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I. INTRODUCTION The byzantine complexities of tax policy toward American multinational firms reflect a simple and alluring intuition: American interests are best served by creating strong fences around American borders. [...], Many features of U.S. tax policy towards multinational firms--including the governing principle of capital export neutrality, the byzantine system of expense allocation, and anti-inversion legislation--reflect the intuition that building 'strong fences '' around the United States advances American interests. This paper examines the interaction of a strong fences policy with the increasingly important global markets for corporate residence, corporate control and corporate equities. These markets provide opportunities for entrepreneurs, managers, and investors to circumvent a strong fences policy. The paper provides simple descriptive evidence of the growing importance of these markets and considers the implications for U.S. tax policy. Keywords: international taxation, initial public offerings, mergers and acquisitions, foreign direct investment, foreign portfolio investment JEL Classification: H25

I. Introduction II. The Nature of Sabbaticals and Scholars' Visits III. The General Business Expense Deduction IV. The Travel Expense Deduction A. The Sleep-or-Rest Rule B. The Meaning of Tax [...]

In re Washburn (1) I. INTRODUCTION In 2005 Congress passed the Bankruptcy Abuse Prevention and Consumer Protection Act (2) (BAPCPA or "the Act") in an effort to curb what it [...]

ABSTRACT This Article argues that tax law has a significant role in the design of nonmarket interactions. Tax law often translates real life into tax terms, and constructs our daily [...]

1. INTRODUCTION A tremendous amount of litigation in the field of gas law has centered around one issue: what costs may a gas producer (hereinafter "lessee") properly deduct when calculating [...]

INTRODUCTION Income tax systems, such as that used by the United States, permit taxpayers to claim deductions for expenses incurred in the course of earning income. Thus, a taxpayer who [...], To what extent should taxpayers deduct expenses incurred domestically that contribute to foreign income production? It is widely believed that if the home country does not tax foreign income, then it also should not permit deductions for that portion of domestic expenses attributable to earning foreign income. This prescription is, however, inconsistent with the decision to exempt foreign income from taxation in the first place. The paper shows that, for any system of taxing foreign income, the consistent and efficient treatment is to permit domestic expense deductions for all expenses incurred domestically. This differs from the current U.S. regime, under which American firms were required to allocate more than $110 billion of domestic expenses against foreign income in 2004.

I. Introduction Proper federal income tax treatment of investment advisory fees incurred by trusts has puzzled trustees, tax practitioners, and the judiciary alike for two decades. The confusion stems from [...]

I. INTRODUCTION This article principally argues that, under the federal income tax, costs of obtaining specific sums of money should be capitalized (as opposed to being treated as expenses), just [...]

INTRODUCTION What are public corporations recording and disclosing about their tax expense during 2006 in advance of the effective date of Financial Interpretation No. 48's Accounting for Uncertainty in Income [...], FIN 48, Accounting for Uncertainty in Income Taxes, standardizes accounting for uncertain tax benefits and requires companies to disclose their tax reserve amounts. We summarize hand-collected disclosures related to tax reserves from 2005 through the first quarter of 2007. For the largest 100 non-financial, non-regulated firms, the reserve at adoption on January 1, 2007 is $78 billion excluding interest, or about two percent of assets. Of this $78 billion, an estimated $58 billion would affect earnings if ever released.

INTRODUCTION Health care costs continue to rise rapidly in the United States. The growth in health care costs has been exceeding GDP growth by two percentage points annually since 1940. [...], Health care costs continue to rise rapidly in the United States, claiming an increasing share of economic resources. One factor contributing to this rise is the favorable tax treatment for employer-sponsored health insurance, whereby employees pay neither income nor payroll taxes on health care that is provided through their employers. This tax treatment, which amounts to a $300-$400 billion per year subsidy for health insurance, has led to greater reliance on employer-sponsored insurance and lower deductible plans. Moreover, individuals who purchase insurance on their own often receive no tax subsidy. This paper discusses a health tax proposal included in President Bush's FY 2009 Budget that would reduce or eliminate these tax biases through a new standard deduction for health insurance (SDHI). The SDHI would be available to all individuals purchasing qualifying insurance and improve incentives by breaking the link between how much an individual pays for insurance and the value of the tax subsidy. The SDHI would increase the number of individuals with health insurance by roughly six to nine million and reorient the tax subsidy more towards lower-income individuals. The paper also considers alternatives to the SDHI proposal, principally a flat refundable health insurance tax credit.

I. INTRODUCTION Businesses stand to save a lot of tax if they can characterize money spent on mechanical repairs as ordinary and necessary business expenses. Indeed, FedEx tried to save [...]

In 1984, Congress enacted Internal Revenue Code section 132 to bring more certainty to the taxation of employee fringe benefits. This article examines the impact of the legislation from the [...]

INTRODUCTION Long-run federal budget projections show large imbalances in coming decades owing to two factors: the aging of the population and the assumed rapid growth in per capita health care [...], We evaluate the long-run sustainability of health spending growth. Under the criterion that non-health consumption does not fall, 1 percent excess cost growth appears to be an upper bound for the economy as a whole when the projection horizon extends over the century, although some groups would experience declines in non-health consumption. More generally, the increase in health spending as a share of income may lead to a significant expansion of public sector financing, as has been the case historically. Extrapolation of historical trends also suggests that higher health spending will lead to insurance contracts with lower out-of-pocket payment shares, putting further upward pressure on health care expenditures.

I. INTRODUCTION The court in Gilmore v. United States (1) permitted the taxpayer to capitalize litigation expenditures attributable to protecting the title of corporate shares in a divorce action. Although [...]