Fox named to chair Council of Henhouse Advisors

From our friends at Citizens for Tax Justice:

Top White House Economic Adviser Involved in Patenting Strategies to Avoid Taxes

Tax Notes, a trade journal for tax experts (sorry subscription required), reports that Edward Lazear, chairman of the President's Council of Economic Advisers, is named on a patent application for a product to help companies avoid taxes. The application was filed 10 months after Lazear began working at the White House.

The White House says that, essentially, Lazear's work on the product ended before he came to the White House. Whatever the case may be, it certainly highlights questions over whether tax strategies should be patentable at all. A patent reform bill in the House of Representatives includes provisions that ban patents on tax strategies. Senators Max Baucus (D-MT) and Charles Grassley (R-IA), chairman and ranking member of the Finance Committee, plan to craft a bill that would ban tax patents as well. A bill introduced by Senators Carl Levin (D-MI), Barack Obama (D-IL) and Norm Coleman (R-MN) in February to target offshore tax avoidance also bans tax patents.

As Levin pointed out when he introduced his bill, patent law exists to encourage innovation. There is no lack of innovation when it comes to avoiding taxes and there is certainly no public policy reason to encourage it.

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