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You Can’t Fix Stupid

When Norway recently enacted a new wealth tax, it was billed as an easy way to make the rich “pay their fair share.” They packed their bags instead.

Within a year, hundreds of high-net-worth Norwegians fled the country, taking with them billions in capital, thousands of jobs, and a massive portion of the tax base. The exodus has been so severe that government revenue declined, serving as a case study in the inevitable response to bad tax policy.

Learning nothing, California is flirting with the same economic poison. A proposed “billionaire

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2026-01-09T17:42:51+00:00January 9, 2026|

Wealth Tax Mania Spreads East

With California’s wealth-tax debate heating up, it appears Congress does not want to be outdone. New York Democratic Representative Dan Goldman has introduced a new tax aimed at appreciated property held by high-net-worth individuals. The legislation offers yet another chance to highlight why tax proposals targeting capital all suffer from the same fatal flaws.

Goldman’s Redistribution of Billions by Instituting New High-Income Obligations on Overlooked Debt (ROBINHOOD) Act would impose a 20-percent excise tax on loans secured by appreciated assets. When a taxpayer borrows against the value of stock, real estate, or a business interest that has risen in value,

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2025-12-23T15:40:17+00:00December 23, 2025|

Talking Taxes in a Truck Episode 46: Tom Nichols on the Backdoor Tax Hike That Needs to be Repealed

Our guest is Tom Nichols, partner at the Milwaukee-based Meissner Tierney Fisher & Nichols, longtime advisor to S-Corp, and author of an excellent new piece exposing the Section 461(l) Excess Business Loss limitation for the money-grabbing fraud it is. Tom walks through the provision’s origins, the harm it does to affected businesses, and how flawed revenue estimates drove the policy. We also get into our SALT Parity efforts and how the state laws and legal analysis he drafted helped pave the way for $20 billion in annual tax savings for Main Street businesses.

This episode of the Talking Taxes in

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2025-12-19T16:35:04+00:00December 19, 2025|

Taxing Losses

Tom Nichols, a shareholder at Milwaukee’s Meissner Tierney Fisher & Nichols and a longtime S-Corp advisor, is out with a great piece in Tax Notes that takes aim at the poorly-crafted Section 461(l) excess business loss limitation. “A Problematic Solution to a Nonexistent Problem” breaks down the provision, its real-world consequences, and the flawed policy rationale that led to its inception.

Prior to the Tax Cuts and Jobs Act, active pass-through business losses were used by owners to offset wages, investment income, and other business income. This treatment reflected the basic principle that income taxes should be paid on an

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2025-12-17T19:32:13+00:00December 17, 2025|

CTA Setback

Breaking news from the Eleventh Circuit Court of Appeals. In a 3-0 decision issued this morning, a three-judge panel reversed our landmark district court ruling that the Corporate Transparency Act (CTA) was unconstitutional.

Readers will remember that district court victory as huge win for Main Street. It not only paved the way for additional successful court challenges, it also freed FinCEN to focus on new rules that limited the CTA’s scope significantly.

Unfortunately, today’s ruling goes in the other direction. Writing for the Eleventh Circuit, Judge Brasher concluded that the CTA falls within Congress’s power under the Commerce Clause:

We

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2025-12-16T21:57:13+00:00December 16, 2025|