By Edward R. Jenkins Jr., CPA, CGMA

Earlier this year, the AICPA Tax Executive Committee sent a letter to the party chairs of the U.S. Senate Committee on Finance and U.S. House Committee on Ways and Means that included its 2023 AICPA Compendium of Tax Legislative Proposals – Simplification and Technical Proposals. In short, AICPA’s compendium focuses on 61 proposals to adjust the Internal Revenue Code (IRC) in areas that need attention or to make technical fixes.

The compendium is a comprehensive, even if it is not exhaustive, collection of all the fixes and updates needed to the IRC. How do I know this? Well, I have had the pleasure to serve as a member of that AICPA committee for three years. And as my term on the AICPA Tax Executive Committee (TEC) comes to an end in May, I’d like to share with you what exactly the TEC does.  

The Tax Division of the AICPA, through the TEC, serves the public interest by assisting CPAs in their role as the most trusted professional providers of tax services and by advocating for sound tax policy and effective tax administration.

As the mission suggests, there are two domains of activity for the TEC: tax policy and advocacy and tax practice and ethics. The TEC fulfills its mission through member committees, technical resource panels (TRPs), and task forces.  

Three core responsibilities within tax policy and advocacy are developed primarily by the TRPs:

• Position the AICPA as a thought leader in tax policy and advocacy.
• Identify emerging legislative, regulatory and administrative developments and issues.
• Develop positions with respect to sound tax policy and effective tax administration, and advocate for those positions.

The core responsibility of tax practice and ethics is to reinforce and elevate CPAs’ reputation as the most trusted professional providers of tax services. Three committees on tax practice fulfill this responsibility by publishing guidance and resources, communicating with AICPA Tax Division members, and supporting Tax Division members.

The TEC is responsible for the development and maintenance of enforceable standards for tax practice, known as the Statements on Standards for Tax Services (SSTS). The TEC has spent much of the past three years updating the SSTS, and that update is presently being modified to reflect the input received during the comment period that ended in December 2022. The TEC also communicates with the IRS Office of Professional Responsibility and other IRS business units regarding professional conduct in tax practice.

Each year, the TEC issues two large deliverables. The first is the Legislative Compendium, introduced at the beginning of the blog. The compendium, a list of recommendations to improve tax law, is issued to the House Ways and Means Committee and the Senate Finance Committee each year. The 2023 compendium mentioned above is 159 pages of tax policy, technical correction, and tax simplification recommendations.

The second big deliverable is the comment letter TEC issues to the IRS regarding its Priority Guidance Plan each year. The IRS struggles to get to all of its work, and the TEC gets to comment on what regulatory matters are the most important for the IRS to address with its limited resources.

These two deliverables are only a part of what TEC does. As legislative proposals are put forth, the committee provides written comment and oral testimony to Congressional committees, and we field questions from members of Congress. TEC also comments on regulations, forms, instructions, and regulatory tax questions issued for comment by the IRS.

AICPA’s tax practice committees work hard to develop and publish resources for Tax Division members. The big publication is the annual compliance package, which includes tax return review checklists for all major tax and information returns, model engagement letters, tax organizers, and a variety of tax practice guides. Those resources include a model tax practice quality guide as well.  

I am proud of my part over the past three years in helping the TEC to fulfill its mission. The experience helped me refine my technical writing and editing skills and added to my technical knowledge as I reviewed and approved hundreds of comment letters during my three-year stint. I am a member of both the AICPA and the PICPA. I have worked on committees for both, and they are vitally important and fulfilling experiences. Most importantly, I enjoyed the relationships and network I developed with national leaders in our field via the AICPA and state leaders via the PICPA.

I encourage you to consider broadening your availability and working to bolster your profession. You won’t regret it.  

Edward R. Jenkins Jr., CPA, CGMA, is the managing member of Jenkins & Co. LLC in Lemont, Pa. He can be reached at edwardj@wemanagetaxes.com.

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Statements of fact and opinion are the authors’ responsibility alone and do not imply an opinion on the part of the PICPA's officers or members. The information contained herein does not constitute accounting, legal, or professional advice. For actionable advice, you must engage or consult with a qualified professional.