The "Small Partnership" Exception: The Best Tax Simplification in a Half Century Is In Jeopardy

Abstract

<p>In an unbelievably sneaky fashion, a group of unhappy tax practitioners in late 2015 managed to pull enough strings to repeal, effective after 2017, a 34-year old statute that resulted from the “tax shelter” efforts of the 1970s.1 The statute was buried in a well camouflaged fashion in the Bipartisan Budget Act of 2015,2 and passed with no debate, no hearings and no notice that a key tax provision for many farm and ranch businesses was in grave danger. The statute has provided a much simpler way to file income tax returns without filing a Form 1065 and without enduring the huge penalties that often accompany a slightly incomplete Form 1065.</p>