Court Opinion

ID: 9785224
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-30 21:11:03.761778+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T07:36:12.517498
License: Public Domain

ALEXANDER, J.,
concurring.
[¶ 17] I concur in and join the Court’s opinion affirming the State Tax Assessor’s decision that the attempted corporate structuring of partnership distributions sent from Preti’s principal place of business in Portland did not avoid attribution of the partnership distributions as income to the individual New Hampshire attorneys for Maine income tax purposes.
[¶ 18] I write separately to emphasize that our decision today should not be read to hold that persons who live and work outside the state and generate income outside the state for Maine-based businesses must have their out-of-state earnings treated as Maine income for Maine income tax purposes. Interstate businesses headquartered in Maine, whether the business is law practice, retail sales, construction, or any other activity that generates income outside the state, do not, by having their headquarters in Maine, subject all their employees who live and work outside the state to Maine income taxation on earnings generated in other states.
[¶ 19] The reason for the result here is the litigants’ choice to focus on structuring corporations to receive income distribu*1205tions, raising issues of law akin to those presented in attempts at corporate structuring for tax avoidance under federal income tax law, which presents no interstate taxation issues. Thus, the briefs by Luker and the amici curiae focus their arguments on precedents such as Moline Properties v. Commissioner, 319 U.S. 436, 63 S.Ct. 1132, 87 L.Ed. 1499 (1943); Sargent v. Commissioner, 929 F.2d 1252 (8th Cir.1991); Johnson v. Commissioner, 78 T.C. 882 (1982), aff'd, 734 F.2d 20 (9th Cir.1984); and Johnson v. United States, 698 F.2d 372 (9th Cir.1982), which address corporate structuring efforts to achieve individual income tax avoidance. Under the arguments citing these precedents, it would appear to make little difference whether the corporation receiving the partnership distributions was located in Concord or Calais.
[¶20] Luker’s original complaint included claims that (1) the New Hampshire partners’ income was not Maine source income, and thus not subject to Maine income taxation; and (2) an apportionment formula exempting most of the income from Maine income taxation should have been applied. As the Court’s opinion indicates at ¶ 1 n. 2, those issues were removed by stipulation from the case and from this appeal. Thus, based on the parties’ litigation strategy, this opinion does not address taxation of employees of Maine-based businesses who live, work and generate income for the business from sources outside the State of Maine.