Abstract
This paper will look briefly at the latest modifications to dividend imputation, a recent case on the deductability of legal expenses incurred in protecting market share, and the rather more mundane issue of deductions for work-related clothing expenses.
At one level, this list represents a selection from the usual annual grab-bag of ad hoc and piecemeal developments to the Australian income tax system. There are no startling new directions here: the heady days of the mid-eighties are behind us.
But at another level, the items on this list serve to underscore some of the major structural and jurisprudential problems facing Australian tax law.
Modern Australian tax legislation is notoriously voluminous and detailed. But this ambitious, rococo edifice has been constructed on quite humble jurisprudential foundations. We have seen a great deal of painting and redecorating over the last ten years. But if some thought isn't given to those foundations soon, the whole structure is in danger of collapsing under its own weight.