OK, But once the IRS tells you that you took a tax credit or break that you were NOT entitled to? What do you do then?

Myself personally? Pay it. Myself as a large corporation (beholden to my shareholders) with tax attorneys that probably do nothing but help me optimize my taxes? Follow their legal advice, which (IANAL) is probably to contest it as long as possible.

The competitive companies have paid their taxes.

Oh I’m sure all the other corporations always pay everything on time and never endlessly contest for various tax breaks with the IRS. Definitely sure. Maybe probably sure. Ok: entirely unsure, even suspicious, you might say.

Look, I’m not happy about an unreadable tax code with intricate tax breaks and credits that are designed by their obscurity to only be taken advantage of by those who can afford tax attorneys. Can anyone really be happy about that? (Besides the tax attorneys!) But it’s precisely ridiculous tax breaks like these that Buffet has been clamoring against!

It is easier to be successful if you don’t have to worry about a level playing field.

What an excellent point. How about we drastically reduce the complexity of the tax code so that Buffet doesn’t have to bother with silliness like this while at the same time raising tax revenues. We can tie those revenue increases to some spending cuts and call it, for lack of a better term, “the plan Obama and congressional Democrats came up with in during the debt ceiling craziness.” We can focus-group the title, but I think the plan is a real winner in Congress.

The only group such a plan really hurts is tax lawyers, but I’m pretty sure we can divert some of the new government revenue to provide them with career re-training.