Curriculum Vitae

Michael J. Graetz
Yale Law School
127 Wall Street
New Haven, CT 06511

EDUCATION
LL.B., University of Virginia, Charlottesville, Virginia
Honors: Order of the Coif;
Law Review, Research and Projects Editor; Recipient of University of Virginia Law School Alumni Association Award; Outstanding Student Note, Volume 54, Virginia Law Review

B.B.A., Emory University, Atlanta, Georgia, 1966
Honors: John Gordon Stipe Scholar

BAR
Member,Virginia Bar

HONORS AND AWARDS

LL.D., Doctor of Laws, honoris causa, Capital University, 1992

Guggenheim Fellow, 1989

Selected for the Esquire Register, 1988, for courses and work in connection with provision of shelter for the homeless.

Recipient of Treasury Medal, U.S. Treasury Department, 1992.

Recipient of Treasury Department Exceptional Service Award for role in formulating Tax Policy, 1972.

Fellow, American Academy of Arts and Sciences

Who’s Who in America

EMPLOYMENT

Justus S. Hotchkiss Professor of Law, Yale Law School, since 1986.  Professor of Law since January 1983.

Assistant to the Secretary and Special Counsel, U.S. Department of the Treasury, 1992.
 
Deputy Assistant Secretary (Tax Policy), U.S. Department of the Treasury, 1990-1991.

Professor of Law and Social Sciences, California Institute of Technology, and Professor of Law, University of Southern California, 1979-1983.

Law Professor, University of Virginia Law School, 1972-1979.

Visiting Professor of Law, Harvard University School of Law, 1978-1979.

Visiting Professor of Law, California Institute of Technology (Division of Humanities and Social Sciences), 1978.

Visiting Professor of Law, University of Southern California Law Center, 1976-1977.

Attorney-Advisor to the Assistant Secretary of the Treasury for Tax Policy, Office of Tax Legislative Counsel, U.S. Treasury Department, 1969-1972.

Adjunct Professor of Law, Georgetown University Law School, 1971 and 1972.

PUBLICATIONS

Books:

100 Million Unnecessary Returns: A Simple Fair and Competitive Tax Plan for the United States, (Yale University Press, 2008).

Death by a Thousand Cuts: The Fight over Taxing Inherited Wealth (with Ian Shapiro) (Princeton University Press, 2005); (paperback edition with a new epilogue, 2006) (selected for the 2006 Sidney Hillman Book Award)

Foundations of International Income Taxation, (2003, Foundation Press).

True Security:  Rethinking American Social Insurance, (1999, Yale University Press) (with Jerry L. Mashaw).

The U.S. Income Tax: What It Is, How It Got That Way and Where We Go From Here (W.W. Norton, 1999).

The Decline (and Fall?) of the Income Tax; W. W. Norton & Co., (1997). 

Federal Income Taxation; Principles and Policies, (5thed. with Deborah Schenk) (5th Ed., 2005).  (Successor volume in 1985 to prior editions with Erwin N. Griswold (1976) and annual Supplements).

Edited Books:

Uncharted Waters:  Withdrawals from Personal Retirement Accounts National Academy of Social Insurance (with Ken Apfel and Virgina Reno)(Brookings Institution Press, 2005).

Integration of the U.S. Corporate and Individual Income Taxes: The Treasury Department and American Law Institute Reports, (Tax Analysts, 1998) (with Alvin C. Warren).

Framing the Social Security Debate: Values, Politics and Economics, (Brookings Institution Press, 1998) (with R. Douglas Arnold and Alicia Munnell).

Life Insurance Taxation: The Mutual vs. Stock Differential (Rosenfeld, Emanuel Inc. 1986).

Contributions to Books:

“Income Tax Discrimination and the Political and Economic Integration of Europe,” in Reuven Avi Yonah, James R. Hines Jr., and Michael Lang (eds.) Comparative Fiscal Federalism, (Kluwer Law International, 2007) (with Alvin C. Warren).

“A Fair and Balanced Tax System for the Twenty-first Century” in Toward Fundamental Tax Reform (Edited by Alan J. Auerbach, and Kevin A. Hassett 2005).

Graetz, Michael and Goldberg, Fred T. Jr.; "Reforming Social Security:  A Practical and Workable System of Personal Retirement Accounts as a Part of Social Security Reform," in Administrative Costs in Social Security Privatization (U. Chicago Press, 2000) (John Shoven, ed.).

"Comprehensive Tax Reform and Fringe Benefits:  The Case of Employer-Provided Pensions and Health Insurance," in Dallas L. Salisbury, ed., Tax Reform:  Implications for Economic Security and Employee Benefits, (EBRI, 1997) (with Daniel I. Halperin).

Comment on Richard V. Burkhauser, et al., "The Disabled Worker Tax Credit," in Virginia P. Reno et al., eds., Disability (National Academy of Social Insurance, 1997).

"Distributional Tables, Tax Legislation, and the Illusion of Precision," in David Bradford, ed., Distributional Analysis of Tax Policy, (American Enterprise Institute, 1995).

"The Report of the United States to the International Fiscal Association on the Costs of Tax Administration and Compliance in the United States," Vol. LXXIVb, Cahiers de Droit Fiscal International 311 (1989) (with Jeffrey A. Dubin and Louis L. Wilde).

"Retirement Security Policy:  Toward a More Unified View" in Theodore Marmor and Jerry L. Mashaw (eds.), Social Security: Beyond the Rhetoric of Crisis (Princeton University Press, 1988).

"Minimum Taxes and Comprehensive Tax Reform," in Aaron, Galper and Pechman (eds.) Uneasy Compromises (Brookings Institution 1988) (with Emil M. Sunley).

"The Estate Tax:  Wither or Whither" in Pechman (ed.), The Promise of Tax Reform (Prentice Hall, 1985).

"Can the Income Tax Continue to be the Major Revenue Source" in Pechman (ed.), Options for Tax Reform (Brookings Institution, 1984).

"Expenditure Tax Design" in Pechman (ed.), What Should Be Taxed -- Income or Expenditure? (Brookings Institution 1980).

Commentary on Norman Ture's "Taxation and the Distribution of Income" in Liebowitz (ed.), Wealth Distribution and the Income Tax (Lexington Books, 1978).

"The Evolution of the Tax Shelter Provisions of the Tax Reform Act of 1976:  Fewer Than Fifty Ways to Limit Your Losses," University of Southern California Tax Institute, 29 Major Tax Planning at 1 (Matthew Bender, 1977).

Articles:

“Dividend Taxation in Europe: When the ECJ makes Tax Policy,” 44 Common Market Law Review 1577 (2007) (with Alvin C. Warren). 

“Tax Reform Unraveling,” 21 Journal of Economic Perspectives, 69-90 (2007).

“Public Opinion and the Push to Repeal the Estate Tax,” LIX National Tax Journal 439-462 (2006) (with Mayling Birney and Ian Shapiro).

“Taxes That Work:  A Simple American Plan,” 59 Florida Law Review 1043-1062 (2006).

“Tax Reform,” LIX Bulletin of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences 17-26 (2006) (with James Poterba).

“Edwin S. Cohen,” 25 Virginia Tax Review 563 (2006).

“Income Tax Discrimination and the Political and Economic Integration of Europe” (115 Yale Law Journal 1186, 2006)

“Tax Reform.  Time For a Plan C?:” in The Economists’ Voice www.bepress.com/ev, December, 2005

“Boris I Bittker, 115 Yale Law Journal 739 (2006).

"Taxing International Portfolio Income,"  56, Tax Law Review 537 (2003) (with Itai Grinberg).

"100 Million Unnecessary Returns: A Fresh Start for the U.S. Tax System," 112 Yale Law Journal 261 (2002).

"2001 Erwin N. Griswold Lecture Before The American College of Tax Counsel: Taxing International Portfolio Income" 56 Tax Law Review 537 (with Itai Grinberg) (2003).

"100 Million Unnecessary Returns: A Fresh Start for the U.S. Tax System," 112 Yale Law Journal 261 (November 2002).

"Erwin Griswold's Tax Law-And Ours," Vol. 56, No. 1, The Tax Lawyer (2002).
 
"Structuring an Exemption System for Foreign Income of U.S. Corporations," National Tax Journal, Vol. LIV, No. 4, p. 771 (2001) (with Paul W. Oosterhuis).

"The David R. Tillinghast Lecture: Taxing International Income B Inadequate Principles, Outdated Concept, and Unsatisfactory Policy," 54 Tax Law Review 261 (2001); also published at 26 Brooklyn Journal of International Law 1357 (2001), and in Ruth Mason (ed). The Tillinghast Lectures 1996-2005 (NYU Press 2006).

 "Integration of Corporate and Individual Income Taxes:  An Introduction," 84 Tax Notes 1767-1777 (September 27, 1999) (with Alvin C. Warren Jr.).

"Universal Savings Accounts: The Clinton IRA," Tax Notes, Vol. 83, No. 10, p. 1487 (June 7, 1999) (with Zoë Neuberger and Armando Gomez).

"Randolph W. Thrower Lecture: Your Tax Dollars at Work: Why U.S. Tax Law Needs to be Changed," 48 Emory Law Journal 849 (1999).

"Do You Really Want to Save the Code?" 50 The Tax Executive 181 (May-June, 1998).

"The 'Original Intent' of U.S. International Taxation," 51 Duke Law Journal 1021(1997) (with Michael O'Hear).

"International Aspects of Fundamental Tax Restructuring: Practice or Principle?" 51 University of Miami Law Review 1093 (1997).

"Current Flat Tax Proposals," Tax Notes, Vol. 67, No. 9, p. 1256 (May, 1995).

"Paint by Numbers Tax Lawmaking," 95 Columbia Law Review 609 (April, 1995).

Book review: Edwin S. Cohen's, A Lawyer's Life Deep in the Heart of Taxes, Vol. 65, No. 8, Tax Notes p. 1045 (November, 1994).

"Ethics, Institutional Complexity and Health Care Reform:  The Struggle for Normative Balance" 10 Journal of Contemporary Health Law and Policy 93 (1994), (with Jerry L. Mashaw).

"Universal Health Coverage Without an Employer Mandate," 2 Domestic Affairs 79, (Winter, 1993).
 
"Mandating Employer Health Coverage: A Big Mistake,” Tax Notes, Vol. 60, No. 15, p. 1765, (September, 1993).

"Praise Reform and Start the Litigation?" New England Journal of Medicine, (December, 1993), (with Jerry L. Mashaw).

"The Decision by Nonfilers to Participate in Income Tax Amnesties," 13 International Review of Economics 271 (1993) (with Louis L. Wilde).

"Tax Policy at the Beginning of the Clinton Administration," 10 Yale Journal of Regulation, 561 (1993).

"Revisiting the Income vs. Consumption Tax Debate," Tax Notes, Vol. 57, No. 11, p. 1437 (December, 1992).
 
"State Income Tax Amnesties:  Causes,"  107 Quarterly Journal of Economics 1057, (1992) (with Jeffrey A. Dubin and Louis L. Wilde).

"The Demand for Tax Return Preparation Services," 74 Review of Economics and Statistics 75 (1992) (with Jeffrey A. Dubin, Louis L. Wilde and Michael A. Udell).

"The Effect of Audit Rates on the Federal Individual Income Tax, 1977-1986," Vol. XLIII, No. 4, National Tax Journal 395 (December 1990) (with Jeffrey A. Dubin and Louis L. Wilde).

"Corporate Integration Puzzles," Vol. XLIII, No. 3, National Tax Journal 307 (September 1990) (with Harvey S. Rosen and Geraldine Gerardi).

"The Changing Face of Tax Enforcement, 1978-1988," Vol. 43, No. 4, The Tax Lawyer 893 (Summer 1990) (with Jeffrey A. Dubin and Louis L. Wilde).

"Tax Aspects of Leveraged Buyouts and Other Corporate Financial Restructurings," Tax Notes, Vol. 42, No. 6 (1989).

"Retirement Security and Tax Policies: A Reply," 137 University of Pennsylvania Law Review 1239 (1989).

"The Truth About Tax Reform," 40 University of Florida Law Review 617 (1988). 

"The Troubled Marriage of Retirement Security and Tax Policies," 135 University of Pennsylvania Law Review 851 (1987).

"Are We a Nation of Tax Cheaters?  New Econometric Evidence on Tax Compliance," 77 American Economic Review 240 (May 1987) (with Jeffrey A. Dubin and Louis L. Wilde).

"The Tax Compliance Game:  Toward an Interactive Theory of Law Enforcement," 2 Journal of Law, Economics and Organization 1 (1986) (with J. Reinganum and L. Wilde). 

"Introduction to the Edwin S. Cohen Symposium:  An Overview of Business Taxation," 5 Virginia Tax Review 577 (1986).

"Reforming Business Taxation in Australia," 2 Australia Tax Forum 385 (1985).

"Retroactivity Revisited," 98 Harvard Law Review 1820 (1985).

"Tax Reform 1985:  The Quest for a Fairer, More Efficient and Simpler Income Tax," 3 Yale Law & Policy Review 5 (1985) (with Barbara McDowell).

"The Economics of Tax Compliance:  Fact and Fantasy," 38 National Tax Journal 355 (1985) (with Louis L. Wilde).

"To Praise the Estate Tax, Not to Bury It," 93 Yale Law Journal 259 (1983).

"The 1982 Minimum Tax Amendments as a First Step in the Transition to a 'Flat-Rate' Tax," 56 Southern California Law Review 527 (1983).

"Monrad Paulsen and the Idea of a University Law School," 67 Virginia Law Review 445 (1981); reprinted in part in U.S.C. Cities Spring-Summer 1981 at 3 (with Charles H. Whitebread II).

"Implementing a Progressive Consumption Tax," 92 Harvard Law Review 1575 (1979).

"Dividend Relief Via Shareholder Credits:  The Treatment of Tax Preferences," Vol. 7, Tax Notes 667 (December 11, 1979).

"Legal Transitions:  The Case of Retroactivity in Income Tax Revision," 126 University of Pennsylvania Law Review 47 (1977); reprinted in part in "Retroactivity in Tax Revision; Efficiency and Fairness Considerations," 30 National Tax Journal 237 (1977).

"Assessing the Distributional Effects of Income Tax Revision:  Some Lessons from Incidence Analysis," IV Journal of Legal Studies 351 (1975); reprinted in part in "Distributional Effects of Income Tax Revision:  Reality May Differ From Appearance," Tax Notes, Vol. III, No. 48, p. 3 (1975).

"Transfer Tax Revision:  Some Perspective," Vol. 4, Tax Notes No. 23, p. 13 (1976). (See also Panel Discussion before the Ways and Means Committee on Federal Estate and Gift Taxes, 94th Congress, 2d Session, at 1233-1309 (invited panelist) and Hearings before the Ways and Means Committee on General Tax Reform, 93d Congress, 1st Session, pt. 8 at 3363).

"Taxation of Unrealized Gains at Death -- An Evaluation of the Current Proposals," 59 Virginia Law Review 830 (1973).

"Tax Reform and the Crisis of Financing Higher Education," a Report of the Association of American Universities (1973) (co-author).

"Reflections on the Tax Legislative Process: Prelude to Reform," 58 Virginia Law Review 1389 (1972).

"The Truth in Negotiations Act:  An Examination of Defective Pricing in Government Contracts," 54 Virginia Law Review 505 (1968).

Newspaper Articles:

"Why Repeal the Estate Tax?", Los Angeles Times (February 2001), "Perspectives on the State of the Union; Cushioning the Risks for the Old and the Young; Instead of Expanding Social Security and Medicare, We Must Take Responsibility for Poor Children," Los Angeles Times (January 27, 2000) (with Jerry L. Mashaw), "Let's Revamp the Tax Code--but How?" Wall Street Journal (April 15, 1998), "Many Happy Returns--The 'User-friendly' Future of the IRS," Chicago Tribune (April 15, 1998), "Make April 15 Just Another Day," Los Angeles Times (November 10, 1997), "Taxes: What the Children Said," Washington Post (November 9, 1997),  "What Gingrich Owes Us," New York Times, (January 8, 1997), "Players and Payers," NewYork Times, (February, 1994), (with James Tobin) New York Times, (June, 1994); "A Misplaced Mandate," Connecticut Law Tribune (October, 1993), also "Health Plan Misplaces Insurance Burden,” Texas Lawyer (October, 1993), also Legal Times, (October, 1993); "I Kept the Cookies," Washington Post, May, 1993 (also "Life with the Gift Unit," Yale Law Report, Spring 1993 and "By the Time the Cookies Got Back from the Gift Unit, They Were Stale," Hartford Courant, March 1993); "The Confusion Around Health Care," The San Francisco Recorder (March, 1993), also published as "The Taxing Problem of Health-Care Reform," Legal Times (February 1993); "The Budget Battle Begins," Hartford Courant, (February 1993); "The Serious Business of Corporate Tax Revision," Tax Times (July 1987); "April 15, 1988," Tax Times (April 1987); "Too Little, Too Late," Tax Times(February 1987); "Tax and Spend; Spend and Spend," Tax Times (December 1986); "Of Tax Reform, Tax Compliance and Impossible Dreams," Tax Times (October 1986); "God Save This Honorable Court," Tax Times (September 1986); "Tax Reform: Conventional Wisdom's Repeal," Tax Times (July 1986).  "Taxes, Etc.:  The Games Lawyers Play," Los Angeles Times (June 22, 1982); "In Defense of the Income Tax: It Has Served America Well, but it Needs to be Made Fairer," Los Angeles Times (June 5, 1981); "Now's the Time to Simplify the Income Tax," Los Angeles Times (January 16, 1977); "Fundamental Tax Reform -- Congress Will Not Hear It," Los Angeles Times (April 16, 1976); "The Democrats' Tax Program," The Wall Street Journal (August 11, 1976).

COURSES TAUGHT
Federal Income Taxation; Federal Tax Policy; International Tax Policy; Reconstruction from the Right; Government without Employees; Health Policy; Social Insurance; Retirement Income Policy; Federalism; International Taxation; Tax Compliance; Ethical Problems in Tax Practice; Workshop on Shelter for the Homeless; Constitutional Law and Economic Regulation; Constitutional Law and Taxation; State and Local Finance; Regulation of Tax-Exempt
Organizations; Redistributional Aspects of Public and Private Law.

SELECTED PROFESSIONAL ACTIVITIES
Testimony: “A Fair and Balanced Tax System for the Twenty-first Century” before the President’s Panel on Tax Reform.

Invited witness before U.S. Congress, House Committee on Ways and Means, and Senate
Finance Committee.  Subjects of testimony include Alternative Minimum Tax International Taxation; Tax Reform Alternatives; Flat Tax Proposals; Health Care Reform; Energy Tax Provisions; Desert Storm; Tax Exemptions for Non-Profit Hospitals; Federal Tax Amnesty; Estate Freezes; Environmental Tax Policies; Life Insurance Company Taxation; Leveraged Buyouts and Other Corporate Restructuring Transactions; Minimum Taxes; Capital Gains Taxes; Integration of the Corporate Income Tax; Carryover Basis Repeal; Estate and Gift Tax Reform.

Co-Chair, National Academy of Social Insurance Panel: Uncharted WatersCWithdrawals from

Individual Social Security Retirement Accounts.

Named Lectures:
Sibley Lecture, University of Georgia, 2003
Griswold Lecture, American College of Tax Counsel, 2002
Tillinghast Lecture, New York University Law School, 2001
Thrower Lecture, Emory University School of Law, 1999
Woodworth Lecture, 1995
Dunwody Lecture, University of Florida College of Law, 1988

Member, Charter Revision Commission, Borough of Woodmont, Ct

Member, Council on the Economic Impact of Health Care Reform.

Consultant, Republican Senate Task Force on Health Reform, 1993.

Consultant, White House Task Force on Health Care Reform, Legal Review Group, 1993.

Member, Commissioner's Advisory Group, Internal Revenue Service, 1989.

American Law Institute, Member (also Member Tax Program Advisory Committee).

Counsel of Record, Hernandez v. Commissioner & Graham v. Commissioner, United States Supreme Court, Argued November 1988.

"Commencement Address" Yale Law Report, Fall 1984, pages 10-11.

Chair, University of Southern California Tax Institute, 1980-1983.

United States Department of the Treasury, Consultant, Office of Tax Policy, 1977-1980.

Reporter, American Law Institute, Airlie House Conference on Tax Simplification, January 1978.  Report published at Vol. 3 ALI-ABA Course Materials Journal 6 (October 1978).

Commission on Private Philanthropy and Public Needs, consultant, 1976 (paper relating to the tax rules governing lobbying by tax-exempt organizations), Research Papers (See Vol. 3 at 2945).

Lecturer and Participant at Numerous Universities and Conferences, including Annual and other meetings of American Bar Association, New York State Bar Association, Australian

Legal Convention, American Economics Association, American Academy of Arts and Sciences, American Political Science Association, OECD, International Fiscal Association, Canadian Tax Foundation, American Enterprise Institute, Brookings Institution, Urban Institute, New America Foundation, American Taxation Association, Society for Public Choice, National Association of Business Economists, National Academy of Social Insurance, Southern Economics Association, National Bureau of Economic Research, American Society of CPA’s, New York State Society of CPA’s, Tax Executives Institute, Tax Council Policy Institute, and other Academic and Professional Organizations.

Member, American Economics Association; American Bar Association; American Law Institute; National Academy of Social Insurance.