Tax Lawyer's Blog

“Watch what people are cynical about, and one can often discover what they lack.”

- Harry Emerson Fosdick -

The National Association of Tax Preparers (the “NATP”), the American Bar Association (the “ABA”) and the American Institute of Certified Public Accountants (“AICPA”) have issued position statements on the IRS’s proposed regulation of unenrolled tax preparers.

The NATP and ABA favor a new regulatory regime while the AIPA opposes it.

The Questioning of Motive as Substitute for Authentic Debate 

Robert Flach, the Wandering Tax Maestro, resorts to his usual defamatory tactics when he accuses the AICPA of opposing regulation and licensing of unenrolled preparers merely because it wants to preserve its members’ monopoly on tax return preparation.

Instead of addressing the AICPA’s stated reasons for opposing preparer regulation and pointing out why those reasons are misguided or wrong, Flach chooses to engage in argumentum ad hominem.

He arbitrarily assigns an ulterior motive to the AICPA and then slanders the entire organization with it as if it were a divine truth.

To wit:

CPAs do not want the competition – they want to continue to have the unjustified “upper hand” with the public in terms of erroneously perceived tax expertise that they now enjoy.

Let me try to put Flach’s mind at ease.

No degree of regulation will ever be sufficient to elevate, in the mind of the public, an unenrolled preparer to the status of a Certified Public Accountant.

It just ain’t happening.

It’s a delusion that CPAs fear competition from unenrolled preparers. And I especially feel confident in saying that CPAs do not fear competition from a chap who prepares tax returns from his attic while proudly eschewing the use of all technology more advanced than hammer and chisel.

Good Reasons to Oppose Regulation of Preparers

I am a member of the AICPA and I favor regulation of unenrolled preparers.

Nevertheless, I know there are sound, non self-interested reasons for CPAs, taxpayers and the general public to oppose the proposed expansion of an already bloated federal bureaucracy.

One of those reasons was recently articulated by my friend, blogging colleague, and fellow AICPA member, Joe Kristan:

A licensing regime spends most of its efforts shuffling the paperwork of honest preparers. This takes a lot of time and resources, and will inevitably involve screw-ups catching honest preparers in a bureaucratic maze. This increases costs for preparers and, ultimately, for taxpayers.

But since Joe possesses the twin nefarious traits of Beezlebub – he’s a CPA and he opposes tax preparer regulation – Flach must believe that he, too, is motivated solely by greed and naked self-interest.

Monkeyshine!

El maestro thinks that he alone among the participants in this debate is pure in heart.

The Modus Operandi in Operation

When you disagree with Mr. Flach or when you take a position that is counter to his interests he does not address your specific points. Instead, he questions your character, your motives and your integrity.

We have seen him employ this tactic time after time after time.

Here are two recent examples:

1. Flach left this comment on my blog after I wrote a post advising self-employed tax preparers to incorporate as a means of reducing their chances of audit:

I am not surprised that a lawyer would list “incorporate” as #1. As a general rule lawyers often get a huge fee for having their secretary type up some proforma papers and selling a corporate “kit”. (Emphasis Added)

Why doesn’t Flach say why he believes incorporating is bad advice for the small businessman, rather than castigate the person who has given that advice?

The answer is apparent. El Maestro, jaded and cynical as he is, cannot even conceive of a lawyer who might advise his clients to incorporate for any reason other than personal gain.

2. Flach wrote the following comment on his own blog about a CPA named Martin Kaplan who had the unalloyed gall to suggest that taxpayers choose licensed preparers over non-licensed preparers:

I wish to take exception to two of the “10 Questions to Ask a Tax Preparer”suggested in an article by Martin S Kaplan CPA.

Question #3 is “Are you a licensed CPA? Enrolled Agent? Tax Attorney?”

Kaplan tells us to “stick with tax preparers who have one of these designations”.

You will notice the initials after Kaplan’s name. (Emphasis Added)

Flach’s judgment is again blurred by his cynicism (or is it bitter envy?).

If he saw better, he would have noticed that Mr. Kaplan doesn’t advise taxpayers to hire only CPAs. He advises them to hire Enrolled Agents and Tax Attorneys, as well.

It is rank libel, then, for Flach to suggest that Kaplan is so advising taxpayers only to further his own narrow, self-interests.

Rules of Debate

When your opponent has clearly stated the reasons for his position, accusing him of lying about those reasons violates a basic tenet of fair debate - attack the idea, not the person.

I agree with el maestro’s end - the regulation of unenrolled preparers, but I abhor his means - disparaging the integrity of his opponents and questioning their motives.

Bookmark & Share: