Tax Chats

Send us a textA 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 HoopesOh Joseph and MaryThey were there for a taskThey came to the cityTo pay their taxBut as they remitted The tax on their worthOh Mary, a virginShe had to give birth They went to the cityBy Caesa­r’s decreeAs taxes touched JosephThey affect you and meWhen we give birthand when we dieHow much we workAnd what car we buy  For every decisionWe weigh how we actBy counting the costAnd we do it post-tax The pros and the consIn dollars and centsWe consider the taxesBefore we commence

Send us a textJeff 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 used to solve social problems.  Scott vows to do better in taxing the subjects of his kingdom. 

Send us a textJeff 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 of marketing they do, which contributes to some of the  decline in soda consumption which has been documented to accompany soda taxes. In sum, Kristopher shows that  marketing can affect the measured elasticity of soda consumption with respect to the soda tax rate.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 earn your CPE certificate.

Send us a textJeff 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 rules will allow companies to calculate their tax base according to a common set of rules (not a different base for every country), and, provides an allocation mechanism to allocate profits to the countries in which the  small EU multinational operates. 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 earn your CPE certificate.

Send us a textJeff 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 download the free app. Go to the Tax Chats channel, register for the course, take a short quiz, and earn your CPE certificate.

Send us a textIn 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.

Benjamin Alarie, a law professor at the University of Toronto and the founder and CEO of BlueJ, discusses Ask BlueJ, a generative AI system for tax research. They cover the limitations of ChatGPT, advancements and limitations of AI in tax law, different approaches to tax research, and the pricing and value proposition of Ask BlueJ for tax professionals.

Send us a textJeff 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," includes the following proposals, among others:Raising the corporate tax rate.Overhauling the current international tax system.Introducing a carbon tax.Securing permanent funding for the IRS.Implementing a financial transactions tax.Expanding the Child Tax Credit and the Earned Income Tax Credit.Overall, these measures aim to generate an additional 3.5 trillion in revenue, over the current baseline of projected revenueGet 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 earn your CPE certificate.

Send us a textNina Olsen was the National Taxpayer Advocate for the United States, a position overseeing the IRS which was created by Congress and described in the Internal Revenue Code. The National Taxpayer Advocate is responsible for overseeing more than 2,000 employees of the office of the National Taxpayer Advocate.  We discuss the responsibilities of the taxpayer advocate, the creation of the Office of National Taxpayer Advocate, and, the types of work the taxpayer advocate has been engaged in in the past two decades.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 earn your CPE certificate.

Send us a textIn this episode, we chat with author and historian Brady Crytzer, who recently published "The Whiskey Rebellion: A Distilled History of an American Crisis ". Brady also hosts "Dispatches: The Podcast of the Journal of the American Revolution" 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 earn your CPE certificate.