Talking Tax

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 pla

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 on

The cannabis industry is booming, but a provision in the federal tax code is holding it back, two attorneys in the industry said. The provision, Section 280E, doesn’t allow for tax deductions or credits stemming from trafficking in controlled substances, such as cannabis. The provision means some cannabis businesses owe more money to the IRS than they bring in, and is a frequent subject of litigation. The issue is increasingly coming into focus as states have moved to legalize marijuana. Last month, New York became at least the 15th state to allow adults to use cannabis. Progress at the federal level is still politically complicated. Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.) has said he plans to pursue comprehensive marijuana legislation, although President Joe Biden has yet to endorse full legalization. On this episode of our weekly podcast, Talking Tax, host Jeff Leon speaks with Iran Hopkins and Jonathan Robbins, two attorneys with the firm Akerman, about why the tax code provision exists and about whe

President Joe Biden this week unveiled his plan to pay for sweeping infrastructure investments by raising taxes on corporations. The proposals include raising the corporate tax rate to 28%, imposing a 21% global minimum tax on U.S. companies, and giving the IRS more resources to crack down on tax evasion. In this week’s episode of Talking Tax, reporters Allyson Versprille and Colin Wilhelm speak to Austan Goolsbee, former chairman of the Council of Economic Advisers under President Barack Obama, and DJ Gribbin, former special assistant to President Donald Trump for infrastructure. Goolsbee and Gribbin discuss the impact of Biden’s proposed tax hikes on U.S. competitiveness and challenges the administration will face getting the plan through Congress.

Once again, we are in the middle of a protracted tax filing season. And for yet another year, tax execs closed the books virtually. This week on our podcast Talking Tax, we hear how the season is going for corporate filers. Host Amanda Iacone speaks with Rema Serafi, national managing partner for tax at KPMG, about how tax directors are coping with having to close the books while their teams are working remotely. She also talks about some of the compliance challenges just around the corner.

The IRS announced this week that it would push back the deadline for some individuals to file and pay their taxes, a move that comes as the agency and taxpayers are grappling with changes in the new pandemic aid law. In this week’s episode of Talking Tax, reporter Amanda Iacone speaks with Scott Berger, a tax principal at the firm Kaufman Rossin, about how the delayed deadline may affect his clients. Berger also talks about how the IRS’ delay of this season’s deadline comes despite the agency still not having resolved all of the issues from the last filing season. The agency also extended last year’s filing season, as the Covid-19 pandemic began.

We are in the heart of tax filing season in the U.S. and, so far, it appears to be going much better than last year. That, however, is an extraordinarily low bar, given that last year's season ran up against the outset of a global pandemic. On this episode of our weekly podcast, Talking Tax, we launch a two-part series looking at how tax season is going and whether any of the problems from last year still linger. Next week, we will be looking at corporate and business filers. But today the focus is on individuals. Bloomberg Tax's Allyson Versprille speaks with Aisha Servaty, an attorney and director of Mid-Minnesota Legal Aid's Low Income Taxpayer Clinic. Servaty says many of the problems from last year's filing season haven't been resolved and talks about what state and federal officials could do to fix them.

A $1.9 trillion stimulus package that includes a third round of direct cash payments to American households will likely wind up on President Joe Biden's desk within the next few weeks. The direct payments are politically popular, but will they become a regular tool in U.S. fiscal policy, even after the pandemic? And if so, is that a good thing? Even among liberal-leaning economists, there is no consensus here. On our weekly podcast Talking Tax, reporter Colin Wilhelm spoke with Claudia Sahm, a senior fellow at the Jain Family Institute, and Marc Goldwein, senior policy director at the Committee for a Responsible Federal Budget. One is glad to see a new round of payments, while the other thinks they are a mistake. 

Retail investors had the opportunity to make a lot of money thanks to recent spikes for GameStop, AMC, and other stocks. New traders who cashed out big gains in 2020 could face complications this tax season. Many novice traders used the online trading app Robinhood. The company missed a Feb. 16 deadline to send those clients tax documents needed for this filing season. For this episode of our weekly podcast, Talking Tax, we speak to Andy Phillips with H&R Block about what you should do if you are short in terms of tax documentation. Phillips tells Bloomberg Tax reporter David Hood that there are ways to avoid penalties from the IRS even if your broker is running behind.

The U.S. has fallen behind other countries’ efforts to police the use of sales-suppression software known as tax zappers. That’s according to Richard Ainsworth, a tax law specialist and adjunct professor at New York University Law School and Boston University School of Law. When a retailer plugs a tax zapper into a register, the technology can essentially make certain transactions disappear. Businesses can then underreport their sales in the hopes of lowering their sales tax bill. On this episode of our weekly podcast, Talking Tax, we hear from Ainsworth about the widespread use of tax zappers. He tells Bloomberg Tax staff correspondent Michael Bologna about what other countries have done to crack down on zappers and the approaches some states are taking to do the same.

"In retrospect, I had no idea what I was getting myself into." Lafayette "Chip" Harter joined the Treasury Department in 2017 as deputy assistant secretary for international tax affairs. He quickly became the Trump administration's point person on negotiating with the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development, which is trying to broker an international agreement to rewrite decades of global tax rules. Having now left the government, Harter sat down with Bloomberg Tax reporter Isabel Gottlieb on the latest episode of our weekly podcast, Talking Tax. Harter discusses the current status of negotiations and previews how the Biden administration could influence the process.

President Joe Biden's campaign promises to raise taxes on corporations and the wealthy got a big boost when Democrats swept the Georgia runoffs, giving them control of both the House and the Senate. One of Biden's major tax proposals, pitched as part of his "Made in America" plan to boost manufacturing, is to overhaul the 2017 tax law's international provisions. New Senate Finance Chairman Ron Wyden (D-Ore.) is among those interested in reworking the tax code to make it less attractive for U.S.-based multinationals to do business overseas. Any of Biden's proposed tax code changes will run up against the same challenge: how to balance the desire to raise revenue with the need to boost the pandemic-ravaged economy. At the same time, the IRS is working to implement a slew of pandemic relief laws passed last year. The latest episode of our weekly podcast, Talking Tax, rounds up highlights from a Feb. 4 Bloomberg Tax event. First, Wyden speaks with editor Sony Kassam about his priorities now that he has the Financ

The architects of the 2017 tax code overhaul had lofty goals: They predicted the law would make filing your taxes easier, boost wages and investment, and cut tax rates without increasing the deficit. The Tax Cuts and Jobs Act of 2017 made broad changes to the tax system, lowering corporate and individual rates, boosting the standard deduction, creating new incentives, and overhauling the way multinational companies are taxed. On the latest episode of our weekly podcast, Talking Tax, Bloomberg Tax reporter Lydia O'Neal spoke with Tax Foundation economist Erica York and Institute on Taxation and Economic Policy senior fellow Matt Gardner about which of the law's stated goals came to fruition.

The second round of the Paycheck Protection Program reopened with fewer bumps for struggling businesses and small lenders that work with under-served communities. The program, revived by the latest Covid-19 relief law, facilitates government-backed small business loans that can be forgiven if used to cover employee salaries and other eligible expenses. The relaunch gave a head start to small lenders, including community development financial institutions, which serve individuals and businesses that don't have access the regular banking system. On the latest episode of our weekly podcast, Talking Tax, Bloomberg Tax reporter David Hood speaks with Tommy Espinoza, president and CEO of Raza Development Fund. The Phoenix-based lender, which has more than $400 million in assets, offers loans and technical assistance to the Latino community. Espinoza discussed how his organization managed a deluge of PPP applications in the first week and offered suggestions to further improve the program.

The pandemic-induced economic downturn has been a huge challenge for states trying to make their budgetary ends meet. Now, some lawmakers are looking to offset a drop in sales taxes and other revenue with new levies on digital advertising. Darcy Kooiker, a partner with Armanino in Bellevue, Wash., who specializes in state and local tax issues, says several states are already trying to roll out taxes on this famously difficult-to-tax sector. With many states kicking off their legislative sessions this month, more will likely follow, she told reporter Amanda Iacone in the latest episode of our weekly podcast, Talking Tax.