Conference on Public Disclosure of Tax Returns

Corporate income tax returns have long been confidential. No information from the tax return is required to be disclosed to the public. The sole source of information about a firm’s corporate income taxes generally is its GAAP disclosures in its audited financial statements. Recently, policymakers and the business press have raised the issue of whether public disclosure of corporate tax returns is feasible and advisable. The purpose of this conference was to provide a forum for tax, legal and financial disclosure experts to explore this topic.

The conference provided lawyers, accountants, and economists the opportunity to present original research on the impacts of disclosure, to be followed by discussants’ comments, a panel of experts, and general audience participation. Invited participants included officials from Congress, and key staff from Capitol Hill, the IRS, the SEC and FASB, as well as practitioners from the tax and financial reporting fields.

ORGANIZERS

William G. Gale, Co-Director of the Urban-Brookings Tax Policy Center
Doug Shackelford, Professor, University of North Carolina Business School

PAPERS AND PRESENTATIONS

Robert Tannenwald
Corporate Tax Disclosure at the State Level: The Massachusetts Experience (pdf)

Michelle Hanlon
What Can We Infer About a Firm’s Taxable Income from its Financial Statements? (pdf) 
    > presentation (ppt)

Lillian F. Mills and George A. Plesko
Bridging The Reporting Gap: A Proposal For More Informative Reconciling of Book and Tax Income (pdf)
    > presentation (ppt) 

Michelle Hanlon
Discussion of “What Can We Infer About a Firm’s Taxable Income from its Financial Statements?” (ppt)

Mihir A. Desai
Comments on “Bridging the Reporting Gap: A Proposal for MoreInformative Reconciling of Book and Tax Income? by L. Mills and G. Plesko (pdf)