Friday, July 31, 2015

Another Problem with Targeted Tax Credits

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Readers of MauledAgain know that I object to using the tax law to accomplish what can and should be accomplished, if at all, through other m...
Wednesday, July 29, 2015

Changing the Look of Tax Forms

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A reader pointed me in the direction of a three-year-old paper published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the Unit...
Monday, July 27, 2015

Tax Fraud in The People’s Court

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Every now and then an episode from a television court show touches on taxation. Sometimes it is tangential and sometimes it is direct. At va...
Friday, July 24, 2015

Yet More Proof Targeted Tax Breaks Miss the Mark

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In my post earlier this week, Who Benefits from Tax Breaks for the Private Sector? , I shared this thought about tax breaks for specifically...
Wednesday, July 22, 2015

When Raising Taxes Isn’t a Tax Increase

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If a sports team that lost two games after winning the first five games of its season claimed to be undefeated because the losses came after...
Monday, July 20, 2015

Who Benefits from Tax Breaks for the Private Sector?

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Many people, I suppose, would respond to the question, “Who benefits from tax breaks for the private sector?” with the answer, “The private ...
Friday, July 17, 2015

Be Careful With Divorce Tax Planning

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Two recent Tax Court cases, published on the same day, illustrate the need for taxpayers to be careful when planning how to work out the eco...
Wednesday, July 15, 2015

Goodbye Because of Tax? Hardly.

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As Pennsylvania moves deeper into budget crisis, rhetoric over the governor’s attempts to replace the shale impact fee with an extraction ta...
Monday, July 13, 2015

So Is It a Tax or a Fee?

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There’s a difference between a tax and a fee. I explained it in Please, It’s Not a Tax . So why do some people use the word “tax” to describ...
Friday, July 10, 2015

When the Rich Beg, for Tax Breaks

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It’s getting tiresome, this begging by wealthy people and entities for tax breaks. Actually, it’s not so much begging as it is blackmail. We...
Wednesday, July 08, 2015

Name a Tax

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A reader sent me this story , and asked a question. First, the story. According to the story, the governor of Rhode Island has proposed a ...
Monday, July 06, 2015

So What’s a Taxpayer To Do?

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Almost all taxpayers who retain tax return preparers to prepare their federal income tax returns do so because they find the task too challe...
Friday, July 03, 2015

When the Job of a Tax Is Finished

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What should be done when the purpose of a tax is finished? Presumably, the tax should be repealed. We know, of course, that this doesn’t hap...
Wednesday, July 01, 2015

Learning About Tax from the Judge. Judy, That Is.

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When, from time to time, I mention that I watch episodes of Judge Judy whenever I get the chance, sometimes the reaction is one of bewilderm...
Monday, June 29, 2015

The Anti-Tax Bully Strikes Again

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Readers of MauledAgain know that I consider Grover Norquist to be an anti-tax bully. In Debunking Tax Myths? , I shared opinions expressed b...
Friday, June 26, 2015

Should Bicyclists Pay Taxes for Road Upkeep?

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A story from two years ago with tax roots is now going viral, as a recent addendum to the story notes. Discussions about what was reported ...
Wednesday, June 24, 2015

So What’s Trickling Down?

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Back in January, in A New Play in the Make-the-Rich-Richer Game Plan , I explained how Kansas politicians were struggling with the need to r...
Monday, June 22, 2015

When Tax Ignorance Gets Particularly Scary

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As one of my readers put it, absurd claims about the size of the Internal Revenue Code is one of my favorite topics. Indeed it is. My explor...
Friday, June 19, 2015

A Tax Fray Between the Bricks and Mortar Stores and the Online Merchant Community

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Sometimes I wonder, when it appears that people exhibit ignorance, if they actually lack understanding and knowledge or simply are pretendin...
Wednesday, June 17, 2015

How Does a Politician Fix a Tax Law The Politician Doesn’t Understand?

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Perhaps we have been handed another clue in the great mystery of why tax laws don’t get fixed. It’s common knowledge that one reason for tax...
Monday, June 15, 2015

The New Five-Year Plan?

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In a National Review commentary , Tom Giovanetti of the Institute for Policy Innovation proposes that every law and regulation expire after ...
Friday, June 12, 2015

When Infrastructure Failure Is Up Close and Personal, Does It Make a Difference?

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Readers of this blog know that on my list of pet peeves – a list that keeps growing – is the foolishness of letting the nation’s infrastruct...
Wednesday, June 10, 2015

The Return of the Lap Dance Tax Challenge

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Almost two years ago, in Lap Dance Tax? , I first wrote about the attempt by Philadelphia to impose its amusement tax on fees paid for lap d...
Monday, June 08, 2015

Is the Federal Income Tax Progressive?

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When debate turns to federal income tax policy, one of the issues focuses on the acceptability of the progressive nature of the tax. Those w...
Friday, June 05, 2015

Appetite for Taxes?

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According to a recent news report describing efforts by the Philadelphia School Reform Commission to deal with the underfunding of city sch...