Michael Aikins (J.D. 2012, Yale) has posted Note, Common Control and the Delineation of the Taxable Entity, 121 Yale L.J. ___ (2011), on SSRN. Here is the abstract:

This Paper proposes a solution to what has been one of the most vexing problems in state corporate taxation and in multijurisdictional taxation generally: the delineation of the scope of the entity that an individual jurisdiction is entitled to tax. Starting from the observation that the federal government already aggregates the income of commonly controlled groups of corporations to prevent them from taking multiple advantage of the lowest tax brackets, this Paper proposes that states “piggyback” on these efforts and allow the federal government thereby to shoulder the burden of delineating the taxable entity. A number of benefits follow from this simple move, including the elimination of double taxation of certain corporate profits, greater simplicity and predictability, cost savings through piggybacking, and uniformity among the practices of the states.