I am honored (and surprised) to be included on the list of Accounting Today’s Top 100 Most Influential People for the second year in a row. The magazine contains one-sentence explanations of why each of the folks made the list; here is mine:

Caron has helped lead the profession’s exploration of new media, and his blog, launched in 2004, is one of the most-visited tax blogs on the Internet.

I am honored to be on the list with such high-powered people in the tax and accounting worlds, including:

Politicans:

• Sen. Max Baucus (Chair, Senate Finance Committee)
• Sen. Charles Grassley (Ranking Member, Senate Finance Committee)

Government and Industry Group Officials:

• Robert Attmore (Chair, GASB)
• Christopher Cox (Chair, SEC)
• Mark Everson (Commissioner, IRS)
• Randy Fletchall (Chair, AICPA)
• J. Russell George (Treasury Inspector General for Tax Administration)
• Robert Herz (Chair, FASB)
• Conrad Hewitt (Chief Accountant, SEC)
• Barry Melanconi (AICPA)
• Mark Olson (Chair, PCAOB)
• Nina Olson (National Taxpayer Advocate, IRS)
• Henry Paulson (Secretary of the Treasury)
• David Walker (U.S. Comptroller General)
• Michael Young (Partner, Wilkie Farr & Gallagher)

CEOs of Major Accounting Firms:

• Samuel DiPiazza (PriceWaterhouseCoopers)
• Timothy Flynn (KPMG)
• Edward Nusbaum (Grant Thornton)
• Barry Salzberg (Deloitte & Touche))
• James Turley (Ernst & Young)
• Jack Weisbaum (BDO Seidman)

CEOs of Tax & Accounting Companies & Publishers:

• Steve Bennett (Intuit)
• Mark Ernst (H&R Block)
• Michael Lister (Jackson Hewitt)
• Roy Martin Jr. (Thomson Tax & Accounting)
• Kevin Robert (Wolters Kluwer)