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Academic Spotlight: Leandra Lederman, Spotter of Silver Linings

Posted on Nov. 4, 2020

Tax law professor Leandra Lederman — recently recognized as the seventh-most-cited tax professor in the country — didn’t let the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic thwart her aims to disseminate tax knowledge over the summer.

Lederman leads the Indiana University School of Law’s Tax Policy Colloquium during the spring semester, which she said was disrupted this year because of the pandemic.

When the 2020 colloquium shifted to online, Lederman saw an opportunity when she realized, “Oh, the geographic boundaries are gone." She told Tax Notes she opened up the colloquium and invited more people to the digital format.

Because of that, the 2020 colloquium had an increased attendance compared with previous years, and toward its end, Lederman asked around to see if there would be an interest in continuing with a brand-new online program over the summer.

That resulted in the Indiana/Leeds Summer Tax Workshop Series, co-hosted by Lederman and Leopoldo Parada of the University of Leeds School of Law in the United Kingdom.

Having publicized the workshop on Twitter and LinkedIn, Lederman wrote on the Surly Subgroup tax blog that organizers would prioritize papers on tax topics of interest in multiple countries.

With speakers Zooming in from Boston College, the University of Oxford, and the University of Lisbon, among others, the workshop affirmed that with increased communication technology — applied because of the threat of COVID-19 — geographic boundaries are removed.

Lederman called the ability to include people from all over the world  a “silver lining” of the switch to an online format forced by the pandemic.

Research in Luxembourg

The pandemic also affected Lederman’s plans to teach an in-person course on U.S. tax law at the Universidad de Navarra in Pamplona, Spain, a course she’s taught every fall since 2011. She taught it online instead.

Lederman did have the chance to carry out a Fulbright research grant at the University of Luxembourg in 2019. Through the grant, she became familiar with some of the similarities and differences between European and U.S. tax law and researched issues regarding transparency of tax rulings and best practices.

Lederman called Luxembourg an ideal place to research tax rulings because of the 2014 incident known as LuxLeaks. The tax community and others were rattled when documents exposing details of advance tax agreements between Luxembourg and over 300 taxpayers leaked after they were obtained by the International Consortium of Investigative Journalists.

Most of the documents were advance tax rulings from 2008 to 2010 granted by Luxembourg officials to multinationals including Amazon.com Inc., Coach Inc., and Ikea. Some indicated that companies had effective tax rates below 1 percent on profits funneled into the Grand Duchy.

Lederman said she favors transparency and public exposure “to the extent that it can be done.”

Tax Transparency

Pushing for transparency on tax matters has emerged as a hallmark of Lederman’s academic career, and not just through her Luxembourg research.

Lederman is a vocal advocate for tax transparency and congressional support of the IRS, evidenced by her 2016 commentary in Tax Notes, “The IRS, Politics, and Income Inequality,” and her 2018 article in Law360, “Increasing Transparency in the U.S. Tax Court.”

“The U.S. Tax Court is not as transparent as other federal courts due to the structure of the federal judicial system,” Lederman told Tax Notes, adding that the court isn’t part of the Administrative Office of the U.S. Courts, and that it’s less transparent and has less accountability than other federal courts. “It’s a problem.”

“We as the public want to hold our government institutions accountable, and for that you need visibility into what they’re doing,” said Lederman.

On October 13 Lederman testified before the House Ways and Means Oversight Subcommittee, promoting the use of audits to encourage tax compliance and bring in large amounts of revenue, and voicing support for adequate funding of the IRS.

Lederman displays the hashtag #FundTheIRS on the bio for her Twitter account, @Leandra2848. “It’s really a tragedy how Congress has slashed IRS funding most years since 2011,” she said. “It’s bad for all aspects of tax administration. It hurts enforcement. It makes it easier for higher-income taxpayers to not fully comply.”

“Ultimately what I’m arguing for is fairness,” said Lederman. “I’m a big believer in a level playing field.”

Cites and Recognitions

With 240 citations, Lederman was the seventh-most-cited tax professor in the United States between 2013 and 2017, according to a law school report from Brian Leiter of the University of Chicago Law School. She appeared on the periodic list three times before that, starting in 2010.

A separate list compiled by Jonathan Choi of the University of Minnesota Law School shows that Lederman wrote the 40th-most-cited tax law journal article of all time: “The Interplay Between Norms and Enforcement in Tax Compliance,” 64 Ohio St. L.J. 1453, 1457-1460 (2003).

“It’s nice to be included on these lists. I’m in really, really good company,” said Lederman, adding that scholars included are typically those with long career experience like her, and that one should take the rankings with a grain of salt.

Lederman is the director of the law school’s tax program and teaches subjects including federal income tax, corporate tax, and tax procedure. She received her JD and her LLM in taxation from New York University School of Law during the 1990s.

With a retired lawyer and a retired professor as parents, Lederman said that in law school, she thought she wanted to be a litigator, but her father encouraged her to consider tax. Her first job out of law school was at White & Case LLP, where she tried her hand in both litigation and tax and was drawn to the latter.

“I loved it,” said Lederman. Expressing a fondness for rule-based systems like taxes, she highlighted the mixture of law and math that arises in legal tax matters.

“I really love procedure. Procedural issues fascinate me,” she said. “Tax has a puzzle aspect that I find really interesting.”

Lederman clerked for Tax Court Judge David Laro before entering academia and has received several teaching awards. In 2019 she received the Tracy M. Sonneborn Award from Indiana University, which is given to exemplary researchers from the university’s faculty who are also known as exemplary teachers.

“I found right away that I love it — being in the classroom teaching students,” said Lederman, adding that she likes explaining complex topics.

Lederman is also the coauthor of Understanding Corporate Taxation (4th ed. 2020) and the casebook and teacher’s manual for Tax Controversies: Practice and Procedure (4th ed. 2018).

Tax Poetry

Lederman has enjoyed writing tax limericks since at least 2001. Summing up a tax case on whether money given to a Las Vegas craps dealer counts as taxable income, Lederman wrote:

“There was a craps dealer named Olk

Who excluded from income his tokes

‘No dice’ said the court,

Fortune’s bounty was sought

And to you they’re like tips from these folks.”

“I really like plays on words,” said Lederman, adding that because they condense information, limericks can be a useful study tool for tax law students. She noted that a colleague has used them on slides in class. Lederman also writes “tax valentines,” which are couplets. Here’s one from her Twitter account:

“Roses are red

No need to feel blue

Valentines aren't income

Per Section 102.”

Here’s another:

“Your take-home pay rose

But before you spend more

You’d better fill out

A new W-4.”

“Once you start writing them, it’s addictive,” Lederman said.

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