Bob Lord

Bob has mostly wound down his 39-year career as a tax and business lawyer (with a 1-year interruption to run for Congress in 2008 (CD3), when he tried to unseat John Shadegg. Bob now serves as the senior advisor on tax policy for the Patriotic Millionaires, a group of wealthy Americans who believe the light taxation of America's rich is destabilizing our democracy, and as an associate fellow at the Institute for Policy Studies. Bob has been writing for Blog For Arizona since late 2011, concentrating mostly on federal issues, with an occasional foray into Arizona state politics.

Man, Did I Get That One Wrong

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Posted by Bob Lord  So, in the aftermath of the Iowa caucuses, where Mitt had carpet bombed Newt into oblivion and Newt had given his beyond bitter caucus night speech, I thought I had Newt figured out. It seemed to me that he entered the race not so much to win, but to rejuvenate his … Read more

A Prediction, and a Word About Predictions

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Posted by Bob Lord On Morning Joe this morning they showed a poll of Obama against each of the R candidates, other than Paul, among Latino voters. They each pulled a whopping 14% of the vote. That’s astounding. In 2004, Bush pulled somewhere in the 40s. McCain did worse than Bush, but way better than … Read more

Today’s Real News

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Posted by Bob Lord While the political world follows the Rush Limbaugh horror show, today’s real news received precious little attention. This is positively stunning:    http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/03/05/1-percent-income-inequality_n_1321008.html So, in 2010, 93% of the income gains went to the top one percenters. The number by itself is staggering, but just a little analysis adds a lot … Read more

Enough With the Praise for Olympia

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Posted by Bob Lord I’ve really read and heard enough of the lionizing of Olympia Snowe for her so-called moderate views. We’re of course going to hear the same about Susan Collins when she retires. Olympia Snowe is no different from Ben Nelson or Evan Bayh or Blanche Lincoln. Each managed to win election in … Read more

Mitt’s Tax Plan — How Bad Becomes Worse

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Posted by Bob Lord

Okay, this post involves a trip through tax geekdom, so hang on and enjoy the ride, or at least try to stay awake.

There have been countless articles and blog posts regarding Mitt’s new tax plan, which he released to coincide with his appearance Friday at Ford Field, which was packed to 1/65th of its capacity. But precious little attention has been paid to one feature of the plan, which actually is unchanged from his previously released plan — the exemption of dividends, capital gains, and interest income from tax for those with taxable income of under $200,000.

That’s too bad. As a tax lawyer, my take on that one provision is that, in concept, it is one of the most fertile areas for tax sheltering I’ve ever seen, will cost us hundreds of billions in revenue, will benefit mainly those who are just a notch below the super rich, and will lead to increased complexity in the tax code. Here’s why.