Monday, April 30, 2007

Should the Tax Law Provide a Fix for This Looming Catastrophe?

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Usually I'm dissecting or criticizing the tax law, or questioning the actions of legislators and other decision makers that affect taxat...
Friday, April 27, 2007

If Government Employees Don't Pay Taxes, Who Will?

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The story broke back in January. A Washington radio station, WTOP, using information obtained under a Freedom of Information Act request, ga...
Wednesday, April 25, 2007

Bar Exams, Law Practice, and Law School Curricula

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Not too long ago, Paul Caron alerted us with this question: Why Isn't Tax on Every State's Bar Exam? Paul was bringing our attentio...
Monday, April 23, 2007

Where Do Bad Lawyers Come From?

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Somewhere, I suppose, it is written that lawyers should be bold. But where is it written that they should do foolish things, be dishonest an...
Friday, April 20, 2007

How Good is Ninety Percent for Tax?

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A parent is teaching a child to drive. Suppose the parent tells the child to try stopping 90 percent of the times the child encounters a red...
Wednesday, April 18, 2007

Mapping the Tax Code

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Everyone knows I'm fond of tax charts, and if there's any doubt, check my most recent review of Andrew Mitchel's contributions....
Monday, April 16, 2007

The "Check the Box" Regulations: Chapter Three

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Almost two years ago, in Check-the-Box Regulations: Simplification Isn't Simple , I reported on the Littriello case, in which the Distri...
Friday, April 13, 2007

Tax Compliant Attorneys Stand Up to Unjustified Indictment

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In my last two posts, Some Aspects of Tax Law Aren't Complicated and Noncompliant Tax Attorneys Are Dangerous to the Tax System , I lam...
Wednesday, April 11, 2007

Noncompliant Tax Attorneys Are Dangerous to the Tax System

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No sooner had I commented on the indictment of an attorney for failure to file federal income tax returns, in Some Aspects of Tax Law Aren...
Monday, April 09, 2007

Some Aspects of Tax Law Aren't Complicated

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If the students in the basic tax course that I teach learn only one thing, it should be that they are under obligation to file federal incom...
Friday, April 06, 2007

What's the Harm in Giving Someone a Chance?

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A few months ago, in Just A Chance, That's All , I commented on the attempt by Mel Thompson to sit for the Connecticut bar examination a...

Tax and Music Reprise: And Sometimes the Combination Is Promising

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It's time for a followup to yesterday's post on Tax and Music: Sometimes the Combination is Frightful . A reader sent along a link t...
Thursday, April 05, 2007

Tax and Music: Sometimes the Combination is Frightful

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I am interested in tax. I am interested in music. So why am I bewildered by the appeal of the TurboTax Tax Rap Contest ? Perhaps it's be...
Wednesday, April 04, 2007

Watch Those Tax (and Other) Deadlines

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Once again, someone's failure to apply scheduling skills has put a taxpayer at a disadvantage. Ronald S. Raczkowski has lost his opportu...
Monday, April 02, 2007

Don't Stop Teaching, Andy

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Andy Cassel has written his last column for the Philadelphia Inquirer. He is steering his career into a related, but different, path. It...
Friday, March 30, 2007

Forwarding Telephone Excise Tax Refunds

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Ring up some accolades for a creative idea. The folks at Refunds for Good have been busy connecting their attempt to make taxpayers aware o...
Wednesday, March 28, 2007

Are Citizens About to be Railroaded on Toll Highway Sales?

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About a month ago, in Selling Off Government Revenue Streams: Good Idea or Bad? , I considered the many factors that need to be taken into a...
Monday, March 26, 2007

Too Long Silent in Health Care Tax Impact Discussion

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Somehow I missed Joe Kristan's response to my response to his response to my posting, Health Care Standard Deduction: Solves Uninsured P...

Splitting Tax Hairs

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Perhaps this commentary should be titled "Dividing Tax Hairs." A recent case from the Tax Court, Goode-Parker v. Comr., T.C. Summa...
Friday, March 23, 2007

Congress Invites My Ideas for Improving Tax Compliance and Of Course I Respond

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Several days ago I received a letter from Senator Max Baucus, chairman of the Senate Finance Committee, and Senator Charles E. Grassley, ran...
Wednesday, March 21, 2007

Some Law and Academic Things I Won't Be the First in the Family to Do

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Ever since I started digging into family history, I've known that a disproportionately high number of Thomas Maule's descendants wer...
Monday, March 19, 2007

It's Sleeting Tax Charts

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The last time I posted about Andrew Mitchel's new tax charts, I titled my comments "It's Raining Charts" . This latest cha...
Friday, March 16, 2007

Ignorant About Tax? It Might Be Dangerous to Life and Law Practice

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It was the headline that caught my eye. CNN announced Americans don't know jack about taxes and followed up with this teaser: "Mos...
Wednesday, March 14, 2007

"Should I Take This Course?"

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My suggestion last week in Law Grads: Time to Start Reading Lots of Tax and Law Books , to the effect that practitioners make lists of cours...