Welcome back! I hope you enjoyed your summer. Whether you are takiung Taxation or Partnership Tax, expect to have fun, be challenged, and learn a lot. Questions are very much encouraged, and I am available as much as you need. We can meet in my office, but my experience is that most students prefer to talk via Zoom in the evenings. I will have drop-in office hours in my office each Monday and Tuesday after Partnership Tax from 5:30 - 6:00. Other office appointments are available by request. Zoom appointments also are available by request. In general, I am not available in the mornings. I am available most afternoons, evenings and weekends.
In the fall, I will be teaching Taxation on Mondays and Tuesdays from 1:30 - 3:30 as well as Partnership Tax from 3:45 - 5:15, also on Mondays and Tuesdays. All classes meet in the basement of the WCC, room 015.
I have posted the course materials for both fall courses. For the Taxation class, the materials are available as a bound volume that the law school provides. The same materials are posted to my web page in .docx format. Please note that the answers to chapter questions and problems can be found at the end of each chapter.
There is a lot of material posted to the Partnership Tax web page that I will explain as we go along. To start, please download the Syllabus and note that I have posted answers to all the problems in the book. My strong suggestion is that you not look at my answers until you have worked each problem as best you can: partnership tax is learned by doing rather than by reading. Please note that a new edition of the casebook should be available for the spring, and it will be used in the Corporate Tax class taught by Professor Brennan. If you anticipate taking that course this spring or next, it probably makes sense not to purchase a new edition of the casebook but rather buy or borrow a used copy. Please note that renting an on-line copy may mean that you do not have a copy to use during the examination.
For each class, the exam will be in-class and will last three hours. Grades will not be adjusted for class participation. You will be permitted to use your laptop but you will not be permitted to access the Internet. You will be permitted to consult the casebook, the Code and Regulations, anything I have posted to my web page (provided you bring a copy to the exam), anything you have prepared, and anything any other student has prepared provided you have your own copy during the exam. You may not consult any commercial materials not required for the course although you are free to type anything you like into your outline that you bring to the exam. Please make sure you own a copy of the Internal Revenue Code and Income Tax Regulations (selected provisions) or have made arrangements to borrow a copy for the exam. Each exam will consist of two hours of essay questions and one hour of multiple-choice questions. Each multiple choice question will have four possible answers, and "none of the above" will not be an answer for any of the questions. The four provided answers for each question will reflect different conceptual answers so that a computational mistake will not cause you to chose the wrong answer, and many of the multiple choice questions will not require any computation at all. The exam will not be a math test: mathematical mistakes will be ignored so long as I can follow your reasoning and your reasoning is correct. Must students will completely finish the exam in the allotted time, and I include what I believe is adequate time for thinking. Tax lawyers think a lot.
My office is 316 Hauser Hall. I can be reached at (617) 495-3159. My e-mail address is habrams@law.harvard.edu.