Tax Chats

Send us Fan Mail In this episode, Jeff and Scott chat once more with Daniel Hemel. In the past we have spoken with Daniel about taxing stock buybacks (episode #79) and Donald Trump's tax returns (episode #80). This time we talk about the carefully watched supreme court decision Moore v USA.  Get CPE for listening to Tax Chats! Free CPE courses are available approximately one week after episod...

Send us Fan Mail  Henry David Thoreau famously refused to pay his poll tax and went to jail (very briefly) as a result. Jeff and Scott chat with Laura Dassow Walls, emerita English professor at Notre Dame and author of Henry David Thoreau: A Life , about what we can learn from Thoreau about taxes and the relationship they create between taxpayers and the state.  Get CPE for listening to Tax Chats!...

Send us Fan Mail Jeff and Scott chat with Jacob Bastian, assistant professor of Economics at Rutgers, about the earned income tax credit (EITC).  Get CPE for listening to Tax Chats! Free CPE courses are available approximately one week after episodes are published. Visit https://earmarkcpe.com/ to download the free app. Go to the Tax Chats channel, register for the course, take a short quiz, and e...

Send us Fan Mail Jeff and Scott talk to Nathan Goldman,  accounting professor at North Carolina State University (completing the tax triangle between UNC, Duke, and NC State!)., about taxes and online sports betting. Sports betting was recently legalized in North Carolina, and Nathan co-wrote (with Christina Lewellen) a widely circulated piece about the tax implications of sports betting,: https:/...

Send us Fan Mail Scott and Jeff chat with Martha Gimbel , executive director of The Budget Lab at Yale University .  We discuss the functions of the lab, including its efforts on budget scoring.  Get CPE for listening to Tax Chats! Free CPE courses are available approximately one week after episodes are published. Visit https://earmarkcpe.com/ to download the free app. Go to the Tax Chats channel,...

Send us Fan Mail Jeff and Scott chat with Gabriel Zucker about Code for America's efforts to enable better access to free tax filing, both at the federal level, and, facilitating state tax filing as the IRS roles out its direct filing program. Get CPE for listening to Tax Chats! Free CPE courses are available approximately one week after episodes are published. Visit https://earmarkcpe.com/ t...

Send us Fan Mail Jeff and Scott chat with Partho Shome about taxes  in the colonial era in India, especially the excise tax on salt. They then discuss how these taxes lead to the famous "salt march" led by Mahatma Gandhi, which ultimately lead to Indian Independence.  This experience is contrasted to the American independance movement, which also had roots in taxes levied by the British...

Send us Fan Mail Recorded on April 15, Jeff and Scott Chat about tax code complexity. Why is the tax code so complex? Is it because life is complex? Because we have chosen to hone the tax code to achieve certain social goals? Jeff and Scott chat about it all in light of Scott not being able to complete his tax code until the very last moment. Get CPE for listening to Tax Chats! Free CPE courses ar...

Send us Fan Mail Jeff and Scott chat with Samford University law professor Tracey Roberts about Cordell Hull. Hull was a senator, secretary of state, and, won the Nobel Prize for his role in creating the United Nations. However, he also had a substantial role in creating the income tax, which Tracey, Jeff and Scott discuss.  This episode is based on Professor Roberts article, " A Man for His...

Send us Fan Mail Scott and Jeff chat with Nic Duquette , Professor of Public Policy at the University of Southern California. We discuss charitable giving, tax deductions related to charitable giving, tax exempt organizations, and the like. Listener submitted correction: "there is no longer an above-the-line charitable deduction for cash contributions for tax years after 2021 (it was a tempor...

Send us Fan Mail Jeff and Scott chat with Clyde Ray , a political scientist and author of the book John Marshall's Constitutionalism , about the Supreme Court case McCulloch v Maryland, which hinged on whether a state could tax a federal bank.  In this case, John Marshall teaches us that "the power to tax involves the power to destroy."

Send us Fan Mail Jeff and Scott chat with  Alexander Arnon. Alex serves as the Director of Business Tax and Economic Analysis at the Penn Wharton Budget Model, and he explains  the Wyden-Smith tax deal, including the extension of the business tax components of the TCJA, the expansion of the child tax credit, and the Employee Retention Credit. Alex talks about the background on the deal, as well as...

Send us Fan Mail Jeff and Scott chat with Douglas Holtz-Eakin, the President of the American Action Forum, former director of the CBO,  and former chief economic policy adviser to Senator John McCain's 2008 presidential campaign. Doug has also testified before Congress more than anyone else that did not do so as a requirement of their job. Jeff and Scott discuss the purpose of Congressional t...

Send us Fan Mail Jeff and Scott chat with Wojciech Kopczuk, professor of Economics at Columbia University, an editor at the Journal of Public Economics, and IgNobel Prize Winner , about the trends in income inequality. The long-standing received wisdom is that income inequality is high, and growing higher. A recent paper published in the Journal of Political Economy by Gerry Auten and David Splint...

Send us Fan Mail Jeff and Scott chat with Laura Snyder, an advocate for an improved tax system for Americans living abroad.  Laura is currently the  President of Stop Extraterritorial American Taxation, (SEAT) and is also an American living abroad. They talk about the different types of Americans living abroad, and how their lives are complicated by the American tax system. Get CPE for listening t...

Send us Fan Mail This episode originally aired on January 15, 2022. Martin Luther King Jr. is the only person to have ever been tried for perjury with regards to state income taxes in Alabama. Jeff and Scott interview Edgar Dyer about the tax perjury trial of Martin Luther King Jr. in 1960. Eddie wrote an article entitled " A Triumph of Justice in Alabama: The 1960 Perjury Trial of Martin Lut...

Send us Fan Mail For the second time, Jeff and Scott chat with Benjamin Alarie, a law professor at the University of Toronto, and, the founder and CEO of BlueJ.  They talk about one of BlueJ's products which predicts tax court case outcomes, and also discuss the future of AI and taxes generally. Get CPE for listening to Tax Chats! Free CPE courses are available approximately one week after ep...

Send us Fan Mail A Way to Pay Taxes (to the tune of Away in the Manger) Re-release (originally released Christmas, 2021) Lyrics by Jeff Hoopes, Sung by Stacey Hoopes Oh Joseph and Mary They were there for a task They came to the city To pay their tax But as they remitted  The tax on their worth Oh Mary, a virgin She had to give birth  They went to the city By Caesa­r’s decree As taxes touched Jose...

Send us Fan Mail Jeff and Scott talk about two taxes levied at the Hoopes household, the "floor tax", and the "toilet tax."  These two taxes demonstrate how the tax system can be used as either a carrot or a stick, and the benefit of each approach, and the importance of administrative costs (which made the toilet tax impractical). We also discus how, and whether, taxes can be u...

Send us Fan Mail Jeff and  Scott talk with UNC Marketing professor Kristopher Keller about his work on the effect of marketing on soda taxes (joint work with  Jonne Guyt and Rajdeep Grewal). After passing a soda tax, a tax on sugared beverages meant to discourage their consumption, stores can change their marketing of soda. Kristopher, with coauthors, show that stores actually decrease the amount...

Send us Fan Mail Jeff and Scott chat with  Benjamin Angel, the Director for Direct Taxation, Tax Coordination, Economic Analysis and Evaluation at the European Commission. The EC has recently proposed rules that would enable smaller business that have operations across EU countries to have a simplified tax filing process,  reducing compliance costs and making the tax filing process easier.  These...

Send us Fan Mail Jeff and Scott chat with two state and local tax experts, Stacey Roberts and Meredith Smith,  about the state and local tax deduction cap put in by Congress  in 2017, and ways states are allowing their residents to get around it. Get CPE for listening to Tax Chats! Free CPE courses are available approximately one week after episodes are published. Visit https://earmarkcpe.com/ to...

Send us Fan Mail In this episode, Jeff and Scott chat with Nick Guest, Assistant Professor of Accounting at Cornell University's SC Johnson  College of Business about a recent study he conducted related to stock repurchases, available published  here or in working paper version  here .

Send us Fan Mail Jeff and Scott chat with Benjamin Alarie, a law professor at the University of Toronto, and, the founder and CEO of BlueJ.  They talk about one of BlueJ's products, Ask BlueJ, which is a generative AI system that allows users to ask it technical tax questions, and, get answers. They discuss how responses are quickly improving, how this AI is different from ChatGPT, and, the f...

Send us Fan Mail Jeff and Scott discussed a new tax proposal with Natasha Sarin, an economist and lawyer at Yale Law School and Yale School of Management. Natasha, in collaboration with Kim Clausing, developed a plan aimed at increasing tax revenue. This plan  also anticipaties several tax provisions expiring in 2025. The proposal, " The Coming Fiscal Cliff: A Blueprint for Tax Reform in 2025...