Deconstructing the Rules of Corporate Tax

While academics, practitioners, and the White House have proposed any number of reform measures to deal with the problems plaguing the U.S. corporate tax regime, their solutions involve varying structural and statutory changes, which are in fact extrinsic to the form of the underlying rules themselves. In contrast, this Article argues for an innate form of change to the U.S. corporate tax rules, which would fundamentally affect the way in which tax lawmakers actually draft tax rules and regulations. In particular, it argues that a systemic focus and commitment by lawmakers to a more principles-based approach to regulation would significantly mitigate many of the challenges currently encumbering the U.S. tax regime. Unlike the present system, which relies almost exclusively on a complex entanglement of bright-line prescriptive rules, a principles-focused corporate tax regime would help significantly simplify tax provisions, close loopholes, make the system more responsive to a dynamic marketplace, and serve as a gateway to lowering the U.S. corporate tax rate. Thus, the implementation of more principles-based rules should be given consideration in any contemplated tax reform proposals