At the Crossroads of Health and Tax Law (Katherine Pratt‪)‬ The Tax Maven

Reproductive decisions affect our lives in profound ways. One of the underappreciated challenges of navigating parenthood in today’s world of assisted reproductive technology lies in understanding the tax treatment of the significant expenses that parents bear. Professor Katie Pratt has been wrestling with difficult policy issues raised by technological change for more than a decade. Pratt explains how the tax law has failed to provide would-be parents with the clarity they need on whether the costs of fertility treatments including IVF, egg donor, and surrogate procedures.

In the world of Obergefell, the questions become both more urgent and more challenging and Pratt offers key insights and answers. Pratt’s scholarship has allowed her to build bridges between the tax and public health communities. She explains why that communication is critical to crafting effective laws by telling the story of one of the sugary drink taxes that fell victim to a simple misunderstanding. Tax laws can help improve lives and even help create them, but it takes thoughtful experts like Pratt to make sure that they deliver results.

Pratt fields a tricky pencil question drawn from an article by her colleagues Ted Seto and Sande Buhai: “Tax and Disability: Ability to Pay and the Taxation of Difference”, 154 University of Pennsylvania Law Review 1053 (2006).