Document Type

Article

Publication Date

2014

Publication Citation

61 Buffalo Law Review 189 (2014)

Abstract

This Essay responds to Leigh Osofsky's, "Who’s Naughty and Who’s Nice? Frictions, Screening, and Tax Law Design." Osofsky’s analysis suggests that tax rules might be designed so as to take account both of heterogeneity in taxpayers’ tax planning proclivities and of taxpayer characteristics relevant for distribution. By designing tax rules so as to create frictions that differentially impose higher costs on those taxpayers who are more successfully circumventing existing taxes we can perhaps reform our tax system so as to better achieve equitable distribution at lower efficiency costs. This Essay argues that Osofsky's analysis is generally correct and that it potentially suggests a path toward a more useful law and economics analysis of detailed tax rules.

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