AICPA Urges End to Abusive Tax Shelters

Exploitative tax shelters are an insult to honest taxpayers and their CPA advisers, the Institute’s tax executive committee said in a letter to Senator Charles E. Grassley, chairman of the Senate Finance Committee, who is proposing legislation to curtail such arrangements. Besides supporting Grassley’s position, the AICPA letter also noted that “deterrence from and the eventual eradication of abusive transactions are best accomplished through disclosure, higher nondisclosure penalties, clearer standards for reasonable cause penalty relief and opinion letters, aggressive enforcement and continued evolution of appropriate solutions by an informed judiciary” ( www.aicpa.org/download/members/div/tax/grassley_letter.pdf ).