I got to squeeze a lot of puns in this short piece on the "Chicken Tax" that is actually a ... tax on light pickup trucks.
"The US introduced the tax after negotiations to resolve the rooster ruckus reached a stalemate. The Lyndon B. Johnson administration imposed a 25% tariff on light trucks—specifically to capture the Volkswagen Microbus—as well as other exportable goods where the offending EU states would feel the pinch."
Preaching to the choir, I guess, but all the people (Andrew Sullivan, etc.) that are raising a hue and cry about the focus on diversity in the Ivy League seem to be ignoring the fact that white males remain the dominant demographic.
Hi! Are you a #lawyer or other #legal professional? Cool, but also, condolences.
We here at https://esq.social want to help. We're a purpose-built #Mastodon instance to provide a home base on the #fediverse for all you looney tunes.
Join us, won't you? We're nice and we've been around for a year -- which is like a decade in fediverse time.
We also have a #Slack-like platform called #Element with about 30 folks popping in and out. I’ll put that link in the next toot.
Increasingly I'm finding #LinkedIn to be the best of the "normy" social media platforms. #Mastodon is where I have conversations, LinkedIn is where I follow industry trends and try not to become nauseated with the hustle culture nonsense.
I don't see how #Threads or #BlueSky really fit in to my mental conceptions of what I want out of social media. But LinkedIn, eh, it serves a purpose.
If any #lawfedi or @law folks are similarly straddling both worlds, look me up.
LinkedIn for me is just about job hunting, or more specifically, being found. I've got my CV on there and recruiters contact me. And I never even have to check LinkedIn. This works fine for me.
In this week's Insights I wrote about a fun little fraud (if #tax fraud can ever be fun) in the EU involving shipping #Apple#AirPods in a big loop and exploiting input credit refunds for VAT payments never made. Also known as a "carousel" or "missing trader intra-community" fraud.
“When intertwined with public funding through state and federal tax incentives, the practice of movie and television write-downs represents a troubling exploitation of taxpayer funds. Coupled with rapidly expanding state tax incentives, it represents a multibillion-dollar Rube Goldberg machine that culminates in a nickel being pulled from your pocket, strapped to an Acme rocket, and fired directly into the bank accounts of movie studios.”
The chain breaks here because studios typically owe very little in state taxes -- so much so that they don't even use the credits they receive from (for instance GA) to offset their own taxes. They sell them to folks that have enough of a bill to make use of them in full.
I had occasion to talk about this in class the other day, and its one of those stories I frequently forget the details of.
The extent to which the #telecommunications landscape re-congealed to nearly pre-1982 #ATT breakup levels by the early 2000s is a pretty compelling argument for the need for ongoing #antitrust enforcement.
He wasn't the main speaker that day, Edward Everett was. He spoke for 2 hours about the significance of the battle. Lincoln's address was only 10 sentences and he delivered it so quickly there are no photographs of him speaking.
Interestingly, the speech itself speaks to the insignificance of anything he could say that day. And yet the speech is unquestionably more well-known than the battle.
SCOTUS adopting a self-imposed ethics code is not the same as being subject to a real ethics code. This is theater. Bad theater.
Community theater where the show they have on the sign isn't what you see and there is gum on your seat and the people on stage spit on you and when you stand up and demand an apology they put the big light on you and everyone laughs and your shoes fall off when you try to run out of the building.
Does any #lawfedi folk know, or have a contact that would know, about rules/restrictions regarding using a "granny cam" in a nursing or rehab facility? Reckon its state-specific, this would be New Jersey for what its worth.
@andrew@law It generally comes down to a question of resident rights, particularly HIPAA privacy when it comes to cares. If it's a shared room, they're generally prohibited without the consent of both residents. Facilities tend to have policies against them for that reason unless the state requires them to be allowed.
"On this day in legal history, November 6, 1917, New York state adopted a state constitutional amendment granting the vote to women.
...
Amendment 1, a legislatively referred constitutional amendment, granted women equal voting rights in the state. This landmark decision was the culmination of nearly seven decades of tireless advocacy since the first women’s rights convention in Seneca Falls, New York, in 1848."
Fri 11/3 - SBF Guilty, Eastman Culpable, NASCAR Biased Against White Men (??), Eric Trump to Face More Tough Questions and Giuliani Wants His License Back
We have #SBF guilty (no way!), #Eastman found preliminarily culpable before bar, #NASCAR accused of bias against white men, Eric #Trump to face more tough questions and #Giuliani wants his DC bar license back.
@andrew@law One would have thought by 1884 relying on Taney's Dred Scott decision would be a red flag. But apparently not for those who wrote and joined the majority opinion.
Weds 11/1 - "Trump Too Small," SBF Closing Arguments, DJTJ to Testify, and New Bar Exam Catches on
In today's episode we have #SCOTUS taking up “Trump Too Small” #trademark claim, #SBF case heads to closing arguments, DJTJ to testify in his father’s trial, and the NextGen bar exam gains traction kind of.
#Intuit should get out of the anti-Direct File business (read: stop being evil) and start lobbying for an open #API.
“Ultimately, the Direct File program is a call for this industry to evolve. It necessitates a reimagining of value proposition to align with taxpayers’ evolving needs and expectations. But it remains an open question whether these companies are up to the challenge."
@andrew@law I love the article, and the ways in which Intuit et al can bring additional value to the table, such as AI.
But your basic presupposition (or hope?) is that the companies have a shred of interest in fair competition.
They perceive, correctly, that they get more bang for the buck spending money lobbying for a system in which consumers need them for basic tax filing, rather than improving their products. And they are waiting for their GOP allies to kill Direct File.
@andrew@law OK, I ran out of characters - I vaguely recall you did bump up the limit from 500 characters briefly, but then it went back down?
At any rate, Intuit and other legacy companies rely upon an antiquated model which demands that government keep things complex to create the need for their product are parasitic special interests who will die if they don't adapt. Or they keep lobbying and bank on the GOP to come to their rescue - either could happen.
FWIW I suggest the #Element app for Matrix. It has both a web version and an "app" (mobile/Windows/macOS/iPadOS/etc.) version. You can preview our main room here: