Webcast sponsored by the Irving K. Barber Learning Centre and hosted by the Faculty of Law.
This talk revisits the issue of including lesbians and gay men as spouses for tax purposes. It highlights existing concerns about this policy, including the fact that it results in a privatization of economic security within relationships. The lecture also considers the impact of changes to the income tax system that permit spouses to split income and concludes that these changes exacerbate existing inequalities and reinforce heteronormativity by rewarding the traditional family in which one spouse is the breadwinner and the other remains at home. The recommendation is that all tax rules that take spousal status into account be abolished and we return to the individual as the unit of taxation.
About the Speaker:
Claire Young
Professor, UBC Faculty of Law
Prior to joining the Faculty of Law in 1992, Claire Young practiced law with the Alberta Attorney-General’s department for several years and taught law at the University of Western Ontario from 1984-1992.She is the co-author of two books and the author of numerous articles on tax law and policy. Her research interests include feminist legal theory and sexuality and the law. She was awarded the Killam prize for excellence in teaching in 1998 and 2002. In 1999 she held the Dunhill Madden Butler Visiting Chair in Women and the Law at the University of Sydney, Australia. She has consulted with the Department of Finance and several international organizations on tax policy issues and is currently a member of the Joint Commonwealth Secretariat and the International Development Research Centre (IRDC) research team (based in London, U.K.) working on The Gender Responsive Budget Project. In 2003 Professor Young was awarded the Therese Casgrain Fellowship in recognition of her research on women and economic issues.
Select Articles and Books Available at UBC Library
Young, C. (2011). Pensions, privatization, and poverty: The gendered impact. Canadian Journal of Women and the Law, 23(2), 661. [Link]
Young, C. F. L. (1994). Tax and the family: Law 409. Vancouver: U.B.C. Faculty of Law.
Young, C. F., & Canada. Status of Women Canada. (2000). Women, tax and social programs: The gendered impact of funding social programs through the tax system. Ottawa: Status of Women Canada.
Young, C. (2003). Tax policy, theoretical explorations, and social realities. Canadian Tax Journal, 51(5), 1922. [Link]
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