Planning and Policy Issues Raised by the Structure of the U.S. International Tax Rules

The U.S. international income tax rules, which govern the U.S. tax treatment of multinational companies, employ five key concepts: corporate residence, source of income, foreign tax credits with limits, deferral, and subpart F. This paper, which is a draft version of chapter 2 of a book in progress entitled Fixing the U.S. International Tax Rules, explores the tax planning and tax policy issues raised in practice by each of these concepts, focusing in particular on how, why, to what extent, and with what consequences each of them runs into difficulty in practice.