Trump tax thread. I'll start with the smaller stuff. What's with the consulting fees to the kids? 1/x
First, by structuring as a consulting fee instead of a gift, it avoids gift tax (and eventually estate tax). This only works if the fee is legit and market rate, which it certainly wasn't. 2/x
Second, a consulting fee is deductible by the partnership, while a gift is not. If Ivanka's marginal tax rate (consulting fees are includible, gifts are not) is < Donald's marginal tax rate (a big if), then it's a useful arbitrage. 3/x
Third, the kids might try to avoid payroll taxes by taking these consulting fees in lieu of higher salaries. The consulting fees were paid to Delaware LLCs (unclear if these LLCs were LLCs for tax purposes, or checked the box as S Corps). 4/x
The LLCs then distribute the cash as business income instead of salary, avoiding payroll taxes (including uncapped Medicaid at 3.8%). 5/x
Fourth, a (mostly) non tax motive: it spreads the graft around on paper. It's suspicious to pay salaries to your kids; less suspicious to pay consulting fees to LLCs. This might matter to Deutsche Bank and anyone else trying to evaluate the creditworthiness of the enterprise. 6/
Fifth, there is potential avoidance of state taxes if the payments are treated as Delaware business income instead of NY salary. Should pass through to NY either way, but who knows how it was reported. 7/end
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The longer that I teach partnership tax, which I think is the hardest class in law school to take (or teach), the more I believe that subchapter K is broken.
We has 704(b) regs that people mostly don’t follow because it doesn’t work for them, opting for targeted allocations and the murky test of “partners interest in the partnership”.
The policy choice behind special allocations is … unclear.
The language that they are complaining about is a reversion to language in the House passed BBB. It’s a technical fix to ensure that billion dollar sponsors are subject to the minimum tax like other corporations. 2/x
Unlike traditional conglomerates with subsidiaries that file a consolidated return, private equity sponsors like Blackstone, Apollo, and KKR own controlling interests in companies through partnerships (funds) and those companies file separate returns. 3/x
I’ve spent 15 years working on carried interest. Whatever happens this weekend, I’m ready to go another 15 rounds. 2/x
Not a lot of easy changes to the current proposal. 5 year holding period is already too short. I guess you could move it to 4, but that looks really bad. 3/x
The Chamber of Commerce released a bogus study on carried interest that claims massive job losses if we tax carried interest allocations as ordinary income. Here's why it's a bogus study. 1/x
Big picture: The study claims massive (4.9 million!) job losses as fund managers scale back investment and avoid risk. But raising tax rates on fund managers will have virtually no impact on fund investors or risk preference. 2/x
Unlike corporate taxes, where the economic incidence of the tax is split between shareholders, managers, and employees, the burden of taxing carried interest as ordinary income falls on fund managers. 3/x
This gets confusing, so at the risk of oversimplifying I'll try to keep it somewhat general. Also, to be honest, a lot of the details are still unclear. 2/x
Trump borrowed a lot of money and sank it into casinos. When those casinos crashed and were restructured, creditors lost money. 3/x
One possible response to the SCOTUS subpoena decision below. 1/x
Section 6103 of the tax code governs the limited circumstances when the Treasury can turn over tax returns to various parties, including Congressional Committees. Congress may want to amend 6103 as it relates to presidential and candidate tax returns, not just Trump. 2/x
Legislation is needed because the public has an interest in seeing presidential and candidate returns, and because Trump has now established a precedent that disclosure is optional. 3/x