AALS Hosts Virtual Panel Today On New Voices In Taxation

The AALS Tax Section hosts a Zoom panel today on New Voices in Taxation at 4:15 pm ET:

This program gives junior tax scholars an opportunity to receive useful feedback on their work from senior reviewers before submitting the work for publication.

Kathleen DeLaney Thomas (North Carolina) (moderator)

Jeremy Bearer-Friend (George Washington), Taxation and the Law-and-Political-Economy Project (with Ari Glogower (Ohio State), Ariel Jurow Kleiman (San Diego) & Clinton Wallace (South Carolina)
Commentator:  Ajay Mehrotra (American Bar Foundation & Northwestern)

Jonathan Choi (Minnesota), Legal Analysis, Policy Analysis, and the Price of Deference: An Empirical Study of Mayo and Chevron
Commentator, Leigh Osofsky (North Carolina)

Hayes Holderness (Richmond), Insidious Regulatory Taxes
Commentator:  Beth Colgan (UCLA)

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AALS Hosts Virtual Panel Today On Tax Law In An Age Of COVID

The AALS Tax Section hosts a Zoom panel today on Tax Law in an Age of COVID at 1:15 pm ET:

In the wake of COVID-19, Congress rushed to use the tax policy and the administrative resources of the IRS to deliver economic benefits to individuals and firms, but it also used this must-pass legislation to enact long-sought tax measures. This panel will consider federal tax policy's role in this unprecedented economic contraction and in the fiscal crisis confronting state and local governments.

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Call For Tax Papers And Panels: Law & Society Annual Meeting On Crisis, Healing, Re-Imagining

Neil Buchanan (Florida) has issued his annual call for tax papers and panels for next year's annual meeting of the Law & Society Association in Chicago (May 27 - 30, 2020):

For the seventeenth year in a row, I will organize sessions for the "Law, Society, and Taxation" group (Collaborative Research Network 31).  For the fifth year in a row, I am pleased to be carried along in these organizational efforts by Professors Jennifer Bird-Pollan and Mirit Eyal-Cohen.

The conference will mostly be held online, but LSA does hope to hold some events in person in Chicago for those who are willing and able to travel.  They are also indicating that they will take account of time zone differences in their scheduling. ...

Although there is an official call for papers, please remember that you are not bound by the official theme of the conference ("Crisis, Healing, Re-Imagining").  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 11:59 p.m. ET (USA) on Thursday, January 7, 2021.

Please be aware that the online submission system has been changed significantly since last year.  (For what it's worth, I think the changes are all for the better.)  Please follow these instructions carefully:

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Tax Analysts Hosts Webinar Today On Artificial Intelligence And The Future Of Tax

Tax Analysts hosts a webinar today (2:00 p.m. ET) on Artificial Intelligence and the Future of Tax (registration):

AI systems process massive amounts of data, identify patterns, spot anomalies, and even generate predictions to guide action. This enables all aspects of businesses – including tax planning and preparation — to improve efficiency, identify critical information, and innovate faster than ever. But does it also bring risks?

• Benjamin Alarie (Professor & Osler Chair in Business Law, University of Toronto Faculty of Law; Co-founder & CEO, Blue J Legal)
• Cara Griffith (President & CEO, Tax Analysts) (moderator)
• Sarah Lawsky (Professor of Law, Northwestern Pritzker School of Law; author, Teaching Algorithms and Algorithms for Teaching, 25 Fla. Tax Rev. ___ (2021))

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NTA 113th Annual Conference On Taxation

Highlights of the first two days of the National Tax Association's virtual 113th Annual Conference on Taxation (full program here):

COVID-19 and Business Tax & Credit Policies
Session Chair: Yilin Hou (Syracuse)

• Mirit Eyal-Cohen (Alabama) & Ana Santos-Rutschman (St. Louis), Tax Policy and Pharmaceutical Innovation
• Joao Granja (Chicago), Christos Makridis (MIT), Constantine Yannelis (Chicago) & Erik Zwick (Chicago), Did the Paycheck Protection Program Hit the Target?
• Byron Lutz (Federal Reserve Board) et al, An Evaluation of the Paycheck Protection Program Using Administrative Payroll Microdata
• Nancy Shurtz (Oregon), A COVID Tale of Two Cities: A Case Study of Business Taxes in the Pacific Northwest
• Discussants: Yilin Hou (Syracuse), Martin Sullivan (Tax Analysts)

Electricity Sector: Policy Design and Outcomes
Session Chair: Agustin Leon-Moreta (New Mexico)

• Anne Kesselring (FAU) & Thiess Buettner (FAU), Banned for Bad Grades: Effects of Minimum Energy Performance Standards in the White Goods Industry
• Michael Ricks (Michigan), When You're Their Biggest Fan: Optimal Subsidies with Multiple Policy Instruments with Application to Wind Power
• Tracey Roberts (Cumberland), Stranded Assets and Efficient Pricing for Regulated Utilities: A Federal Tax Solution, 11 Colum. J. Tax L. 1 (2019)
• Discussants: Thiess Buettner (FAU), Louis Preonas (Maryland) & Tracey Roberts (Cumberland)

Legal Issues in International Taxation
Session Chair: Lilian Faulhaber (Georgetown)

• Reuven Avi-Yonah (Michigan), Constructive Dialogue: BEPS and the TCJA
• Yariv Brauner (Florida), Tax Treaty Negotiations
• Noam Noked (Chinese University of Hong Kong), Defense of Primary Taxing Rights
• Daniel Shaviro (NYU), What Are Minimum Taxes, and Why Might One Favor or Disfavor Them?
• Discussants: Lilian Faulhaber (Georgetown), Fadi Shaheen (Rutgers)

Nonprofit Organizations
Chair: Jeremy Bearer-Friend (George Washington)

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Tax Innovators Exchange Today At Stetson

New Tax Innovators Exchange Brings National Tax Experts to Stetson Law:

The Tax Law Society at Stetson University College of Law will present the Stetson Tax Innovators Exchange (S.T.I.X.) on Nov. 13, 2020, featuring nationally renowned experts in environmental taxation and tax technology.

S.T.I.X. is a new and forward-thinking tax law collaboration event focused almost exclusively on tax practitioners – those working in the trenches every day.  The nation’s top tax attorneys will dive into bleeding edge approaches to the practice of tax law and lead group discussions where practitioners can share challenges they face…and have a platform full of the greatest tax minds in the country work the problem out with them.

This interactive seminar will feature topics that run the gamut, but the overall goal is to ensure attendees leave armed with useful new techniques to advance not only their practice, but the field itself.

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Leff Presents Cannabis Taxation: Theory And Practice Today At Boston University

Benjamin M. Leff (American) presents Cannabis Taxation: Theory and Practice at the Virtual Boston University Law Review Conference today on Marijuana Law 2020: Lessons from the Past, Ideas for the Future:

My goal in my presentation is to make two primary points: (1) In designing a tax instrument to tax cannabis at the state level, it is misguided to get distracted by any theory of Pigouvian taxes, since the most important market substitute for legal cannabis is illegal cannabis, and so (except for some special cases) taxation of legal cannabis is not Pigouvian.  (2) In designing a tax instrument to tax cannabis at the federal level, the most important issue is the degree to which any federal tax crowds out state-level taxation, not the purported incoherence (or injustice?) of section 280E.  In fact, section 280E has some plausible benefits as compared to federal excise taxes.

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Florida Hosts 16th Annual International Tax Symposium

The University of Florida Graduate Tax Program hosts its Sixteenth International Taxation Symposium virtually today:

• Shu-Yi Oei (Boston College), Who Joined BEPS? Understanding the Proliferation of International Tax Consensus
• Young Ran (Christine) Kim (Utah), Blockchain Initiatives for Tax Administration

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15th Annual Junior Tax Scholars Workshop Concludes Virtually Today At Utah

Jon Choi (Minnesota), Implied-Utility Tax Analysis
Commentators: Ariel Jurow Kleiman (San Diego), Daniel Schaffa (Richmond)

Hayes Holderness (Richmond), Hate the Sin, Tax the Sinner
Commentators: Shelley Layser (Illinois), Blaine Saito (Northeastern)

Ariel Jurow Kleiman (San Diego) & Emily Satterthwaite (Toronto), Trading a Safety Net for a Living Wage?
Commentators: Ed Fox (Michigan), Goldburn Maynard (Indiana Business School)

Sloan Speck (Colorado), Double Tax Benefits and Targeted Tax Benefits Under the CARES Act
Commentators: Andrew Appleby (Stetson), Ed Fox (Michigan)

Clint Wallace (presenting, South Carolina), Jeremy Bearer-Friend (George Washington), Ari Glogower (Ohio State), & Ariel Jurow Kleiman (San Diego), Tax and the Law-and-Political-Economy Project
Commentators: Jon Choi (Minnesota), Hayes Holderness (Richmond)

Eleanor Wilking (Cornell, presenting) & Jacob Goldin (Stanford), What Are the Distributional Consequences of Federal Income Tax Penalties?
Commentators: Andrew Appleby (Stetson), Christine Kim (Utah)

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ABA Tax Section Hosts Free Webinar Today On The Tax System and Social Policy

The ABA Tax Section hosts a free webinar today on The Tax System and Social Policy at 1:00 ET:

The tax system has been used with increasing frequency as a social policy tool to administer social programs. From the Earned Income Tax Credit to the recent Economic Impact Payments, the IRS has been asked to do more with an ever decreasing budget. While the tax system may be an attractive vehicle to administer certain payments or benefits, it can also pose challenges. Panelists will examine the history of the tax code as a way to administer social programs. Panelists will then evaluate certain programs and discuss some advantages and disadvantages of administering these programs through the tax code. In particular, panelists will discuss the recent Economic Impact Payments and some of the challenges with administering these payments successfully. Lastly, panelists will propose some changes and alternatives to the way programs are administered to better serve the communities that are most in need of these benefits.

Speakers:

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15th Annual Junior Tax Scholars Workshop Continues Virtually Today At Utah

Andrew Appleby (Stetson), Subnational Digital Services Taxes
Commentators: Christine Kim (Utah), Shelly Layser (Illinois)

Ed Fox (Michigan, presenting) & Zach Liscow (Yale), When the Taxman Pays Taxpayers: Understanding the Psychology of Negative Tax Liability
Commentators: Jeremy Bearer-Friend (George Washington), Clint Wallace (South Carolina)

Jacob Goldin (Stanford, presenting) & Ariel Jurow Kleiman (San Diego), Whose Child Is This?
Commentators: Jeremy Bearer-Friend (George Washington), Daniel Schaffa (Richmond)

Christine Kim (Utah), Taxing Teleworks in the Wake of COVID-19
Commentators: Goldburn Maynard (Indiana Business School), Ariel Jurow Kleiman (San Diego)

Shelley Layser (Illinois), Magnet Zones
Commentators: Zach Liscow (Yale), Tracey Roberts (Cumberland)

Daniel Schaffa (Richmond), Payroll Subsidies as a Policy Tool
Commentators: Tracey Roberts (Cumberland), Eleanor Wilking (Cornell) 

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15th Annual Junior Tax Scholars Workshop Kicked Off Oct. 2 Virtually At Utah

Zach Liscow (Yale, presenting) & Ed Fox (Michigan), The Psychology of Taxing Capital Income: Evidence from a Survey Experiment on the Realization Rule
Commentators: Jon Choi (Minnesota), Sloan Speck (Colorado)

Goldburn Maynard (Indiana Business School), Enjoying Luxury while Black
Commentators: Jacob Goldin (Stanford), Blain Seto (Norteastern)

Tracey Roberts (Cumberland), Regulatory Taxation (Revisited)
Commentators: Hayes Holderness (Richmond), Eleanor Wilking (Cornell)

Blaine Saito (Northeastern), Tax Coordination
Commentators: Jacob Goldin (Stanford), Clint Wallace (South Carolina)

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ABA Tax Section Virtual Meeting

The ABA Tax Section Virtual 2020 Fall Meeting kicks off today. The full program is here. Today's highlight is Beyond CARES: Tax and Economic Policy Responses to the Ongoing COVID Pandemic (Teaching Taxation Committee (10:00 − 11:30 AM ET)):

In March, 2020, Congress enacted the Coronavirus Aid, Relief, and Economic Security (CARES) Act to ameliorate economic shocks to U.S. households from the COVID pandemic and lockdowns. The CARES Act included temporary: (1) Economic Impact Payments to individuals and families of up to $1,200 per adult (subject to income limitations) and $500 per child under 17 years old; (2) Paycheck Protection Program (PPP) forgivable loans to businesses, including independent contractors, to cover up to eight weeks of payroll costs or to pay interest on mortgages, rent, and utilities; and (3) supplemental Federal Pandemic Unemployment Compensation (FPUC) of $600 per week. Following expiration of CARES Act relief, the question is: what new COVID economic relief package is advisable? Members of Congress and policymakers disagree about the best approaches to counteract the continuing economic shocks to households from the pandemic. Panelists, including experts in tax, economics, and public policy will discuss tax and related policy responses to COVID economic relief going forward. Panel topics include proposals: to expand and increase the Earned Income Tax Credit; to expand and increase the Child Tax Credit; to reduce payroll taxes; to extend FPUC benefits; to increase federal subsidies to states; and to enact a federal VAT or Carbon Tax, which could fund an expanded EITC or Child Tax Credit or a lump sum Basic Income for Americans. Panelists will consider potential gender, racial, and socio-economic disparities in the economic impact of (1) the COVID pandemic and (2) pandemic relief proposals.

Speakers:

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Copenhagen Business School Hosts Virtual Conference Today On Inequality Within International Taxation

Copenhagen Business School hosts a two-day virtual conference beginning today on Inequality Within International Taxation (program):

How should concerns about inequality influence the choices that countries make in the design of their international tax laws and regulations? What role do international tax rules play in reducing (or exacerbating) inequalities of income and wealth, and how do concerns such as gender and racial inequalities inform and intersect with economic and political concerns? Can tax rules, for example, allow wealthier countries to help pull poorer countries out of poverty? Will political systems be willing to use tax policy to address the effects of continuing discrimination in employment, housing, and other areas of people’s live?

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International Tax Symposium In Honor Of Tim Edgar

Symposium, Re-Imagining Tax for the 21st Century: Inspired by the Scholarship of Tim Edgar (York University, Osgoode Hall Law School) (Vol. 67, No. 3; Vol. 67, No. 4; Vol. 68, No. 1; and Vol. 68, No. 2):

• Jinyan Li (Osgoode Hall), J. Scott Wilkie (Osgoode Hall), Graeme Cooper (University of Sydney), Re-Imagining Tax for the 21st Century: Inspired by the Scholarship of Tim Edgar, 67 Canadian Tax J. 613 (2019)
• J. Scott Wilkie (Osgoode Hall), An Introduction and a Tribute, 67 Canadian Tax J. 615 (2019)
• Richard M. Bird (Toronto), The Income Tax in an Uncertain World: Pillar, Symbol, and Instrument, 67 Canadian Tax J. 623 (2019)
• Robin Boadway (Queen's), Rationalizing the Canadian Income Tax System, 67 Canadian Tax J. 643 (2019)
• Geoffrey Hale (Lethbridge), Navigating Disruption: The Politics of Business Tax Reform as Two-Level Game, 67 Canadian Tax J. 667 (2019)
• Kevin Milligan (British Columbia), The Future of the Progressive Personal Income Tax: How High Can It Go?, 67 Canadian Tax J. 693 (2019)
•  Victor Thuronyi, A Supplemental Expenditure Tax for Canada, 67 Canadian Tax J. 711 (2019)
• Micah Burch (Sydney), Extranational Taxation: Canada and UNCLOS Article 82, 67 Canadian Tax J. 729 (2019)
• Brian J. Arnold (Canadian Tax Foundation), The Relationship Between Restrictions on the Deduction of Interest Under Canadian Law and Canadian Tax Treaties, 67 Canadian Tax J. 1051 (2019)
• Michael Kobetsky (Melbourne), The Transfer-Pricing Profit-Split Method After BEPS: Back to the Future, 67 Canadian Tax J. 1077 (2019)
• Jinyan Li, Jin Bao & Huaning Li (York), Value Creation: A Constant Principle in a Changing World of International Taxation, 67 Canadian Tax J. 1107 (2019)
• Wei Cui (British Columbia), The Digital Services Tax on the Verge of Implementation, 67 Canadian Tax J. 1135 (2019)
• Allison Christians & Tarcisio Diniz Magalhaes (McGill), A New Global Tax Deal for the Digital Age, 67 Canadian Tax J. 1153 (2019)
• Arthur J. Cockfield (Queen's), Sharing Tax Information in the 21st Century: Big Data Flows and Taxpayers as Data Subjects, 67 Canadian Tax J. 1179 (2019)

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Call For Papers: UC-Irvine Symposium On Taxation In Times Of Crisis

The UC-Irvine Graduate Tax Program has issued a call for papers for its third annual UCI/Lavar Taylor Tax Symposium on Taxation in Times of Crisis on February 22, 2021:

The purposes of this full-day symposium is to launch an in-depth discussion on the effects of local, national, and global crises on tax administration, tax policymaking, and tax compliance. We are interested in submissions for proposed presentations related to taxation in times of (or in response to) social unrest, racial tensions, pandemics, natural and man-made disasters, wars, climate and geological emergencies, financial crises, and other types of large-scale social challenges.

This one-day symposium will be attended by tax industry professionals, government officials, and academic researchers. We expect about 150 attendees this year. Presenters of accepted submissions will be invited to present at the symposium. If the symposium is held on campus, the Graduate Tax Program will cover the presenters’ reasonable travel and lodging expenses.

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AALS Call For Papers Due Thursday: New Voices In Taxation

Call For Papers: New Voices in Taxation Panel
AALS Section on Taxation/2021 Annual Meeting

The AALS Section on Taxation is pleased to announce the following Call for Papers. Selected papers will be presented at a works-in-progress session at the 2021 AALS Annual Meeting from January 5 through 9. While AALS has not made a decision about whether the conference will be held in person, selected presenters will have the opportunity to present remotely. This program will provide panelists the opportunity to present their work and receive feedback from senior colleagues in the field.

Eligibility: Scholars teaching at AALS member schools or non-member fee-paid schools with seven or fewer years of full-time teaching experience as of the submission deadline are eligible to submit papers. (Non-tenure track teaching fellowships count for this deadline.). For co-authored papers, all authors must satisfy the eligibility criteria. While we welcome submissions from previous panelists, we will give a preference to scholars whose work has not been selected for a previous new voices panel.

Due date: 5 p.m. PDT, Thursday, August 20, 2020.

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Webinar Today On Taxation And Social Contract In A Post-Pandemic Era

AfronomicsLaw Webinar IV: Taxation and Social Contract in a Post-pandemic Era today at 10:00 A.M. ET/7:00 A.M. PT (registration):

The responses of countries to the coronavirus pandemic have been limited by the strength of their revenue collection, especially through taxation. On the other hand, the expectations of citizens from their governments have been high, notwithstanding the strength or otherwise of the social contract between the sovereigns and the governed. In many developing countries, it is argued that the social contract has failed or is failing, calling for its review, if citizens will be obliged, whether legally or morally, to keep funding the social contract. As Alexander Ezenagu, the symposium convener argues, this conversation is applicable at the international level, as well as to domestic tax conversations.

This webinar is a follow-up to the recently concluded Taxation and the Social Contract in a Post-Pandemic Era: Domestic and International Dimensions Symposium which had 20 blog submissions.

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Taxation And Gender Equality Conference: Postponed

Following up on my previous post, Conference Announcement And Call For Contributions: Taxation And Gender Equality: 

Taxation and Gender Equality Conference: Postponed:

As the Organizers and members of the Academic Advisory Committee we regret to confirm what you probably assumed:  The Taxation and Gender Equality Conference and Research Roundtable that were to be held on September 14 and 15, 2020, in Washington, DC, have been postponed due to the travel and other risks brought on by the COVID-19 pandemic.  The Conference and Research Roundtable were to have explored the interaction between tax law and gender equality with the objective of shining a spotlight on gender issues in taxation and bringing consideration of gender impacts into mainstream discussions surrounding the enactment and administration of tax laws.  With the continued support of our sponsors, the Tax Policy Center, the American Tax Policy Institute, the American Bar Foundation, the Tax Section of the American Bar Association and the American College of Tax Counsel, we expect to hold the Conference in Fall 2021.  We will announce a date and venue once the public health crisis brought on by the pandemic has abated sufficiently to allow for safe travel and large in-person gatherings, and we will issue another Call for Papers at that time.

We thank all who submitted papers in response to our original Call for Papers and are endeavoring to provide virtual outlets for at least some of them. Please be on the lookout for further developments and thank you for your continuing support of this important project.

Organizers
Julie Divola (Pillsbury Winthrop Shaw Pittman and American Tax Policy Institute), Elaine Maag (Tax Policy Center), and Alice Abreu (Temple Center for Tax Law and Public Policy and American Tax Policy Institute)

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ABA Tax Section Hosts Free Webinar Today On Careers In Tax Law

The ABA Tax Section hosts a free virtual program on Careers in Tax Law today at 12:00 - 1:15 pm ET (9:00 - 10:15 am PT):

The program is intended for summer associates, law clerks, law students, and young lawyers who may be considering a career in tax law. Panelists will discuss their own career paths, provide advice, and give their perspective on the practice of federal tax law.

• Michael J. Desmond (Chief Counsel, IRS)
• Diana L. Erbsen (Partner, DLA Piper)
• Maurice B. Foley (Chief Judge, U.S. Tax Court)

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ABA Tax Section Hosts Free CLE Webinar Today On Race And The Internal Revenue Code

The ABA Tax Section hosts a free CLE webinar on Race and the Internal Revenue Code today at 1:00 pm to 2:35 pm ET:

As the nation focuses on the many racial inequities that permeate society, this free webinar will explore how the federal tax code, state and local taxes and international taxation impact racial inequality.

The panel will feature a demonstration of a recently released interactive feature that traces IRS Form 1040 line by line to examine the impact of the federal tax code on racial and economic inequality. The panel will further explore the impact of colorblind tax data on social policy. Panelists will also discuss the racial inequities perpetuated through taxable treatment of employment discrimination damages and how race intersects with international tax law and policy.

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AALS Hosts Virtual Panel Today On Inclusion And Addressing Racism In The Federal Income Tax Course

The AALS Tax Section hosts a Zoom panel today on Inclusion and Addressing Racism in the Federal Income Tax Course at 1:00 pm ET:

The AALS Tax Section will convene a panel discussion on classroom inclusion and how to identify and address policies with racist implications in the Federal Income Tax Law course. It may also discuss issues relating to who takes tax courses in law school. Many colleagues have been spurred by Jeremy Bearer-Friend’s post to the TaxProf email list about inclusive course design, and this panel seeks to connect course design choices to the specific context of tax classes.

The session will have two parts. The first (about forty minutes) will provide an overview that touches on casebook selection and syllabus goals. Each panelist will speak briefly about what they have done in their classrooms, with a focus on specific examples. The second part (about thirty minutes) will feature a moderator-panelist exchange during which the moderator will pose questions that have been submitted to panelists in advance of the panel.

Speakers:

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South Carolina Law Review Call For Papers: Taxation, Finance, And Racial Justice

The South Carolina Law Review will host its 2021 Virtual Symposium on February 19, 2021, at the University of South Carolina School of Law, hosted on Blackboard Collaborate Ultra. The symposium will specifically examine the intersection of tax law and policy and racial (in)justice at the local, state, and federal levels.

Tax law and policy plays an essential role in defining the ways in which individuals relate to and support one another. Revenue needs and spending policy are inextricably entwined and reflect and reinforce a society’s understanding of what each individual owes to and is owed by the society in which she lives. How tax defines income, whom it taxes, their relative contributions, and the activities that our tax system chooses to subsidize or not create countless points of overlap between tax and racial justice. The goal of this symposium is to critically examine the intersection of tax law and policy, finance, and racial justice through both a chronicling of the past and detailing pathways to reform. Topics may include (but are not limited to): the past and current impact of federal tax law and policy on historically-marginalized groups, the role of state tax systems in exacerbating and/or perpetuating racial injustice, and how tax law may be reimagined to advance racial justice at the state and federal levels.

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Avi-Yonah Delivers Keynote Address On Taxation After The Pandemic Today At Copenhagen Virtual Workshop On Corporate Tax Practice And Inequality

Copenhagen Business School, Three Day Virtual Workshop on Corporate Tax Practice and Inequality:

Scholars from the variety of fields that tackle either corporate sustainability or corporate tax practices do not ‘naturally’ meet for conversations, yet there are links between the various fields that could benefit from further dedicated exploration. Meanwhile, given the intensive media coverage of corporate tax practices and wider societal interest in the topic, much interesting research is underway to explore the linkages and other aspects of corporate tax practice that is relevant for the business in society agenda.

With this background in mind, this workshop will gather together speakers (and workshop participants) who are already involved in, planning or have a keen interest in research on the linkages between corporate tax and sustainability issues. The workshop will include presentation of innovative proposals as well as space for more general conversations about potential future research streams, key concepts that could inform work at this intersection, and theoretical themes or methodological approaches that are relevant to this work. It is our hope that the engagement between researchers from a variety of disciplines and with a variety of perspectives will generate new insights and add value to ongoing research that will enter the literature in the years to come.

The public key note speech by Professor Reuven Avi-Yonah from University of Michigan will be on Taxation after the Pandemic and followed by a Q&A:

If there is one thing that is relatively clear about the Covid-19 pandemic, it is that governments will need new sources of revenue to offset its costs and build a better social safety net. All over the world, governments are borrowing and spending at a pace not seen since World War II, and at the same time revenues from both income and consumption taxes are falling because of pandemic related slowdowns in economic activity. The result is unprecedented levels of debt that even with low interest rates mean inevitable needs for more revenue down the road. Even a country that borrows in its own currency like the US or Japan cannot debt well in excess of GDP forever without risking either inflation (if it creates money to pay off the debt) or a sharp increase in borrowing costs that crowds out other government expenditures at a time when they are most needed to bolster the social safety net, which the pandemic revealed to be quite fragile in many countries including the US.

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Symposium: The Impact And Future Of The Tax Cuts And Jobs Act

Symposium, The Impact and Future of the Tax Cuts and Jobs Act, 45 Ohio N.U. L. Rev. 501-560 (2019):

• Jennifer Bird-Pollan (Kentucky), Revising the Tax Law: The TCJA and its Place in the History of Tax Reform, 45 Ohio N.U. L. Rev. 501 (2019)
• Daniel Hemel (Chicago), A Place for Place in Federal Tax Law, 45 Ohio N.U. L. Rev. 525 (2019)
• Darien Shanske (UC-Davis), States Can and Should Respond Strategically to Federal Tax Law, 45 Ohio N.U. L. Rev. 543 (2019)
• John Koskinen (Commissioner, IRS), Woodworth Memorial Lecture: The Challenges Facing the IRS of the Future, 45 Ohio N.U. L. Rev. 561 (2019)

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Roin: Changing Places, Changing Taxes — Exploiting Tax Discontinuities

Julie Roin (Chicago), Changing Places, Changing Taxes: Exploiting Tax Discontinuities, Symposium on Legal Discontinuities (Cegla Center for Interdisciplinary Research, Tel Aviv University), 22 Theoretical Inquiries in Law ___ (2020):

President Trump’s decision to move his official state of residence from high-tax New York to no (income)–tax Florida has brought public attention to an issue that has long troubled scholars, as well as designers and administrators of income tax systems: how the interaction of tax rules deferring the taxation of income and tax rules based on residency allows taxpayers to reduce and even avoid taxation of their deferred income. These discontinuities in tax treatment may lead to excessive migration, as well as reductions in state income tax revenues.

Although trans-national moves of this sort are increasingly treated as “realization events” for tax purposes, triggering the immediate taxation of accrued but untaxed gains in the taxpayer’s country of original residence, the states of the United States have not tried to impose similar rules on residents moving to other states. This reluctance may stem in part from concerns that any attempt to do so would be struck down as a violation of the federal constitution’s Commerce Clause or its Right to Travel. But it may also stem from the fact that such a forced realization rule creates a different discontinuity; a tax rule accelerating the taxation of accrued gain penalize interstate movers (relative to those who stay put and continue to benefit from tax deferrals), disincentivizing such moves. Instead of too much interstate migration, there may be too little, interfering with both economic efficiency and what could be a valuable feedback mechanism about the performance of state governments. The same discontinuity problem arises in the international realm, of course, but there the difference in institutional structures and political sensibilities—not to mention larger revenue concerns due to higher tax rates—has led to a different policy outcome.

My paper analyses legal mechanisms or rules that might reduce both positive incentives and negative disincentives for interstate moves.

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Washington University Symposium: Current Issues In State Tax

Symposium, Current Issues in State Tax, 58 Wash. U. J.L. & Pol'y 1-296 (2019):

• Richard Pomp (Connecticut), Wayfair: Its Implications and Missed Opportunities, 58 Wash. U. J.L. & Pol'y 1 (2019)
• David Gamage (Indiana), Darien Shanske (UC-Davis) & Adam Thimmesch (Nebraska), Taxing E-commerce in the Post-Wayfair World, 58 Wash. U. J.L. & Pol'y 71 (2019)
• Charles Merriweather & John Whiteman (Missouri Dep't of Revenue), Missouri's Taxation of Remote Sellers in a Post-Wayfair World, 58 Wash. U. J.L. & Pol'y 95 (2019)
• Kirk Stark (UCLA), Regional Taxation in State Tax Reform, 58 Wash. U. J.L. & Pol'y 117 (2019)
• Michael McLaughlin (Washington Univ.), Alcohol Taxation and Child Maltreatment, 58 Wash. U. J.L. & Pol'y 151 (2019)
• Daniel Hemel (Chicago), The State-Charity Disparity and the 2017 Tax Law, 58 Wash. U. J.L. & Pol'y 189 (2019)

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Temple Symposium: Taxpayer Rights — All The Angles

Symposium, Taxpayer Rights: All the Angles, 91 Temp. L. Rev. 679-830 (2019):

• Alice G. Abreu (Temple), Foreword: Taxpayer Rights: All the Angles, 91 Temp. L. Rev. 679 (2019)
• T. Keith Fogg (Harvard), Can the Taxpayer Bill of Rights Assist Your Clients?, 91 Temp. L. Rev. 705 (2019)
• Richard K. Greenstein (Temple), Rights, Remedies, and Justice: The Paradox of Taxpayer Rights, 91 Temp. L. Rev. 743 (2019)
• Leslie Book (Villanova), Giving Taxpayer Rights a Seat at the Table, 91 Temp. L. Rev. 759 (2019)
• Jennifer J. Lee (Temple), Operationalizing Language Access Rights For Limited English Proficient Taxpayers, 91 Temp. L. Rev. 791 (2019)

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University Of North Carolina And Tax Policy Center Host A Virtual Conference Today On Responding To Income Shifting By Multinational Corporations

The University of North Carolina and Tax Policy Center host a virtual conference on Responding to Income Shifting by Multinational Corporations today at 9:30 am to 12:00 pm EDT (register):

Over the past few decades, corporate income tax rates and revenues have eroded worldwide as multinational corporations have shifted their reported profits from intangible assets to low-tax jurisdictions. In its study of base erosion and profit shifting, the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) recommended ways to limit abusive transactions that shift profits to low-tax jurisdictions and to improve corporate income reporting worldwide. The OECD is now considering more fundamental revisions of global rules for taxing multinational corporations that would either assign more profits to countries where goods and services are sold or impose new global minimum taxes on the intangible profits of a country’s resident companies.

Keynote Address:  Pascal Saint-Amans (Director, Centre for Tax Policy and Administration, OECD)

Panel #1: How Big a Problem is Income Shifting?

• Kimberly Clausing (Reed College; moving to UCLA)
• Scott Dyreng (Duke)
• Leslie Robinson (Dartmouth)
• Gabriel Zucman (UC-Berkeley)
• Edward Maydew (University of North Carolina Tax Center) (moderator)

Panel #2: The OECD’s Response to Income Shifting

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Ohio State Symposium: Artificial Intelligence And The Future Of Tax Law And Policy

Symposium, Artificial Intelligence and the Future of Tax Law and Policy, 16 Ohio St. Tech. L.J. 67-302 (2020) (program):

Introduction

• Stephanie Hoffer (Ohio State), What If Tax Law's Future Is Now?, 16 Ohio St. Tech L.J. 67 (2020)

Writing Laws That Robots Can Read

• Joshua Blank (UC-Irvine) & Leigh Osofsky (North Carolina), Legal Calculators and the Tax System, 16 Ohio St. Tech L.J. 73 (2020)
• Allison Christians (McGill), Taxation in the Age of Smart Contracts: the CryptoKitty Conundrum, 16 Ohio St. Tech L.J. 91 (2020)
• Sarah Lawsky (Northwestern), Form as Formalization, 16 Ohio St. Tech L.J. 114 (2020)

Taxing Robots

• Stephanie Hoffer (Ohio State), Tax Theory & Feral AI, 16 Ohio St. Tech L.J. 157 (2020)
• Robert Kovacev (Norton Rose Fulbright, Washington, D.C.), A Taxing Dilemma: Robot Taxes and the Challenges of Effective Taxation of AI, Automation, and Robotics in the Fourth Industrial Revolution, 16 Ohio St. Tech L.J. 182 (2020)

AI, the Labor Market, and Tax

• Daniel Hemel (Chicago), Does the Tax Code Favor Robots?, 16 Ohio St. Tech L.J. 221 (2020)
• Anton Korinek (Virginia), Taxation and the Vanishing Labor Market in the Age of AI, 16 Ohio St. Tech L.J. 244 (2020)

AI in Tax Compliance and Enforcement

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Symposium: Green Tax Solutions

The Pittsburgh Tax Review has published Symposium, Green Tax Solutions, 17 Pitt. Tax Rev. 1-200 (2019):

• Roberta Mann (Oregon), Tax Policies for Clean Manufacturing: Implementing the Green
  New Deal, 17 Pitt. Tax Rev. 1 (2019)
• Tracey M. Roberts (Cumberland), Greenbacks for the Green New Deal, 17 Pitt. Tax Rev. 53 (2019)
• Janet E. Milne (Vermont), How Durable Is a Lockbox for Carbon Tax Revenue?, 17 Pitt. Tax Rev. 105 (2019)

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Tax Papers At 6th Annual Michigan Junior Scholars Conference

6th Annual Michigan Junior Scholars Conference:

Rory Gillis (Toronto), Dividing the Public Fisc: Rethinking the Division of Tax Room in Fiscal Federalism

Michelle Layser (Illinois), How Place-Based Tax Incentives Can Reduce Geographic Inequality, 74 Tax L. Rev. ___ (2020):

Place-based tax incentives are frequently used by governments to encourage investment in low-income areas. But no standard exists to describe the ideal place-based tax incentive, making evaluation of these programs nearly impossible. This Article provides the necessary baseline by explaining when, where, and how to design place-based tax incentives that can benefit low-income communities by reducing geographic inequality. Using Geospatial Information System (GIS) mapping methods, this Article demonstrates how lawmakers can use public data to map spatial disadvantage. It then draws on tax theory to show how to design place-based tax incentives to reduce geographic inequality in targeted areas. The result is not a one-size-fits-all prescription, but a place-specific approach that can help place-based tax incentives become an effective vehicle for reducing underlying, geographic causes of neighborhood disadvantage. Comparing current place-based tax incentives to this baseline reveals that a significant weakness of current approaches is their failure to target places with geographic inequality or promote activities that could reduce it.

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23rd Annual Critical Tax Theory Conference At Florida

Florida hosts the 23rd annual (and first virtual)  Critical Tax Theory Conference today and tomorrow:

The Critical Tax Theory Conference has a long history of fostering the work of both established and emerging scholars whose research challenges and enriches the tax law and policy literature. Critical tax scholars question assumptions of objectivity in tax, as their work explores how tax law and policy impact historically marginalized groups. At a time when tax policy is once again at the forefront of politics and public discourse, the work of these and other critical tax scholars supports a more robust discussion of the role for tax law in current and future social and economic policy.

Friday

• Yariv Brauner (Florida), Tax Treaty Negotiation
• Kim Brooks (Dalhousie), A Hitchhiker’s Guide to Comparative Tax Scholarship
• David Elkins (Netanya), The Right and the Good: The Rhetoric of International Taxation
• Jonathan Choi (NYU), An Empirical Study of Statutory Interpretation in Tax Law, 95 N.Y.U. L. Rev. ___ (2020)
• Tessa Davis (South Carolina), Taxing the Cyborg
• Victoria Haneman (Creighton), Green Burial, Funeral Poverty, and Tax Incentives
• Darryll Jones (Florida A&M), Subsidizing Hate? Does the Constitution Require Tax Exempt Status for the Alt-Right?
• Henry Ordower (St. Louis), Capital, an Elusive Tax Object and Impediment to Sustainable Taxation
• Orli Oren-Kolbinger (Villanova), The Error Cost of Marriage
• Leandra Lederman (Indiana), The Fraud Triangle and Tax Evasion
• Fernando Loayza (LL.M. 2020, Yale), A Peruvian Tax Lawyer in a US Corporate Tax Class: What Can Be Explained and What Cannot Be Explained
• Kerry Ryan (St. Louis), Employment Taxation of Prison Labor
• Morenike Saula (George Washington), Why Nigeria Needs a FATCA
• Dan Shaviro (NYU), What Are Minimum Taxes, and Why Might One Favor or Disfavor Them?
• Phyllis Taite (Florida A&M), Making Tax Policy Great Again: America, You’ve Been Trumped
• Cristina Trenta (Örebro), Tax Measures in Support of the Circular Economy and Sustainable Development: The Experience of the Nordic Countries

Saturday

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Pepperdine Symposium: The Impact Of The 2017 Tax Act On Income And Wealth Inequality — Lessons For 2020 And Beyond

Due to the coronavirus, we had to cancel today's Pepperdine Law Review Symposium, The Impact of the 2017 Tax Act on Income and Wealth Inequality: Lessons For 2020 And Beyond. We are incredibly disappointed that we did not get to spend the day with these wonderful tax scholars and show off our beautiful law school, campus, and city. I feel especially bad for 3L Nicole Mitchell, the law review's symposium editor who conceived of the topic (after our Tax Policy class last Spring), selected and invited the speakers, and made all of the travel, hotel, and restaurant arrangements. However, we are delighted that many of the participants will be publishing their papers in the symposium issue of our law review.

Inequality Debate At Pepperdine: Arthur Laffer v. Emmanuel Saez

The Triumph of Injustice: Will a Wealth Tax Increase Prosperity and Opportunity in America?:

Join Pepperdine School of Public Policy and The Steamboat Institute for an evening debate over whether a wealth tax would enhance or diminish prosperity and opportunity in America, featuring Arthur B. Laffer, inventor of the Laffer Curve and member of President Reagan's Economic Policy Advisory Board, and Emmanuel Saez, professor of economics at the University of California, Berkeley, and advisor to US senator and presidential candidate Elizabeth Warren. This debate will be moderated by Amber Athey, White House Correspondent for The Daily Caller and Tony Blankley Fellow with the Steamboat Institute.

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Fordham Symposium: The Future Of The New International Tax Regime

Symposium, The Future of the New International Tax Regime, 24 Fordham J. Corp. & Fin. L. 219-319 (2019):

• Rosanne Altshuler (Rutgers)
• Jeffrey Colon (Fordham)
• Fadi Shaheen (Rutgers)
• Steven Dean (NYU)
• Michael Graetz (Columbia)
• Rebecca Kysar (Fordham)
• Susan Morse (Texas)
• Daniel Shaviro (NYU)

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UC-Irvine Hosts Symposium On Machine Intelligence And The Changing Nature Of Tax Law Practice

UC-Irvine hosts a two-day symposium on Machine Intelligence and the Changing Nature of Tax Law Practice. Tax Prof speakers include:

• Ted Afield (Georgia State)
• Benjamin Alarie (Toronto)
• Joshua Blank (UC-Irvine)
• Victor Fleischer (UC-Irvine)
• Stephanie Hoffer (Ohio State)
• Christine Kim (Utah)
• Sarah Lawsky (Northwestern)
• Omri Marian (UC-Irvine)
• Manoj Viswanathan (UC-Hastings)

Columbia Hosts Program Today On The Global Consequences Of The U.S. Tax Cuts And Jobs Act

Columbia Business Schools hosts a program today on The Global Consequences of the U.S. Tax Cuts and Jobs Act of 2017:

With the Tax Cuts and Jobs Act of 2017, the US government had great goals of improving US competitiveness by lowering the corporate tax rate, enabling the movement of money back to the United States, and driving job growth in the country. More than two years after enactment, there are a number of important questions to consider. Has corporate behavior changed as a result of the legislation? More broadly, how are businesses in the United States and abroad reacting to the changes? What is happening to tax policies around the world? And how might this change in the future, given the resulting deficits, rising US debt levels, and the impending US election?

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UC-Hastings Hosts Symposium Today On Revolution or Evolution: Administrative Law In The Age of Trump

Hastings Law Journal Symposium: Revolution or Evolution: Administrative Law in the Age of Trump:

This year, we will consider how the Trump administration has pushed the boundaries of regulatory policy and upended longstanding policy assumptions in a variety of different domains. Specifically, the symposium will consider the Trump administration’s use of administrative procedures to advance policy goals, the judicial response to Trump administration policies, and whether any administrative law doctrines and theories should be reconsidered. At the symposium, we plan on having panels dedicated to discussing how the Trump administration’s use of administrative law has impacted environmental law, immigration law, and tax policy.

Tax Law Panel:

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ATPI & TPC Host Conference On Taxes And The Future Of Philanthropy

The American Tax Policy Institute and the Urban-Brookings Tax Policy Center hosted a conference yesterday on Taxes and the Future of Philanthropy:

The philanthropic sector currently faces a difficult challenge: Recent changes to the tax law leave only about 10 percent of households, mainly with higher incomes, with incentive to donate to charity. This increasingly dominant influence of wealthy donors has drawn criticism, and leaders of the philanthropic sector have expressed concern about diminishing public trust in the sector’s efforts. In addition, a lack of resources limits regulators’ abilities to police this influence, thus bad actors threaten the sector’s reputation.

All this occurs against a backdrop of vexing societal challenges—climate change, rising inequality, loss of faith in government—that call for the philanthropic sector’s involvement. To address these issues, the sector is creating new philanthropic vehicles and approaches and considering legal and structural changes.

On Tuesday, February 18, a conference jointly organized by the Urban-Brookings Tax Policy Center and the American Tax Policy Institute, featuring panels of experts and a keynote address by Chronicle of Philanthropy editor Stacy Palmer, deepen the discussion by addressing the following:

• Has charitable giving become the province of the rich, and, if so, what are the consequences?
• What policies would more efficiently and fairly encourage charitable giving?
• Can the Internal Revenue Service regulate the philanthropic sector, and should reform account for the Internal Revenue Service’s capacity?
• How has the passage of the Tax Cuts and Jobs Act of 2017 affected charities?
• How will generational change affect philanthropy?

Welcome and Introduction

• Ellen Aprill (Loyola-L.A.; American Tax Policy Institute)
• Mark Mazur (Tax Policy Center)

Panel #1:  Oversight of Nonprofits

• Karin Kunstler Goldman (Charities Bureau, Office of the New York Attorney General), State Regulation and Enforcement in the Charitable Sector 
• Nina Olson (Center for Taxpayer Rights), TAS Studies of IRS 1023-EZ Determinations
• Marcus Owens (Loeb & Loeb), Charity Oversight: An Alternative Approach 
• Art Taylor (BBB Wise Giving Alliance), Hacking Nonprofit Collaboration 
• Elizabeth Young (American Institute of Certified Public Accountants), UBIT—Times, They Are a’changing…. 

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ABA Tax Section Mid-Year Meeting

The ABA Tax Section Midyear Meeting concludes today in Boca Raton, Florida. The full program is here. The highlight of the program is:

Teaching Taxation: Opportunity Zones – Two Years In
The Tax Cuts and Jobs Act enacted in December 2017 included a new provision intended to direct investment into low-income communities through a combination of tax benefits for investors (deferral, partial reductions in gains, and exclusions of future appreciation). Though the enactment of such targeted tax incentives is not entirely new, the design of this provision has raised significant questions for investing taxpayers seeking to secure the tax benefits and for public policy advocates assessing whether the Opportunity Zone provisions achieve their stated goals. To explore all of these issues, this panel will discuss the design of the new incentive, who is making the investments, where, in what projects, how much is being invested, who is securing the benefits, and what will be the likely community impact. The panel also considers the current data reporting requirements and what/whether data should be made public to facilitate assessment of the program’s success in promoting economic growth in low-income areas.

• Edward De Barbieri (Albany)
• Michelle Layser (Illinois)
• Ellen Aprill (Loyola-L.A.) (moderator)

Other Tax Profs with speaking roles include:

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Call For Proposals: Association For Mid-Career Tax Law Professors

The Association for Mid-Career Tax Law Professors (“AMT”) has issued a Call for Proposals:

The entirely overstaffed but largely underpaid 2020 AMT organizing committee—Ted Afield, Steven Dean, Miranda P. Fleischer, Brian Galle, Leigh Osofsky, and Darien Shanske—welcomes proposals for our annual conference.

AMT is a recurring conference intended to bring together relatively recently tenured professors of tax law for frank and free-wheeling scholarly discussion. Our sixth annual meeting will be held on Monday and Tuesday, June 1 and 2, 2020, at the University of North Carolina Law School, in Chapel Hill, NC. We’ll begin early on Monday and adjourn by noon-ish on Tuesday, in time to be somewhere near the middle of the line for tickets to the men’s basketball tip-off against UNC-Wilmington (Nov. 2020).

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Hamilton Project Hosts Conference Today On Tackling The Tax Code: Efficient And Equitable Ways To Raise Revenue

The Hamilton Project hosts a conference today on Tackling the Tax Code: Efficient and Equitable Ways to Raise Revenue at the Brookings Institution (webcast here):

The United States needs additional revenue sources for investments that support broadly shared growth, for fiscal balance, and for a more equitable tax code. As policymakers address these challenges, important questions about taxes arise—who pays them, what effects do they have on the economy, and how much revenue can they raise? Therefore, it is necessary to examine how our nation’s tax code can most effectively provide for a strong government that promotes not only growth, but also widespread economic well-being and reduced inequality.

Panel #1:  Efficient and Equitable Ways to Raise Revenue

• Timothy  Geithner (President, Warburg Pincus)
• Penny Pritzker (Founder and Chair, PSP Partners) (moderator)
• Robert Rubin (Former U.S. Treasury Secretary)
• Lawrence Summers (Harvard)

Panel #2:  From a Financial Transactions Tax to a VAX

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NTA 112th Annual Conference On Taxation

Highlights of the concluding day of the National Tax Association 112th Annual Conference on Taxation in Tampa (full program here):

Digital Services Taxation
Chair: Stephen Shay (Harvard)

• Christine Kim (Utah), Digital Services Tax: A Cross-Border Variation of Consumption Tax Debate
• Daniel Shaviro (NYU), Digital Services Taxes and the New Direction in Source-Based Taxation
• John Vella (Oxford), Digital Services Taxes: Principle As a Double-Edged Sword
• Discussants: Tom Neubig (Tax Sage Network), Susan Morse (Texas), Stephen Shay (Harvard), 

Directions for Tax Policy
Chair: Katherine Pratt (Loyola-L.A.)

• Jacob Nussim (Bar Ilan), Loss Offset and Income Averaging
• Katherine Pratt (Loyola-L.A.), Making Tax Expenditures Work
• Jay Soled (Rutgers), Gift and Estate Taxes and the Case for Deunification
• Sloan Speck (Colorado), The Taxation of Crowdfunding for Medical Care
• Discussants: Sloan Speck (Colorado), Eleanor Wilking (NYU)

Legal Issues In Tax
Chair: Doron Narotzki (Akron)

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Pittsburgh Symposium: The 1969 Tax Reform Act And Charities — Fifty Years Later

The Pittsburgh Tax Review hosted a symposium last Friday on The 1969 Tax Reform Act and Charities: Fifty Years Later (video):

Panel #1: Investing for Charity 

• Ray Madoff (Boston College), The Five Percent Fig Leaf
• Dana Brakman Reiser (Brooklyn), Foundation Regulation in Our Age of Impact
• Commenter:  Carolyn Duronio (Reed Smith, Pittsburgh)

Panel #2: Origins of Private Foundation Rules and their Meaning for Today 

• Jim Fishman (Pace), Does the Origin of the 1969 Private Foundation Rules Suggest a Match for Current Regulatory Needs?
• Khrista McCarden (Tulane), Private Operating Foundation Reform & J. Paul Getty
• Commenter:  Penina Lieber (Dinsmore & Shohl, Pittsburgh)

Panel #3: Regulating Charitable Actors  

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AEI Hosts Panel Discussions Today On The Tax Cuts And Jobs Act

The American Enterprise Institute hosts a panel discussion today on Trump’s Tax Reform Happened: Now What? A Panel Discussion on the Tax Cuts and Jobs Act (live stream at 2:00 - 4:00 pm EST here):

At the end of 2017, the passage of the Tax Cuts and Jobs Act (TCJA) brought the most sweeping overhaul of the US tax code in decades. At the time, projected effects and opinions were diverse and relatively uncertain, even among leading thinkers in the field. Now more than a year and half since its enactment, we are asking top tax experts from across the ideological spectrum to answer a variety of questions about this major tax overhaul — such as the impact on households, the corporate rate, the impact on inequality, deficit effects, long-term growth, and more.

• Alex Brill (AEI), Pro-family Tax Policy: The Case of the Tax Cuts and Jobs Act
• Leonard E. Burman (Syracuse), The Pro-Growth Argument for Progressive Tax Reform That Was Missing from TCJA
• Kimberly Clausing (Reed College), The Tax Cuts and Jobs Act Was Never About Workers
• Dhammika Dharmapala (Chicago), The Consequences of the Tax Cuts and Jobs Act’s International Provisions: The Early Empirical Evidence
• Jason Furman (Harvard Kennedy School), 'Not Much’: What Macroeconomic Data Say About the Impact of the Tax Cuts and Jobs Act
• William G. Gale (Brookings Institution), A Fixable Mistake: The Tax Cuts and Jobs Act
• Mindy Herzfeld (Florida), The Tax Cuts and Jobs Act: Lessons For the Future
• R. Glenn Hubbard (Columbia), The Tax Cuts and Jobs Act and Investment: Progress, Not Perfection

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UCLA Hosts 35th Annual Tax Controversy Conference

UCLA hosts its 35th Annual Tax Controversy Conference today in Beverly Hills.:

The Annual Tax Controversy Conference is the preeminent conference exclusively dedicated to tax controversy and tax litigation. The conference provides an open forum for distinguished presenters and panelists to discuss, and often debate, sensitive tax practice issues with an engaged audience. ...

We are privileged to have as our keynote luncheon speaker Charles P. Rettig, the 49th Commissioner of Internal Revenue. Chuck just recently completed his first year in the job and by all accounts had received very high marks. Tax administration is in very good hands.

This year we are again honored to have as our opening keynote speaker, Eric Hylton, recently appointed Commissioner of SBSE and former Deputy Chief, Criminal Investigation Division. Eric hit it out of the park last year and set the tone for a lively and informative conference.

Michael Desmond, the newly appointed Chief Counsel, Internal Revenue Service will be giving our afternoon keynote.

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Call For Papers And Commentators: 23rd Annual Critical Tax Conference At Florida

[W]e at the University of Florida are pleased that we will be the hosts of the 2020 version of the Critical Tax Conference. To give you all maximum time to make plans and to consider the special publication possibility that I'll describe momentarily, we are sending this official Call for Papers a bit earlier than usual.

The conference will begin early on Saturday, April 4 and conclude on Sunday the 5th, with the usual mixture of paper panels and incubator sessions — and, of course, the meals and get-togethers that we've all come to expect and enjoy.

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Call For Tax Papers And Panels: SEALS 2019 (Oct. 23 Deadline)

While it is a little hard to believe, it is already time to start thinking about next summer.  The Call for Papers for SEALS 2020 has been open for awhile, but somehow I missed the original call, so we are now running late.  The 2020 conference will be held July 30-August 5, 2020 at the Marriott Fort Lauderdale, Florida. 

The conference submission tool is now open, and I am eager to coordinate people who are interested in presenting tax work at the SEALS conference into relevant panel groups.  In addition, we have also had very successful Tax Policy Discussion Groups in recent years.  Panels are generally composed of 4 to 5 people speaking for 15 to 20 minutes each.  I will attempt to group papers so that panels include papers on similar topics.  The Discussion Group includes about 10 people, each speaking for 5-8 minutes on a topic related to tax policy, broadly interpreted.  This has often included topics that are not necessarily fully formed paper ideas, but are thoughts the presenter has had on something he or she would like to discuss with a group of smart, informed people in an informal setting.  Both types of presentation have been very successful in the past.  Each presenter may participate in one Panel AND one Discussion Group.

So, if you are interested in submitting to SEALS and would like me to include you in a group of other tax profs, please email me at jbirdpollan@uky.edu with the following information:

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Call For Proposals: Inequality Of Wealth, Race, And Class, Equality Of Opportunity

The University of St. Thomas (MN) Journal of Law and Public Policy is hosting a symposium on March 27, 2020, entitled “Inequality of Wealth, Race, and Class, Equality of Opportunity.” Topics include “Student Loans;” “Social Mobility;” “Housing;” and “The Public Good.”

Please submit proposals of 250 to 500 words to Professor Charles J. Reid, Jr, by November 15, 2019. We shall notify those who have submitted successful proposals shortly after that date. Successful submissions can expect a modest honorarium. Successful submissions will be published in our Journal of Law and Public Policy. The deadline for final drafts is July, 2020.

For those who wish to present in person on March 27, in addition to the honorarium, we shall cover travel costs, food and lodging.