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Tax Chats

Dyreng and Hoopes

Taxes touch every aspect of society, including who rules, where factories are built, what people drink, what car they buy, when they have children, and when they die. Scott Dyreng (Duke) and Jeff Hoopes (UNC), two accounting professors, chat about taxes, including current events, with the energy of an over-caffeinated chihuahua. Listening is guaranteed to be far more entertaining than actually paying your taxes.

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  • 20 episodes
  • Avg 34 min
  • English

Episodes 20

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  • S1 · E180
    Monday · 37 min

    Annie Lowrey and taxes on time

    Send us Fan Mail Jeff and Scott talk with Annie Lowrey, staff writer at The Atlantic and author of the new book The Time Tax: How the Government Wastes Our Time—and How to Fix It. Annie explains how government bureaucracy imposes a hidden tax on Americans through paperwork, waiting, and complicated administrative requirements. We discuss why these burdens often fall hardest on lower-income Americans, how tax filing fits into the broader problem, and what government could do to give people back their time. Scott complains about his interactions with the government.

  • S1 · E179
    September 15 · 39 min

    The Everywhere Millionaire: A Chat with Owen Zidar and Eric Zwick about their new book

    Send us Fan Mail Jeff and Scott talk with economists Owen Zidar and Eric Zwick about their new book, The Everywhere Millionaire: Who Is Really Rich in America and How They Got There, in which they use vast amounts of tax return data to gather evidence that paints a picture of who America’s rich really are and how they got there. It’s not just public-company CEOs, but franchise owners and car dealership owners. They finish by giving advice to Scott’s kids about how they can end up rich. Buy the book here: https://www.everywheremillionaire.com/.

  • S1 · E178
    August 25 · 30 min

    Brandon Arnold on Data Centers

    Send us Fan Mail Scott and Jeff speak with Brandon Arnold , the Executive Vice President of the National Taxpayer's Union, about data centers. Do they drive up real estate prices? Do they use too much water? Are they just a substitute for people's fears about AI? And, what are they doing for property taxes (this is, after all, Tax Chats!). Read Brandon's article on data centers here: https://www.ntu.org/publications/detail/smart-policies-not-kneejerk-bans-can-help-taxpayers-benefit-from-data-centers

  • S1 · E177
    August 10 · 32 min

    Jared Walczak on the Laffer Mesa

    Send us Fan Mail Recent research suggests that the Laffer curve is less curve-like than originally thought. Jeff and Scott talk with Jared Walczak from the Tax Foundation about the Laffer Curve, and why we think it is mesa-like, based on his writing here: https://thesaltroad.net/p/the-laffer-mesa.

  • S1 · E176
    July 6 · 35 min

    Tax the Ultrarich Without Throwing Out Realization: A conversation with Brian Galle

    Send us Fan Mail Jeff and Scott chat with Brian Galle about his new paper, How to Tax the Ultrarich. Most proposals that seek to tax the very wealthy differently eliminate the principle of realization, such as wealth taxes or mark-to-market regimes. These approaches carry considerable baggage, including liquidity problems, valuation problems, and related concerns. By contrast, Brian proposes a tax that eliminates some of the value of deferral, which would reduce the incentive to hold assets merely to delay taxation, but still only levies taxes upon realization.

  • S1 · E177
    June 29 · 35 min

    Lobbying for the National Association of Manufacturers: A Chat with Charles Crain

    Send us Fan Mail Jeff and Scott speak with Charles Crain, Managing Vice President of Policy at the National Association of Manufacturers (NAM). Charles works closely with NAM’s member companies to advocate for tax policies that support manufacturers and strengthen the manufacturing sector. In this episode, Jeff and Scott first discuss the important matter of how to pronounce NAM (NOT like Viet-NAM). They then discuss NAM’s role in the policy process, how the organization identifies and prioritizes its tax policy agenda, and some of its most significant advocacy successes. They also explore the story behind NAM’s efforts to secure the bonus depreciation adjustment in the corporate alternative minimum tax.

  • #176
    June 8 · 28 min

    Benjamin Jaros on Colonial Tobacco Tariffs

    Send us Fan Mail Jeff and Scott chat with Ben Jaros, a research fellow at the Hoover Institution, about his paper, “Tobacco Tariffs in the Colonial Chesapeake.” Ben explains how tobacco tariffs shaped the finances of colonial Maryland and Virginia, the English Crown, and the broader Atlantic economy from the early 1600s through the Revolutionary War. We discuss who actually bore the burden of these tariffs, why European consumers may have paid most of the cost, and how tobacco revenue helps explain Britain’s fiscal interest in maintaining control over the colonies

  • S1 · E174
    May 26 · 31 min

    The Tax Policy Center: Chatting with Elena Patel

    Send us Fan Mail Jeff and Scott chat with Elena Patel about the Tax Policy Center, where she is co-director. We talk about the history of the TPC, who works there, and its mission.

  • S1 · E173
    April 29 · 34 min

    Former IRS Commissioner Danny Werfel on the IRS

    Send us Fan Mail Jeff and Scott interview Danny Werfel, a former IRS commissioner under President Obama and President Biden. They talk about his background, the request from President Obama and Biden that he lead the IRS, challenges and opportunities he encountered at the IRS, and what he would change about the agency if he were IRS King for a day.

  • S1 · E172
    February 23 · 38 min

    Inconsistency In Crypto Tax Compliance Providers: A Chat with Tyler Menzer

    Send us Fan Mail Jeff and Scott talk with Tyler Menzer, an assistant professor of accounting at Texas Christian University, about his recent research on cryptocurrency tax reporting. In the project, Tyler submitted the same set of cryptocurrency transactions to multiple crypto tax software and reporting services, many of which present themselves as tracking or reporting tools rather than tax preparation providers. He found that these services often produced very different calculations of taxable income from identical transactions. The conversation explores why these discrepancies arise and uses them as a starting point for a broader discussion of cryptocurrency taxation, compliance, and reporting challenges.

  • S1 · E171
    February 17 · 32 min

    What is "The Tax Law": A Chat with Michael Kaercher

    Send us Fan Mail Jeff and Scott chat with Mike Kaercher, Deputy Director of the Tax Law Center at NYU Law, about where tax law comes from. We often refer to “tax law,” but in this episode we unpack what that actually means—how the Internal Revenue Code, Treasury Regulations, and court cases, all the rest, all fit together, and who actually writes the words on the pages we consider to be tax law.

  • S1 · E170
    February 9 · 40 min

    The Supreme Court and Tariffs: A Chat with Conor Clarke

    Send us Fan Mail Jeff and Scott chat with Conor Clarke, a law professor at Washington University in St. Louis, about the Supreme Court case challenging President Trump’s sweeping tariffs imposed by executive order. The key questions are whether the International Emergency Economic Powers Act authorizes the types of tariffs President Trump has put in place, if it does, whether Congress can delegate tariff-setting power that broadly even if they want to. What will the Court decide?

  • S1 · E169
    February 2 · 42 min

    How the US Weaned Itself off Tariffs: A chat with Joe Thorndike

    Send us Fan Mail Jeff and Scott chat with Joe Thorndike about how the United States moved from relying heavily on tariffs to building the modern income-tax-based system we know today. Joe is a tax historian and journalist, and writes for Tax Notes, where he writes widely on the history and politics of U.S. tax policy. They walk through the political and economic forces that made tariffs both attractive—and eventually untenable—as a main source of revenue. Along the way, they discuss the creation of the federal income tax, the rise of new revenue needs, and what this history can teach us about today’s debates over trade and taxation.

  • S1 · E168
    January 27 · 32 min

    What can we learn from 25 Years of Tax History? A Chat with Jason DeBacker

    Send us Fan Mail Jeff and Scott talk with Jason DeBacker about his new paper, Learning from 25 Years of Changes in Business Tax Policy (with Aerfate Haimiti). Jason is an associate professor of economics at the University of South Carolina and the director of the Policy Simulation Library, an open-source effort that helps researchers and policymakers analyze policy. They discuss his work at PSL and what the last 25 years of business tax changes have taught us—whether bonus depreciation boosts investment, how firms respond to shifts in business tax rates, and more.

  • S1 · E167
    Dec 26, 2025 · 25 min

    A Chat about the Small Business Stock Exclusion with David Mitchell

    Send us Fan Mail Jeff and Scott chat with David Mitchel, a Senior Fellow at the Washington Center for Equitable Growth, about the small business stock exclusion, recent changes to it, and an article that David wrote with Kyle Pomerleau about why we should get rid of it.

  • S1 · E166
    Dec 18, 2025 · 31 min

    Taxes and Christmas: What we Know about Mary and Joseph's Tax Situation, with Roman Historian Anna Dolganov

    Send us Fan Mail Luke 2 tells us that Mary and Joseph went to Bethlehem "to be taxed", and while there, the baby Jesus was born. But, what do we know about that taxing from history? Did everyone travel? What was the general tax environment in the Roman world at the time? Did they actually remit a tax, or, what was the purpose of this trip? Jeff and Scott chat with Roman historian Anna Dolganov about these questions, and more. Anna's previous appearance on the show: https://www.buzzsprout.com/1878989/episodes/17860482 . One note: On the podcast we talk about how burdensome the tax imposed by the Romans in situations like this was, in terms of days of labor (a la Tax Foundation's "Tax Freedom Day"). Here is a follow-up note from Anna: "A Roman legionary's salary was about 225 denarii per year, and the poll tax rate in Egypt was 8-40 drachmas per year (depending on location and tax privilege). So, not quite Austrian level taxation, but still quite a considerable sum." A denarii and a drachma are equivalent. So, Tax Freedom Day for Mary and Joseph, based only on the poll tax, may have been sometime in mid-February.

  • S1 · E165
    Dec 3, 2025 · 31 min

    Death and Taxes: A chat with documentary filmmaker Justin Schein

    Send us Fan Mail Jeff and Scott talk with Justin Schein. They discuss Justin's newest film, and the issues and questions it brings up. Justin's newest film is Death and Taxes, which "is a feature documentary about wealth, inequality and the American Dream, viewed through the lens of the estate tax and the very personal story of a father and son at odds over what kind of inheritance we want to leave our kids and our country." Learn more about the film here: https://www.deathandtaxesfilm.com/.

  • S1 · E164
    Nov 19, 2025 · 35 min

    A Chat with Pete Sepp, President of the National Taxpayers Union

    Send us Fan Mail We start by explaining the Tax Chats DC Tour, 2025, an exclusive live event! Then, Jeff and Scott chat with Pete Sepp, President of the National Taxpayers Union. They talk about the work the NTU has done in the past, and what it currently does, including advocate for legislation that is beneficial to taxpayers and engaging in litigation the NTU believes will bring about taxpayer-friendly changes. Pete gives advice to those who want to make the world a friendly place for taxpayers and want to engage in tax advocacy.

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