Author: Sloan Speck
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The Promise and Peril of the OBBBA’s Populist Tax Breaks
With less than two weeks before Tax Day, Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent has touted the uptake of the One Big Beautiful Bill Act’s big four tax breaks for individuals: “no tax on tips,” “no tax on overtime,” “no tax on car loan interest,” and the additional deduction for seniors (which really isn’t “no tax on
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New Data on Whether Graduate Degrees Pay Off
From 1993 to 2022, the percentage of early-career college graduates with a graduate degree grew by more than one-third (31% to 42%). During this period, law school tuition more than doubled (in constant dollars), alongside substantial increases in graduate tuition more generally. So are graduate degrees—and law degrees—still worth it? A recent NBER working paper
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Soffe & Incerti: Anticipatory Effects of Corporate Tax Shaming
Trevor Incerti (U. Amsterdam, Dept. Pol. Econ.) & Raphaëlle Soffe (Inst. Fiscal Stud.), Anticipatory Effects of Corporate Tax Shaming: Evidence from the European Union, IFS Working Paper 26/19 (Mar. 5, 2026): Offshore wealth is estimated at 10% of global GDP. To curb tax avoidance, policymakers have adopted tax transparency reforms. We analyze anticipatory effects associated with
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Politico: IRS CEO Defiant as Washington Asks Who’s Running Things
This week, Politico has an exclusive interview with Frank Bisignano, who serves as Commissioner of the Social Security Administration and as the “newly invented” Chief Executive Officer of the IRS. Politico’s report also includes comments from six IRS employees on Bisignano’s tenure. Next up: Bisignano’s scheduled appearance at a Tax Day Senate hearing. Links and
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SSRN Review & Roundup: Speck Reviews Mann and Roberts’s The Long and Winding Road
This week, Sloan Speck (Colorado, Google Scholar) reviews a new work by Roberta F. Mann (Oregon, SSRN) & Tracey M. Roberts (Samford, Google Scholar), The Long and Winding Road: The Inflation Reduction Act’s Energy and Environmental Tax Credits, 78 Nat’l Tax J. 223 (2025) (download here). The Inflation Reduction Act of 2022 introduced a generational
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Does the Work Opportunity Tax Credit Actually Work?
For nearly three decades, the Work Opportunity Tax Credit (WOTC) provided small but material subsidies to employers for hiring certain categories of employees, including veterans, ex-felons, and those receiving public assistance. Although the provision expired on December 31, 2025, bipartisan legislative efforts may revive and expand the program, perhaps as part of a “tax extenders”
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Tax Law Center: Webinar on Clean Energy Credits
On Monday, March 30, 2026, NYU’s Tax Law Center is hosting a webinar on the prohibited foreign entity (PFE) rules applicable to clean energy credits. Details below the fold.
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IMF’s F&D Magazine: Taxing Harmful Habits
Christoph B. Rosenberg (IMF) & Marius van Oordt (Independent), Taxing Harmful Habits, Fin. & Dev. Mag. (IMF, Mar. 2026): Taxation is more than a fiscal instrument; it is a powerful lever for shaping healthier societies. . . .
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NY Times: They Want to Stop Paying Taxes as a Protest. There Are Consequences.
Tara Siegel Bernard, They Want to Stop Paying Taxes as a Protest. There Are Consequences, N.Y. Times (Mar. 22, 2026): “How can I pay taxes when I don’t want to pay for things I abhor, while neglecting things I care about?” asked [a retired chaplain in Sonoma, California], who objects to paying for immigration detention
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SSRN Review & Roundup: Saito Reviews Noked, Kim & Avi-Yonah’s How the U.S. Constitution Shapes International Tax Law
This week, Blaine Saito (Ohio State, Google Scholar) reviews a new work by Noam Noked (CUHK, Google Scholar), Young Ran (Christine) Kim (Cardozo, Google Scholar) & Reuven S. Avi-Yonah (Michigan, Google Scholar), How the U.S. Constitution Shapes International Tax Law: Instrument Choice in Tax Agreements (Feb. 26, 2026). The United States has not ratified a major new tax treaty
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What the xAI Acquisition Means for a SpaceX IPO
Elon Musk’s SpaceX is reportedly exploring a mid-2026 IPO that could rank as the all-time largest in nominal dollars and catapult SpaceX’s valuation well into the trillion-dollar club. Add in the company’s sci-fi-to-reality approach and controversial founder, and a SpaceX IPO would be the highest-profile deal of the summer. February brought a teaser of this
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Legalweek New York: AI and the Billable Hour
Last week’s tech-forward Legalweek New York conference was replete with AI-focused panels. (Mindy Kaling gave the keynote; there was—fortunately—no indication that her talk centered on AI.) One hot topic: what AI means for the billable hour, both in terms the time-efficiency of lawyers and the extraordinary costs of deploying AI-driven services. The economics of legal
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The Launch of the Tax Policy Network
Jeff Hoopes (UNC, Kenan-Flagler Bus. Sch.), Becky Lester (Stanford, Grad. Sch. Bus.), Martin Jacob (IESE Bus. Sch.), and Scott Dyreng (Duke, Fuqua Sch. Bus.) have launched the Tax Policy Network, which is “a community of scholars translating rigorous tax research into clear, policy-relevant insights on the debates that matter most.” Front-page topics at launch include
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Treasury “Considering All Options” for Proposed § 892 Regs
In mid-December 2025, Treasury issued proposed and final regulations under § 892 that could impose additional burdens on sovereign wealth funds’ investments in the United States, including in the currently volatile private credit market. This latest iteration in the long-running guidance project under § 892 stood in some tension with the Trump Administration’s efforts to
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SSRN Review & Roundup: Harpaz Reviews Gamage & Maynard’s Confronting the Tax-and-Oligarchy Catch-22
This week, Assaf Harpaz (Georgia; Google Scholar) reviews a new work by David Gamage (Missouri; Google Scholar) and Goldburn Maynard Jr. (Connecticut; Google Scholar), Confronting the Tax-and-Oligarchy Catch-22, U. Ill. L. Rev. (forthcoming). Taxes on wealth are among the most widely debated tax policies in the U.S. and abroad, frequently invoked by policymakers as a
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Bessent’s Term as Acting IRS Commissioner Expires
Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent’s 210-day stint as Acting IRS Commissioner expired in early March 2026. The Federal Vacancies Reform Act precludes Bessent from continuing in that specific temporary role. The IRS says that there will be more continuity than change, however. On March 13, 2026, a news release clarified leadership responsibilities at the IRS going
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Fordham Colloquium: The Professional Socialization of Lawyers
Fordham Law Review (vol. 94, no. 4) has a new colloquium on the ABA’s Standard 303(b)(3)—promulgated in 2022—that requires law schools to “provide substantial opportunities to students for . . . the development of a professional identity.” According to Matthew Diller’s Foreward, the colloquium’s ten essays “cover a lot of ground” but generally “suggest that
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Larsen & Oats: Crossing Borders, Sharing Burdens
Lotta Björklund Larsen & Lynne Oats, Crossing Borders, Sharing Burdens: Rethinking Taxation and Migration as Fiscal Belonging (2026) (open access pdf/ePub): Tax matters. It structures our societies, influences our choices, and reflects our values. Yet the meaning and impact of taxation are constantly changing in step with a world marked by climate transitions, demographic shifts, digitalisation, globalisation,
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Goldman, Lusch & Watson: Is State Tax Policy Associated with State-Level COVID-19 Restrictions?
Nathan C. Goldman, Stephen J. Lusch, Luke Watson, Is State Tax Policy Associated with State-Level COVID-19 Restrictions?, 2026 Contemp. Acct. Rsch. 1, https://doi.org/10.1111/1911-3846.70039:
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SSRN Review & Roundup: Narotzki Reviews Thomas’s Taxing Attention
This week, Doron Narotzki (Akron; Google Scholar) reviews Kathleen DeLaney Thomas (UNC; Google Scholar), Taxing Attention, Emory L.J. (forthcoming). Thomas offers an important contribution to one of the most difficult tax debates created by the digital economy. For years, much of the legal and tax literature has treated data as the core commodity exchanged when
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Court of International Trade Orders Tariff Refunds, but Implementation Questions Remain
On February 20, 2026, the Supreme Court struck down the Trump Administration’s tariffs under the International Emergency Economic Powers Act (IEEPA). The Court did not, however, specify how importers who paid those unlawful tariffs would obtain relief. This week brought a potential breakthrough—and some fast pushback—in the post-decision fight over refunds and refund mechanics. The
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Call for Proposals: AMT/EITC Conference
The 2026 Association of Mid-Career Tax Scholars/Experienced in Tax Conference (AMT/EITC) invites proposals for their conference on June 4 and 5 at NYU School of Law. The full call, below the fold.
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VoxEU: Fiscal Drag in Europe: How Inflation Is Quietly Affecting Public Revenue
From the Centre for Economic Policy Research (CEPR), new work on how European tax systems responded to post-pandemic inflation. Relevant in the United States, including in the context of a revival of political rhetoric around basis indexing and the indexing of tax expenditures. A post on CEPR’s VoxEU blog, as well as the underlying paper,
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Rubin: The Tax Nerd Who Bet His Life Savings Against DOGE
Richard Rubin reports on a young economist who staked his “life savings”—$342,195.63—on federal spending increasing during the first year of the Trump Administration, compared to the final quarter of the Biden Administration. And he won. More on the intersection of prediction markets, herd wisdom, and mandatory spending—plus the economist’s winnings—below the fold.
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SSRN Review & Roundup: Eyal Reviews Harpaz’s Taxing AI
This week, Mirit Eyal (Alabama; Google Scholar) reviews a new work by Assaf Harpaz (Georgia; Google Scholar), Taxing AI, B.U. L. Rev. __ (forthcoming 2026): Artificial intelligence is no longer a distant prospect confined to science fiction or academic speculation. It is now reshaping industries, displacing workers, and concentrating wealth at an unprecedented pace. The