Talking Tax

After years of grueling negotiations, the world's wealthiest countries reached an agreement on how—and how much—to tax multinational corporations.Now comes what could be a heavier lift: Getting buy-in from the rest of the world.Kate Barton, EY's global vice chair for tax, joins this week's episode of Talking Tax to sort through what the recent G-7 agreement means. She also touches on how getting approval from dozens of other countries—not to mention each of their respective legislatures—could be a more difficult task. Barton tells Bloomberg Tax's Hamza Ali that the pact is indeed as big of a deal as it seems.Have feedback on this episode of Talking Tax? Give us a call and leave a voicemail at 703-341-3690.

The first loan approved through the Small Business Administration's Paycheck Protection Program went out the door just one week after the program was created last spring.At the time, with the pandemic shutting down nearly the entire country, the economic devastation looked like it could be limitless. The PPP was designed to help small business owners survive, offering government-backed loans that could be entirely forgiven if used to cover payroll and other approved business expenses.As the head of the SBA's Office of Capital Access, Bill Briggs was in right in the eye of this hurricane. Briggs joins this week's episode of our podcast, Talking Tax, to reflect on the PPP, which stopped processing new loans about two weeks ago. Briggs, now in the private sector, speaks with Bloomberg Tax's David Hood about the launch of the program, its future, and efforts to stop pandemic relief fraud.

A federal tax credit has played a big role in speeding adoption of electric vehicles and plug-in hybrids, offering consumers up to $7,500 off their year-end tax bill if they buy a qualifying vehicle.But Congress designed the credit to phase out as manufacturers established EVs as viable parts of their product line, setting a sales threshold that Tesla and General Motors passed a few years ago.Rep. Dan Kildee (D-Mich.) is among the lawmakers who want to expand the credit as a way to keep encouraging electric vehicle sales as part of a broader climate strategy. Kildee has been fine-tuning a proposal with Sen. Debbie Stabenow (D-Mich.) and the White House to expand the credit.In this week’s episode of our podcast, Talking Tax, reporter Kaustuv Basu speaks with Kildee about the future of the tax credit, how it fits into the Biden administration's infrastructure plan, and the move towards all-electric pickup trucks.

A few weeks ago, a Talking Tax listener reached out about an episode from last summer that focused on why so few CPAs are Black.Lynnwood G. Campbell's stories from a more than 40-year-long career in accounting were so fascinating, we invited him on this week's show. Campbell, now retired, started out at what is now PricewaterhouseCoopers LLP, then spent decades at the Treasury Department.Campbell spoke with podcast hosts Amanda Iacone and Jeff Leon about why he went into accounting in the late 1960s, the fortuitous way he landed at PwC, and how he managed to thrive at a time when most other Black accountants weren't able to.

The market for special-purpose acquisition companies, or SPACs, was all the rage over the last year, with exponential asset growth in just a few months plus the involvement of celebrities like R&B singer Ciara and former Yankees slugger Alex Rodriguez.Then, last month, the Securities and Exchange Commission threw a sudden damper on it: new accounting guidance that forced many SPACs to issue financial restatements, which continue to appear just about daily.Did the SPAC market just hit a wall? Or was it more like a speed bump?On today's episode of our podcast, Talking Tax, Bloomberg Tax's Nicola White speaks with Demetrios Frangiskatos of BDO about why the SPAC market got so hot, what the SEC's guidance really did to it, and where it might be heading in the near future.

The Biden administration has given a boost to a years-long effort toward global agreement on digital tax rules as negotiators work to strike a deal in the coming months.Since she took office, Janet Yellen’s Treasury Department has started to reshape the conversation on both elements of the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development’s two-part plan for a global tax overhaul. Treasury’s proposal to simplify the OECD’s “Pillar One”—which would move more tax revenue to countries where companies have users or consumers, instead of their headquarters—has helped move the talks past a stalemate. And a Biden administration proposal to hike the U.S.’s own global minimum rate to 21% has shaken up negotiations at the OECD over the minimum corporate tax rate, known as “Pillar Two.”On this week's episode of our podcast, Talking Tax, we hear from Marcus Heyland, managing director of tax at KPMG in Washington. Until March, Marcus was a tax policy adviser at the OECD, where he worked on the Pillar One and Two plans.Bloomberg Tax's Isabel Gottlieb talks to Heyland about the impact of the new U.S. administration on the global talks, and what issues negotiators are still grappling with as they try to reach an agreement this year.

Rep. Tom Suozzi (D-N.Y.) is among lawmakers from high-tax states who want to repeal the $10,000 cap on deductions for state and local taxes paid. Individuals in Democratic states like New York and California have seen their tax bills go up as a result of the cap, which was part of the 2017 tax law.Suozzi is leading the fight against the cap, trying to pressure the Biden administration and leaders in Congress to include the repeal in an upcoming legislative package.In this week’s episode of Talking Tax, reporter Kaustuv Basu talks to Suozzi about the battle to get rid of the cap and what he sees happening in the next few months.

President Joe Biden this week outlined his plan to increase taxes on wealthy individuals as a way to pay for investments in childcare and education.An almost doubling of the federal capital gains tax rate and a provision curtailing a tax break on property transferred to heirs at death are among the changes in the American Families Plan. But noticeably absent are any increases to the estate tax—either by raising the top rate or by cutting the amount that wealthy families can pass on to the next generation tax-free, both of which are issues Biden campaigned on.In this week's episode of Talking Tax, reporter Allyson Versprille speaks to Brad Dillon, a senior wealth strategist at UBS Group AG in New York City.Dillon discusses the impact the Biden plan would have on wealthy individuals if enacted and whether it makes sense to plan for those changes now. 

The U.S. Supreme Court will consider a case Monday involving a California law requiring nonprofits to disclose the identities of their major donors to state officials.Americans for Prosperity Foundation, a Charles Koch-backed nonprofit, and the Thomas Moore Law center argue that the law violates the First Amendment and have asked the high court to review a ruling from the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit upholding the law.The case has drawn attention for its potential impact on elections: Supporters of the law say it protects the charitable sector from a flood of anonymous, politically motivated donations.On this episode of our weekly podcast, Talking Tax, Bloomberg Law’s Jeff Leon talks with University of Notre Dame professor Lloyd Hitoshi Mayer about the case, Americans for Prosperity Foundation v. Becerra.

It has been a challenging year for the IRS, which is dealing with yet another prolonged tax-filing season while also distributing pandemic relief payments to hundreds of millions of people.Those challenges come at a time when the agency has struggled for years to carry out its core duties of auditing returns, collecting taxes, and answering its phones due to underfunding and staffing shortages.President Joe Biden is seeking to reverse these trends through a substantial increase to the IRS’s budget—he asked Congress to boost the agency’s baseline funding by more than 10% to $13.2 billion. The president hopes a bigger budget will allow the IRS to audit more wealthy individuals and corporations and plans to pair the increased enforcement revenue with tax hikes on corporations to pay for his infrastructure plan.In this week’s episode of Talking Tax, reporter Allyson Versprille speaks to former IRS Commissioner John Koskinencq about how years of budget cuts have impacted the IRS and what an increase—like the one requested by the Biden administration—would mean for the agency.