as a whole (58%).
- Since 2017, 50% of new ELPs possessed a doctorate degree.
- Clerkships were less common among ELPs (43%) than across the market as a whole (57%).
- 66% of new ELPs practiced law in some capacity before entering academia.
- Women made up 60% of ELP hires, while they made up only 46% of hires across the market as a whole
September 29, 2022 in Legal Ed Scholarship, Legal Education, Scholarship | Permalink
Inspector General: The IRS Uses Cloud Computing Services Without Adequate Security Controls, Putting Taxpayer Data At Risk
Treasury Inspector General for Tax Administration, Cloud Services Were Implemented Without Key Security Controls, Placing Taxpayer Data at Risk (No. 2022-20-052) (Sept. 27, 2022):
To facilitate and guide its cloud security implementation efforts, the IRS developed its Cloud Security Reference Architecture in September 2019 and the Cybersecurity Cloud Operations Framework in November 2019. The IRS issued its updated Cloud Strategy and Cloud Security Internal Revenue Manual in March 2021 and September 2021, respectively.
By the end of Calendar Year 2020, the IRS had fully implemented 56 cloud services, 12 of which contained taxpayer data. The IRS deployed these cloud services without fully implemented security controls for protecting the data. ... [T]he IRS continued to accelerate cloud adoption without ensuring that important security controls designed to protect taxpayer data were in place in the cloud environment. ...
September 29, 2022 in Advice for Erwin Chemerinsky, IRS News, Tax, Tax News | Permalink
Are Discipline Code Proceedings Another Example Of Racial Disparities In Legal Education?
Andrea Anne Curcio (Georgia State) & Alexis Martinez (Georgia Tech), Are Discipline Code Proceedings Another Example of Racial Disparities in Legal Education?, 22 Md. J. Race Religion Gender & Class __ (2022):
Addressing racism within legal education has historically focused on diversifying the faculty and student body, as well as integrating teaching about institutional and structural racism into the law school curriculum. More recently, law school faculty have begun to focus on creating an inclusive campus culture, which requires looking at all systems and procedures that affect our students' sense of belonging and potential success as students and lawyers. One system that merits this attention is law school disciplinary code proceedings. This Article reviews studies from K-12, undergraduate, and lawyer disciplinary proceedings--all of which have found disparities exist. Given those findings, it is unlikely law school disciplinary code proceedings are a disparity-free zone. Because of the effect of disciplinary code proceedings on students' academic and career trajectories, as well as their emotional well-being, if law schools truly seek to address the institutional, structural, and interpersonal racism within our institutions, this area needs to be explored.
September 29, 2022 in Legal Ed Scholarship, Legal Education, Scholarship | Permalink
The Code Section 267 Related Party Rules: When Do They Apply To Section 351 Transactions?
Doron Narotzki (Akron; Google Scholar) & Melanie McCoskey (Akron; Google Scholar), The Code Section 267 Related Party Rules: When Do They Apply to Section 351 Transactions?, 136 J. Tax'n __ (2022):
Code Section 351 states that property transferors do not recognize gain or loss when they have control of the corporation immediately after the exchange. If the control requirements are not met, any realized loss that would be allowed under Code Section 351 may be disallowed under the Code Section 267 related party rules. One question that has not been addressed clearly in any primary source of authority is the proper time for testing to determine whether the related party rules apply. This article attempts to provide a review of the relevant legislation and court cases in order to provide guidance on this issue.
September 29, 2022 in Scholarship, Tax, Tax Scholarship | Permalink
What Trump Gets Right About Harvard
Politico Magazine: What Trump Gets Right about Harvard, by Evan Mandery (CUNY; Google Scholar; Author, Poison Ivy: How Elite Colleges Divide Us (2022)):
Clad in his trademark red sweater, Hall of Fame college basketball coach Bobby Knight introduced Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump to an enthusiastic audience of supporters in late September 2016. “I’ll tell you one thing for damn sure,” Knight bellowed. “I know how to win and he’s going to be the best winner we’ve had in a long time.”
Trump emerged to the theme from Rocky, praised Knight’s incredible winning record, and then launched into a diatribe about elite colleges and universities. Two months earlier, Hillary Clinton had proposed to make public college free for middle-class families. Trump would have none of that. “Universities get massive tax breaks for massive endowments,” Trump said, to boos and catcalls. “These huge multi-billion-dollar endowments are tax free,” he explained. “But too many of these universities don’t use the money to help with tuition and student debt. Instead, these universities use the money to pay their administrators or put donors’ names on buildings or just store the money, keep it, and invest it.” The chorus of boos loudened. “In fact, many universities spend more on private equity managers than on tuition programs.”
Trump’s persistent attacks on elites were a major component of his electoral strategy and remained a key part of his message during his presidency and subsequent exile. Condemning elites — particularly in higher education — has long been a part of the GOP playbook, but it’s even more key today. Last November, Republican Senate candidate J.D. Vance delivered a half-hour speech at the National Conservatism Conference titled, “The Universities are the Enemy.” Vance accused universities of pursuing “deceit and lies.” To applause, he said, “I think if any of us want to do the things that we want to do for our country and for the people who live in it, we have to honestly and aggressively attack the universities in this country.” Vance’s would-be Senate colleagues Josh Hawley — like Vance, a graduate of Yale Law School — and Ted Cruz — a graduate of Harvard — routinely attack elites and elite institutions.
To some extent, elite colleges are simply collateral damage in the culture war. Indeed, the thrust of Vance’s speech is about the need to break through the indoctrination of the liberal intelligentsia — via what he calls “red pilling,” a reference to The Matrix — where the “fundamental corruption” at the root of the system, as Vance put it, can’t be unseen once seen. “So much of what drives truth and knowledge, as we understand it in this country,” Vance said, “is fundamentally determined by, supported by and reinforced by the universities in this country.”
But that’s not the whole story. Another line of attack is about access. It’s about who gets to be part of the elite, and whether America has gotten a fair return on the massive investment that it has made in elite colleges. For, difficult as this might be for liberals to hear, almost everything Trump said to the crowd Bobby Knight had warmed up was true.
September 29, 2022 in Book Club, Legal Education, Tax | Permalink
Wednesday, September 28, 2022
Adediran: Disclosures For Equity
Atinuke O. Adediran (Fordham; Google Scholar), Disclosures for Equity, 122 Colum. L. Rev. 865 (2022):
This Article addresses how to increase funding to nonprofit organizations that are led by minorities or serve communities of color and how to hold corporations and private foundations who make public commitments to fund these organizations accountable for those commitments. The Article makes two policy recommendations to address these problems, while engaging with Supreme Court jurisprudence on mandatory disclosures to ensure that the proposals are narrowly tailored to institutional donors and include an opt-out provision so as not to chill the constitutional protection of the freedom of association. The first is for charities to publicly disclose their institutional donors in Schedule B of Internal Revenue Service (IRS) Form 990. The second is to modify IRS Form 990 to include information on the race and ethnicity of top managers, boards of directors, and the communities an organization serves.
September 28, 2022 in Scholarship, Tax, Tax Scholarship | Permalink
Subversive Legal Education: Reformist Steps Toward Abolitionist Visions
Christina John (New Jersey Appellate Division), Russell G. Pearce (Fordham), Aundray Jermaine Archer (Legal Aid Society of Westchester County), Sarah Medina Camiscoli (Public Counsel, Peer Defense Project, Yale) & Aron Pines (PEN America Writing for Justice), Subversive Legal Education: Reformist Steps Toward Abolitionist Visions, 90 Fordham L. Rev. 2089 (2022):
Exclusivity in legal education divides traditional scholars, students, and impacted communities most disproportionately harmed by the legal education system. While traditional legal scholars tend to embrace traditional legal education, organic jurists—those who are historically excluded from legal education and those who educate themselves and their communities about their legal rights and realities—often reject the inaccessibility of legal education and its power. This Essay joins a team of community legal writers to imagine a set of principles for subversive legal education. Together, we—formerly incarcerated pro se litigants, paralegals for intergenerational movement lawyering initiatives, first-generation law students and lawyers, persons with years of formal legal expertise, and people who have gained expertise outside of law schools—bring together critical insight about the impact of legal education’s exclusivity and the means by which we have worked to expand access necessary for our survival. The Essay explores the frameworks of movement law, Black feminism, and abolition as impacted people look to reclaim experiences and create tools for subversive legal education that teaches that the law belongs to the people and how they themselves can make and change the law.
September 28, 2022 in Legal Ed Scholarship, Legal Education, Scholarship | Permalink
Nurturing The Baby Bond Proposal: How Tax Principles Can Close The Racial Wealth Gap In The United States
James T. Smith (J.D. 2022, Temple), Comment, Nurturing the Baby Bond Proposal: How Tax Principles Can Close the Racial Wealth Gap in the United States, 94 Temp. L. Rev. 147 (2021):
“Every day I’m trying to play catch-up,” said Kourtney McGowan—a Black mother from California who became unemployed after her company refused to accommodate her work schedule during the COVID-19 pandemic. McGowan noted that she could not “have [her] son in [her] office for eight hours every day,” and she had no reliable plan for childcare. She turned her eight-year-old son to therapy to address his anxieties stemming from the pandemic. “Raising Black boys is hard in itself . . . . I’m just trusting God,” said McGowan.
The United States of America is the wealthiest country in the world, but, paradoxically, it has the largest wealth gap in the world. The wealth gap in the United States is starkest between races—Black wealth per family has declined by approximately 50% since 1983, while White wealth per family has increased by 33%. Families, like the McGowans, are finding themselves in difficult positions where they are “going to have quite a bit less to leave to their children.” Black children are more likely to live in poverty than their White peers, which impacts not only their physical and mental health but also their ability to achieve economic mobility.
Congress has relied primarily on fiscal policy mechanisms to provide substantial economic stimulus to the public and private sectors of the U.S. economy through the Tax Cuts and Jobs Act (TCJA) and—in the face of a raging pandemic—through the Coronavirus Aid, Relief, and Economic Security Act (“CARES Act”). However, these policies have fallen short of erasing racial economic disparities; in some cases, the policies have increased these disparities.
In order to address the racial economic gap, scholars and researchers across the United States have promulgated the idea of a “baby bond.” Upon the birth of an American child, that child would be provided a trust fund, which would become accessible when the child becomes a young adult. Each child would receive varying amounts of funds that would correlate inversely with the net worth of the child’s household at the time of birth. U.S. Senator Cory Booker (D-NJ) and others have adopted this idea but rely on gross familial income to calculate the amount of each disbursement, as opposed to actual wealth. The baby bond solution is gaining traction within academia and policy spheres.
September 28, 2022 in Scholarship, Tax, Tax Scholarship | Permalink
Early Decision Programs Pose Risks To Applicants And Law Schools Alike
Following up on my previous posts (links): Law.com, Early Decision Programs Pose Risks to Applicants and Law Schools Alike:
A number of law schools offer Early Decision application programs, giving prospective students the benefit of an expedited application review process in exchange for a commitment to attend that institution. But history has shown there are a number of potential downsides for applicants, as well as for the schools offering these programs.
Overall, less than 40% of American Bar Association-accredited law schools in the U.S. offer Early Decision applications. However, among the top 52 law schools (top 50, including ties), that number jumps to approximately 67%, according to various sources, including PowerScore Test Preparation’s LSAT and Law School Admissions blog and Spivey Consulting’s blog.
Eleven of the T14s have Early Decision—Yale, Stanford and Harvard do not. ...
Early Decision acceptance almost always has a “binding” requirement, meaning that prospective students must sign on the dotted line that they will be attending that school and withdraw any applications to other schools, according to Powerscore’s blog.
Just within the past month, two law schools changed their policies—one adding Early Decision and another eliminating it.
Last week, Boston College Law School launched a new Early Decision admissions program to provide an expedited review. ...
But some schools have found Early Decision programs to be detrimental to the admissions process overall. On Aug. 31, the Office of Admissions at Notre Dame Law School announced the elimination of the Early Decision application program in an effort to promote a more inclusive admissions process, according to the school’s announcement.
September 28, 2022 in Legal Ed News, Legal Education | Permalink
Dickerson Reviews Brown's The Whiteness Of Wealth
A. Mechele Dickerson (Texas), Shining a Bright Light on the Color of Wealth, 120 Mich. L. Rev. 1085 (2022) (reviewing Dorothy A. Brown (Georgetown; Google Scholar), The Whiteness of Wealth: How the Tax System Impoverishes Black Americans — And How We Can Fix It (2021)):
Professor Dorothy A. Brown boldly asserts in The Whiteness of Wealth: How the Tax System Impoverishes Black Americans — And How We Can Fix It that “whiteness has consistently and continually played a serious role in wealth building” (p. 20). Using stories from her life and the lives of other Black taxpayers, Brown methodically exposes how the same tax laws and policies that help whites build intergenerational wealth impoverish Blacks. Although readers who lack a business or legal background may not grasp the intricate technicalities of the Internal Revenue Code sections that Brown dissects, that does not matter. The clarity of Brown’s writing, her storytelling, and vivid examples involving her parents (Miss Dottie and James) and other ordinary Black taxpayers convey complex points—think tax policy preferences for horizontal equity or the lock-in effect—with ease.
This Review examines Brown’s powerful assertion that tax policies build and protect intergenerational white wealth and exacerbate the racial wealth gap by subsidizing activities and personal choices that disproportionately benefit white taxpayers. Those stunned by the enormity of this racial wealth gap will be horrified to learn that tax policies were designed to create white wealth.
September 28, 2022 in Book Club, Scholarship, Tax, Tax Scholarship | Permalink
Arkansas Law Professor Files State Claim Over Denial Of Named Professorship With $10,250 Stipend
Arkansas Democrat Gazette, UALR Law Professor Files Claim With State Claims Commission over Named Professorship:
A University of Arkansas at Little Rock law professor has filed a claim with the Arkansas State Claims Commission saying he was improperly denied a named professorship despite being the best-qualified faculty member for the position.
Robert Steinbuch said that his failure to receive the Arkansas Bar Foundation Professorship — which comes with a $10,250 stipend annually for four years — was "at least an abuse of discretion" by Dean Theresa Beiner of the W.H. Bowen School of Law at the University of Arkansas at Little Rock, and he seeks an award of $10,250.
Beiner "did not employ the required donor selection criteria for the position, and improperly adopted a series of her own created substantive criteria, including arbitrarily limiting the time period of accomplishments considered to five years, which obviously benefits candidates without a long history of accomplishments," according to the claim. "Named Professorships are designed to reflect a career of accomplishments, which inevitably includes recent years, but are not designed to only consider recent accomplishments at the expense of also considering" the full records of candidates.
"Beiner filled the one Named Professorship she advertised with an applicant," Lindsey Gustafson — who has been a member of the faculty since 1998 and was appointed Associate Dean for Academic Affairs in 2020 — "who at minimum demonstrably and significantly didn't fulfill the requirements of the Arkansas Bar Foundation Professorship as well as Steinbuch did, if she (did) at all, which does not appear the case," according to the claim. "Had the rules been properly applied, Steinbuch would have received the Named Professorship and the accompanying $10,250, which he seeks in damages."
Arkansas Democrat Gazette, Conflict Continues:
September 28, 2022 in Legal Ed News, Legal Education | Permalink
Tuesday, September 27, 2022
Taub Presents No Income Taxation Until Basic Accommodations: Toward Tax Justice In America Today At NYU
Jennifer Taub (Western New England; Google Scholar) presents No Income Taxation Until Basic Accommodations: Toward Tax Justice in America at NYU today as part of its Tax Policy and Public Finance Colloquium hosted by Daniel Shaviro:
Tax reform proposals recently promoted by progressive policymakers and candidates for elected office have focused on increasing federal taxes assessed on and paid by large business enterprises and wealthy individuals. These types of recommendations are designed to achieve redistributive justice based policy goals and also wisely follow the changing direction of public sentiment. From a policy perspective, economic research suggests that this sort of tax-receipts driven redistribution is essential in order to stem –– and ideally reverse –– growing wealth and income inequality trends. As for popular sentiment, the timing is good as the American public was already stirred up in response to the 2017 Republican-championed tax cuts for corporations and the super wealthy. Now, post-pandemic, the American people are even more receptive than they were before to taxing perceived coronavirus profiteering by billionaires and transnational corporations. We can also see evidence of strong support for targeting tax increases on big business and well-off individuals in polling as well as recent responses to the Inflation Reduction Act, the August 2022 legislation that moves modestly in that direction including with a financial-statement based fifteen percent alternative minimum tax on corporations that have on average $1 billion or more in annual earnings.
These efforts to raise revenue and reduce inequality through taxation are commendable. However, there’s something mostly missing from this agenda that proposes (and recently achieved) adding additional taxes for corporations and the wealthy. Absent, so far, is a serious discussion of direct tax relief for the rest of us.
September 27, 2022 in Colloquia, Scholarship, Tax, Tax Scholarship, Tax Workshops | Permalink
Table Of Links To U.S. Law School Statements On Antiracism/Diversity
Elizabeth Mertz (Wisconsin; Google Scholar) & Frances Tung (American Bar Foundation), Table of Links to U.S. Law School Statements on Antiracism/Diversity:
This Table continues a data-sharing effort begun by Scharf & Merton, and continued by Tung & Mertz in a 2021 SSRN posting as part of a larger project on law school education funded by the American Bar Foundation and directed by Elizabeth Mertz. For this Table, we collected links and information posted on law schools' websites regarding diversity and antiracism. We searched using law schools' websites, Google, and the Law Deans Antiracist Clearinghouse Project (https://www.aals.org/antiracist-clearinghouse/).
September 27, 2022 in Legal Ed Scholarship, Legal Education, Scholarship | Permalink
Mann Presents Energy Tax Policy And Support For Zero-Emission Cars In Fleets Today At UC-Hastings
Roberta Mann (Oregon) presents Taxation Support for Zero-Emission Cars in Fleets: Cases from the US and Australia at UC-Hastings (with Diane Kraal (Monash; Google Scholar)) today as part of its Tax Speaker Series hosted by Heather Field:
Two qualitative case studies of fleet vehicles in the US and Australia are presented that consider the effect of energy tax policy to increase light car zero-emission electric vehicles (ZEV) adoption in each jurisdiction. The article reflects on tax policies of selected European countries with EV uptakes that surpass the US and Australia. This research makes a substantial contribution to energy policy in the US and Australia by determining energy policies that can enhance the uptake of light car ZEVs, thereby linking to the United Nation’s target of reducing CO2 emissions in the transport sector. Recommendations are supported by analysis of case study transport emissions and government data. This article is significant because it presents strategies for more effectively using tax for energy policy in the US and Australia to increase the number of light car ZEVs. Taxation is seen as necessary to complement EV technology. The US case study finds tax changes are needed to support the current US energy policy of increased uptake of electric vehicles in government fleets.
September 27, 2022 in Colloquia, Scholarship, Tax, Tax Scholarship, Tax Workshops | Permalink
If Legal Education Embraced Pay Transparency, Would Law Professors Emulate Hockey Players And Focus More On Scholarship And Less On Students?
Wall Street Journal, Success at Work Is Warped by Your Co-Workers’ Salaries:
Like most people with regular jobs that don’t require wearing skates to work, professional hockey players had no idea how much money their colleagues made—until one morning in 1990 when a newspaper published the salary of everyone in the National Hockey League.
It was an extreme case of a topic that captivates economists: pay transparency.
So not long ago, intrigued by the consequences of that overnight shock, a researcher decided to exploit this natural experiment hiding in plain sight. It led to insights that have never been so relevant about how one industry’s wage disclosure affected the performance of those employees and their entire teams.
Now a version of what happened in hockey is on the verge of happening across the U.S.
The country is nearing a crossroads in the battle over salary transparency that would bring major changes to some of the nation’s most powerful companies from Wall Street to Silicon Valley.
A small number of states already have wage-disclosure laws that require most workplaces to list pay ranges on their job postings. These policies meant to narrow gender pay gaps could become more common, as New York City is set to enact sweeping legislation in November and California sent a bill to the governor’s desk for a decision by the end of September.
Talking about money in the office used to be taboo. But younger workers are more comfortable discussing how much they make, a phenomenon their older colleagues find as befuddling as TikTok. As it turns out, there are hidden effects of pay transparency that warp the way people view success, and that’s why hockey’s unplanned experiment is worth another look today: We could all learn a thing or two from a few hundred people a few decades ago.
That moment of mass disclosure in the NHL is the focus of a new paper by James Flynn, an economics Ph.D. candidate at the University of Colorado [Salary disclosure and individual effort: Evidence from the National Hockey League]. Plenty of studies have shown that salary transparency affects employee satisfaction. This one measures their production.
The employees who discovered they were paid less than their peers didn’t suddenly put in less effort at work. They just exerted a different kind of effort.
In a likely response to what they perceived as unfair pay, these NHL players sacrificed defense and shifted their attention to offense, since players who were better at offense commanded higher salaries in contract negotiations. They had seen the skills their labor market rewarded—and they were following the money. But this was counterproductive. The performance of their teams suffered when they altered their individual play. ...
September 27, 2022 in Legal Ed News, Legal Education | Permalink
Evaluating The Tax Veto In A Digital Age: Legislative Efficiency And National Sovereignty In The European Union
Charlotte A. McFaddin (J.D. 2021, Virginia; Associate, Weil, Gotshal & Manges, Washington, D.C.), Note, Evaluating the Tax Veto in a Digital Age: Legislative Efficiency and National Sovereignty in the European Union, 62 Va. J. Int'l L. 429 (2022):
The total market capitalization of the six largest U.S.-headquartered tech companies now tops $4.5 trillion; yet much of their revenues legally escape taxation every year. Recognizing the challenges of taxing the digital economy, the international community joined forces to reform the outdated global tax framework. In 2018, however, the United States hesitated to commit to reform and international negotiations stalled. The European Commission (Commission) subsequently proposed an interim Digital Service Tax for the European Union (EU), in part, to incentivize stronger U.S. involvement in negotiations. Because the European Council requires unanimity when voting on tax proposals, however, the proposal failed when three Member States exercised their tax veto. Defeated by veto, EU leaders could have pursued Enhanced Cooperation to revive the legislation. Instead, the Commission proposed permanent elimination of tax unanimity through the obscure and never used Passerelle Clauses that allow legislators to utilize majority voting without amending any treaties. In doing so, the Commission signaled its desire for the European Union to emerge as a global tax leader, unencumbered by the need to obtain unanimity. However, the Commission’s proposal also raises serious EU state sovereignty concerns.
September 27, 2022 in Scholarship, Tax, Tax Scholarship | Permalink
