Given the increase in foreign-educated attorneys applying for and enrolling in Tax LLM programs in US law schools (including the Graduate Tax LLM Program at Georgetown Law), due in part to a strong job market, it seemed like there’s a need for tax law-related legal English resources for foreign-educated attorneys and law students preparing to start at (or thinking about applying to) a tax LLM program at a US law school. This page is attempting to help out by filling that need.
- Special thanks to students and colleagues who have provided their suggestions.
- Any additional suggestions are always welcome!
- You can email Stephen Horowitz at sh1643@georgetown.edu or just post in the comment section below.
1. Websites/Blogs
1. Legal English Resources Page on the Georgetown Legal English Blog: Not specifically tax-related, but plenty of resources that may nonetheless be helpful (and which we don’t want to duplicate on this page.)
2. Big Four Accounting Firm Websites (recommended by Georgetown Tax LLM students from non-US countries)
3. Bloomberg Tax (recommended by Georgetown Tax LLM students from non-US countries)
4. TaxProfBlog by Prof. Paul L. Caron – Started as a tax law-oriented blog. Now it also includes posts on more general topics in addition to tax law-related topics.
2. Articles
1. “An Introduction to Tax Careers for JDs” by Heather M. Field, Professor of Law at UC Hastings College of Law (published on ABA website) – This article was written originally for JD students but is equally beneficial for any tax LLM student.
2. “Pursuing a Tax LLM Degree: Why and When?” Caron, Paul L. and Kowal, Jennifer M. and Pratt, Katherine, Pursuing a Tax LLM Degree: Why and When? (March 24, 2010). U of Cincinnati Public Law Research Paper No. 10-11, Loyola-LA Legal Studies Paper No. 2010-9, Available at SSRN: https://ssrn.com/abstract=1577966 or http://dx.doi.org/10.2139/ssrn.1577966
3. Tax Basics Books
1. A Short & Happy Guide to Federal Income Taxation by Joel S. Newman – Part of Westlaw’s Short & Happy Guide series, this book was specifically mentioned by a foreign-educated Georgetown tax LLM student who found it very helpful. (Note: Various LLM students have also told me that generally speaking they find the Short & Happy Guide series to be a little easier to comprehend than other supplements.)
2. Examples & Explanations: Federal Income Tax (Eighth Edition) by Katherine Pratt, Thomas D. Griffith & Joseph Bankman (published by Wolters Kluwer) – Another study supplement/guidebook recommended and used by a foreign-educated law student who graduated from Georgetown’s Tax LLM program.
3. Federal Income Tax (Chirelstein): This is the supplement that most professors recommend for students studying basic federal income tax (Note: All foreign-trained Tax LL.M. students in Georgetown’s Tax LLM program take this course with Professor Emily Satterthwaite in the fall).
4. Federal Tax Research (Larson) – From Prof. Ellis Duncan, Director of Georgetown’s Graduate Tax LLM program: “This is the book that I use for my legal research class. It’s a bit long, and I only cover about half the book in class, but it does give students a good intro into the US legal system for tax, including IRS/Treasury administrative guidance, the court system for tax cases, and a decent introduction to various research tools (both electronic and hard cover) for tax.”
5. Nutshell on International Tax (Herzfeld): This is the supplement that Georgetown Tax Law Professors Grinberg and Faulhaber recommend to students taking international tax at Georgetown (a class that most foreign trained LL.M. students at Georgetown take in the fall semester.)
4. Other Tax-related Books
1. The Whiteness of Wealth: How the Tax System Impoverishes Black Americans–And How Can We Fix It
By Professor Dorothy A. Brown, presently of Emory Law School but who will soon be joining the faculty of Georgetown Law starting fall 2022.
In the words of Carl Davis on the JusTax Blog, Prof. Brown’s book
uses a mix of data, legal scholarship, interviews, and personal stories to tear down the myth that our tax system is neutral with respect to race. Federal tax laws favoring investment income, homeownership, higher education, retirement savings, and marriage systematically advantage white families at the expense of Black families and other people of color.
2. A Fine Mess: A Global Quest for a Simpler, Fairer, and More Efficient Tax System
By journalist T.R. Reid, author of many similarly intriguing books (including The Healing of America: A Global Quest for Better, Cheaper, and Fairer Health Care and Confucius Lives Next Door: What Living in the East Teaches Us About Living in the West among others.)
From the description of the book on Reid’s website:
In A Fine Mess — A Global Quest for a Simpler, Fairer, and More Efficient Tax Code, Reid looks at countries like ours –advanced, high-tech capitalist democracies –and finds that they have made taxation vastly simpler than our convoluted, inequitable system. In the Netherlands, filing your income tax return takes 15 minutes; in Britain and Japan, it takes no time, because the revenue agency fills out the return for you. And many countries spread the tax burden more fairly, with the richest people paying the most tax (unlike the U.S.).
5. Podcasts
1. USLawEssentials Law & Language Podcast – A podcast created to help people improve their legal English, the podcast includes shorter episodes that focus on legal English vocabulary words and current topics in the legal news as well as longer episodes of interviews with multilingual lawyers. Several of those interviews are with lawyers involved with tax law, including:
1. Ellis Duncan – Director of the Graduate Tax Program at Georgetown Law
2. Maria Garay – A tax lawyer from Spain who completed her tax LLM in the US and now works in the Tax Law department of the New York law firm Fried Frank.
3. Dianne Miano – A tax lawyer from the Philippines who completed Georgetown Law’s Two-Year LLM program and Tax LLM program and subsequently went to work for a large US company in Chicago.
4. Guanxiong Xu – A tax LLM graduate originally from China who has gone on to work for the law firm of Simpson Thacher & Bartlett in San Francisco.
6. Accounting
A number of foreign-educated tax LLM program graduates have mentioned that if you don’t have any experience with accounting, it’s very helpful to get some background with accounting before starting a tax LLM program, as many other students in the program will have prior experience with accounting.
Appropriate materials and suggestions will be added soon.
