Congress is expected to agree upon major retirement legislation in the coming months. The EARN Act which was developed by the Senate Finance Committee, should be revised to better enhance retirement equity, particularly for the many American workers and their families who are seeking to...

In this article, the authors review the income tax treatment of prizes and awards in the context of Dr. Ralph Steinman who died in 2011 before being named a Nobel Laureate in Medicine. The Nobel Committee has announced that it intends to pay the prize money to Dr. Steinman's estate. Should this...

The beneficiary of an inheritance has the right to disclaim (i.e., decline) it, within limits ordinarily set by state law. This Article examines situations where a beneficiary’s right to disclaim might instead be governed by federal law, as a matter of both existing doctrine and public policy....

ERISA preemption of state laws is determined using the following three rules. First, ERISA permits state laws that do not diminish or enhance any of the ERISA basic benefit protections. Second, ERISA preempts any state law that diminishes or enhances any of the three ERISA basic benefit...

The article supplements the two classic legislative histories of ERISA: (1) James A. Wooten, the Employee Retirement Income Security Act of 1974 — A Political History (2004) and (2) Staff of S. Comm. on Labor and Public Welfare, Leg. History of the Employee Retirement Income Security Act of...

This short essay introduces a special issue of the ACTEC Law Journal devoted to the estate planning jurisprudence of the Supreme Court of the United States. The issue includes two invited essays on the role of the court in developing the law in this area, as well as commentaries on seventeen of...

Sole entrepreneurs overwhelmingly choose the single-member limited liability company (SMLLC) as the business entity for their operations. Consequently, simplicity of formation and operation of SMLLCs is highly desirable, both to facilitate entrepreneurship and to acknowledge that costs, lack of...

Government attacks on abusive tax shelters often assume one of two forms. On the one hand, the Executive Branch brings actions that rest, in part, on broad judicial doctrines. One such doctrine, for example, requires that potentially abusive transactions demonstrate economic substance. On the...

The concept of using legal structures to protect property from those who might otherwise have some claim to it is an idea with deep roots. The trust device is one such legal structure, and its evolution as an asset protection device has not been without controversy. The recent and noticeable...

Command-and-control regulations are generally thought to be inferior to incentive-based alternatives. This essay proposes an incentive-based approach for regulating campaign finance. In place of our current regime of contribution ceilings, the essay calls for a graduated system of contribution...