Friday, June 05, 2026

Finding Meaning in Suffering

 

Finding Meaning in Suffering

Dispatch Faith:  The World Needs to Recover True Lament. Christianity Can Teach It., by Kelly M. Kapic (Covenant College), M. Elizabeth Lewis Hall (Biola University) & Jason McMartin (Biola University) (Co-Authors, When the Journey Hurts: Finding Meaning in Suffering for Heart, Mind, and Soul(2026)):

Benjamin Franklin famously declared that only death and taxes are certain. But he forgot one thing: Suffering is the third universal—as inescapable as mortality, as indifferent as the IRS.

Every major religion or philosophical system in human history has addressed the problem of suffering. Buddhism teaches acceptance and detachment—the goal is to loosen the grip of craving and desire that amplify pain, ultimately freeing the self from suffering’s hold. Secular modernity largely hands suffering to experts: therapists, physicians, pharmaceuticals, and self-optimization regimens. Suffering becomes a problem to be solved, a malfunction to be corrected. Stoicism, of the ancient and current life hack varieties, encourages cultivating indifference and yielding to fate. 

But Judaism and Christianity, at their best and growing out of their shared biblical tradition, offer something none of these does: a structured, communal practice for bringing honest anguish into relationship with a God who, the psalms insist, neither despises nor ignores the cry of the afflicted.

That practice is called lament. In the psalms, lament is a structured form of prayer that follows a discernible pattern: crying out to God, complaining, requesting, remembering God’s works, and—perhaps most surprisingly—often ending in praise of God. And for much of contemporary American Christianity, which we know best and have been studying for years, it has quietly disappeared. But research we’ve been conducting suggests the costs are both deeper and wider than most churches recognize.

The current season of Lent is a time for honest reckoning—40 days of sitting with mortality, limitation, and the long ache of a world not yet whole. It is, at least in theory, the one time of year when Christianity makes room for suffering rather than rushing past it. And yet for many people, Lent passes without ever touching what is actually hardest in their lives. 

That gap between what the church’s calendar invites and what its culture permits is where our research—compiled for our forthcoming book, When the Journey Hurts—begins.

When one of our research participants was asked what lament had done for her, she said something we’ve heard in different forms from many people we’ve interviewed: “I never gave myself permission to be honest with God. I think for a long time I really felt like I needed to put up a face for him because I wanted to give him what he wanted. But I had a wrong idea of what he wanted. He wants honesty from us.” …

 

Bloomberg: “Biofuel Groups Push IRS for New Model to Calculate Tax Credit”

Erin Schilling (Bloomberg): Biofuel Groups Push IRS for New Model to Calculate Tax Credit:


Saez and Zucman: The Case for California’s Billionaire Wealth Tax

Emmanuel Saez (Berkeley-Economics) and Gabriel Zucman (Paris School of Economics) have published a guest essay in the New York Times: “The Case for California’s Billionaire Wealth Tax.” From the article:

On taxes and much else, California has often led the country. In 1978 the state’s voters approved Proposition 13, which strongly limited tax increases. Prop 13 was the opening salvo in Ronald Reagan’s antitax revolution, which swept the United States two years later.

This year California’s voters could spearhead a shift in the opposite direction. A large labor union representing health care workers and advised by academic experts — including the two of us — got the 2026 Billionaire Tax Act on this November’s ballot. The proposed tax would be a one-time levy of 5 percent on billionaire wealth, spread over five years. If the measure passes, it would be the first tax targeted at the combined personal and business wealth of billionaires enacted anywhere in the world.

California is an ideal place to test this idea. The state needs money to fill a budget hole that the Trump administration created when it cut, among other things, Medicaid, a state-federal partnership that provides health coverage to low-income people. Without more state tax revenue to fill the loss in federal funding, the fraction of uninsured Californians will increase substantially, reversing part of the progress made since Obamacare.

More TaxProf Blog coverage on California’s billionaire wealth tax:

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KPMG and Accontinb Mob - Aussie media calls for new ATO powers in big tech news war

Disgraced KPMG executive’s cushion: board overrules legal and HR chiefs

The Albanese government is considering banning KPMG from public sector contracts as data reveals the embattled firm holds $27.4m in government audit deals.
DAVID ROSS and TANSY HARCOURT
June 5, 2026
Demoted KPMG Australia chief operating officer Eileen Hoggett in Sydney on Thursday. 

 Albanese government is considering a freeze on KPMG after data showed the embattled firm collected millions in public sector audit contracts and as partners continue to depart.

The Albanese government is considering a freeze on KPMG after data showed the embattled firm collected millions in public sector audit contracts and as partners continue to depart.

Amid another bruising day of parliamentary hearings, which have focused on the firm’s links with the public service, Greens senator Barbara Pocock said it was time to ban KPMG from ­future spending. 
The Greens have pointed to AusTender data that shows the public service has dozens of audit contracts directly with KPMG worth $27.4m. 
The deepening scandal has claimed the scalps of the CEO Andrew Yates and head of audit Julian McPherson and led to the demotion of chief operating officer Eileen Hoggett. 
The Australian understands KPMG chief legal counsel Louise Capon and head of people Dorothy Hisgrove had recommended a significantly tougher penalty for Ms Hoggett after the firm’s own internal investigation and a review by legal firm Ashurst, but were overruled on the basis the issue sat with the board.
KPMG’s audit teams are facing multiple regulatory probes, amid allegations they leaked confidential documents to others in the firm to help them win work. Among the public deals is a $6.4m contract struck with the Australian National Audit Office, with KPMG supplementing the work of the agency charged with scrutinising public spending. 
Greens senator Barbara Pocock says KPMG has abused the system for its gain. Picture: Martin Ollman / NewsWire
Greens senator Barbara Pocock says KPMG has abused the system for its gain. Picture: Martin Ollman / NewsWire
KPMG also holds a $2.1m audit contract with the Bureau of Meteorology, and a $1.7m audit deal with the Department of Industry, Science and Resources. 
KPMG also has a $4.9m internal audit contract with the CSIRO. 
The Greens said KPMG should have no role in government audits, with Senator Pocock saying the firm had shown itself unfit for government contracts after repeated scandals. 
“It’s clear that KPMG’s rot spans far and wide in government,” she said. 
“Labor must immediately ban KPMG and stop these corrupt firms from milking taxpayers of millions of dollars while abusing the system for their gain.”
The warning comes as state governments mull over their dealings with KPMG, after NSW said the firm had to provide assurances about its dealings with that state’s public service and give an account of what went wrong. 
KPMG has been under fire since whistleblower reports emerged suggesting partners at the firm had shared confidential audit documents with others in the business. 
These were used in a bid to try to win business from the rivals of KPMG’s audit customers. 
The regulatory response to the scandal has seen six partners at KPMG allegedly implicated in the audit misuse. Three of them have self-reported to Chartered Accountants Australia New ­Zealand, but the Australian Securities & Investments Commission only holds the power to pursue the audit partners, and not those within KPMG’s consulting division who helped misuse the documents. 
Clockwise from top left: Martin Sheppard, chairman of KPMG Asia Pacific; interim CEO Stan Stavros and former CEO Andrew Yates
Clockwise from top left: Martin Sheppard, chairman of KPMG Asia Pacific; interim CEO Stan Stavros and former CEO Andrew Yates
Senator Pocock took aim at the regulation blindspot, saying the self-regulatory model for the big four consulting firms was failing. “Labor needs to put an end to their special treatment – on tax, public reporting, professional liability and whistleblower protections – and regulate the big four like other large Australian firms,” she said. 
“The latest KPMG scandals show the big four consultancy firms making a mockery of the parliament yet again. They have made millions of dollars from government work and abused the system.”
Rival PwC Australia faced a similar baptism of fire after that firm was alleged to have misused confidential federal government tax briefings to prepare strategies for clients, in breach of ­undertakings. 
PwC’s government consulting arm was ultimately carved off from the firm as the scandal saw it frozen out from new commonwealth contracts. 
Multiple KPMG partners are now understood to be actively searching for a new employer, amid concern over the future of work with the firm. 
Finance Minister Katy Gallagher, right, alongside Treasury secretary Jenny Wilkinson. Picture: NewsWire / Martin Ollman
Finance Minister Katy Gallagher, right, alongside Treasury secretary Jenny Wilkinson. Picture: NewsWire / Martin Ollman
Already KPMG’s chief executive Andrew Yates has quit, replaced by Stan Stavros, while several other partners have been punted or demoted. 
It’s chair, Martin Sheppard, is clinging on.
Appearing at a Senate estimates hearings, Finance Minister Katy Gallagher said the government was seriously concerned about the scandal, with the Department of Finance preparing to take further action. 
This could see KPMG banned from the Management Advisory Services Panel or an agreement sought from the firm not to tender for government contracts for some time. 
The Department of Treasury told Senate estimates that KPMG had provided assurances to the federal government that none of its staff involved in the firm’s audit scandal was involved in contracts with it. 
Treasury deputy secretary Katrina Demarco said KPMG had contacted the department on Wednesday “to confirm none of the matters provided to Fin­ance concern the performance of services to Treasury”. 
Treasury secretary Jenny Wilkinson, however, said issues around KPMG were “very serious” and would come into consideration about how the public service responded to future contracting with it. The Queensland government is also scrutinising how it will deal with KPMG, with $85m in public service contracts now at risk.

Aussie media calls for new ATO powers in big tech news war 

by Sam Buckingham-Jones 

A coalition of Australian media companies has called for robust powers to be granted to the nation’s tax chief, who could demand tech giants like Meta, Google and TikTok reveal the full extent of their local revenue amid concerns they are shifting billions overseas to minimise tax.

Google, which owns YouTube, Gmail and its dominant search engine, and Meta, which owns Facebook, Instagram and WhatsApp, transferred at least $11 billion out of the country to related entities last year as part of internal transfer pricing deals buying advertising space, which they then on-sell to Australians.

The Albanese government’s proposed News Bargaining Incentive includes a 2.25 per cent charge on TikTok, Meta and Google’s group revenue. Michaela Pollock

But a new law the Albanese government is seeking to pass in coming weeks will impose a levy on the three tech giants’ “consolidated revenue” – unless they negotiate commercial deals to pay Australian media companies for their news content.

The proposed News Bargaining Incentive includes a 2.25 per cent charge on TikTok, Meta and Google’s group revenue that can be fully offset if they strike deals worth 1.5 per cent of that broad revenue figure. It adds to the News Media Bargaining Code, a 2021 law that prompted Google and Meta to strike deals worth roughly $200 million a year – until Meta pulled out.

The problem is that it is unclear exactly how much money the tech giants make from Australia. The government has estimated the policy will raise between $200 and $250 million, suggesting it thinks those companies make between $13 and $16 billion from Australians – figures not reflected in the accounts they lodge locally.

The competition regulator has previously estimated Meta makes more than $5 billion from Australians – it reported $1.8 billion last year. The rest is believed to come from Australians buying ads on Facebook and Instagram companies based in low-tax places overseas, like Ireland. Irish media reported Meta wrote revenue of €85 billion ($138 billion) in 2024 in the country, which has a population roughly one-quarter of Australia.

“The tax office needs to have express powers to interrogate what revenue is generated in this territory for the purposes of this scheme”: Free TV chief executive Bridget Fair. Louie Douvis

Now a lobby group representing Nine Entertainment, Southern Cross Media and Network Ten has called for new “robust” powers to be added to the law to allow the taxation commissioner to probe major tech platforms.

While the incentive calls for a levy on those three companies’ “consolidated revenue attributable to Australia”, Free TV told the government it was concerned transfer pricing and other practices made it difficult to find the true figure to tax.

“This whole scheme is trying to recognise the value these companies generate in Australia based off, to some extent, the news content of broadcasters and other news providers, and that needs to be recognised in total – not after complicated accounting treatments to minimise what that looks like,” said Free TV chief executive Bridget Fair.

“The tax office needs to have express powers to interrogate what revenue is generated in this territory for the purposes of this scheme. Since we’re doing this, why not design it in a way to get to the bottom of how much they make?”

Free TV has also called for the scheme’s levy rate to be far higher than 2.25 per cent. Similar rules introduced by the government, forcing streaming companies to spend money making Australian content, set the percentage at 7.5 per cent of revenue. There are “no policy reasons”, Free TV wrote in its submission, that the rate is so much lower.

“It’s only going to end up generating about the same as we were getting five years ago,” she said, “despite massive growth in the advertising market that these people have enjoyed. It’s more companies, but the same number.”

While the incentive has been welcomed by Australian news publishers, it has been savaged by the tech companies. On Wednesday morning, Meta published a scathing blog post describing the policy as “a discriminatory, retroactive tax targeting a handful of foreign companies”.

It echoed aggressive comments from powerful US business lobby groups that warned it formed part of a “deteriorating tax environment” for investment in Australia. The White House criticised it as “foreign extortion”.

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 is the media, marketing and telecommunications reporter at The Australian Financial Review. Send tips about the media and the telco sectors via encrypted messaging platform Signal (@samebjones.18) or email. Email Sam at sam.buckinghamjones@afr.com

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100 Iconic Moments From Sir David Attenborough

 

Make Way for Beavers


100 Iconic Moments From Sir David Attenborough


Let’s the keep the David Attenborough love going: this is a six-hour video featuring 100 of the most iconic moments from the famed naturalist’s work. I got this via Enrique, who rightly asserts that “There’s no such thing as too much David Attenborough.”

See also Three Hours of Unbelievable Moments From Nature, Narrated by David Attenborough.

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The Butterfly Effect: How Tiny Actions Unleash Global Consequences

I used to live in New York City. If I guy got on my train with a Nazi shirt, I'd get off. Or, more accurately, he would.


The Butterfly Effect: How Tiny Actions Unleash Global Consequences 

In Stephen King’s 11/22/63, a man named Jake discovers a portal that transports him back to 16 May 1958. Determined to prevent the assassination of President John F. Kennedy, he believes this single act will benefit humanity. After years of meticulous planning, he succeeds in altering history. But when he returns to the present, he finds a world ravaged by earthquakes and nuclear war—a dystopian reality far worse than the one he left behind. Devastated, Jake goes back once more to reset the timeline.



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Thursday, June 04, 2026

The Stories Behind the Cases - The Typo Vibe Shift

ATO issues $1,650 fine to 97-year-old woman who had not ‘prioritised tax obligations’ after husband’s death


Report finds misconduct spread within the ATO


Estimates Committee


The Stories Behind the Cases

In a forthcoming article in the Journal of Legal Education, St John’s Professor Ashley B. Armstrong offers a systematic approach to what has long been understood as a gap in traditional law school courses. Presenting what she calls “the contextual case method”, Professor Armstrong doesn’t merely highlight the importance of expanding case analysis to include the context that led to the dispute and the concrete impact on the parties and society of the court’s opinion. She charts a three part course helping faculty incorporate context into our classrooms. She proposes we (1) interrogate judicial opinions as constructed narratives; (2) supplement court opinions by assigning texts to problematize and expand students’ understanding; and (3) teach cases “to their end” by uncovering what happened after a decision was handed down. Sounds good to me.
.Armstrong, Ashley B., The Stories We (Don’t) Teach (February 01, 2026). St. John’s Legal Studies Research Paper No. 26-0007, Available at SSRN: https://ssrn.com/abstract=6570520 or http://dx.doi.org/10.2139/ssrn.6570520



The Typo Vibe Shift

The Atlantic Gift article – “To some, they’re no longer a sign of laziness but proof of human touch…More than two decades later, as AI-generated writing has flooded workplaces, social media, and dating apps, old hallmarks of sloppiness—typos chief among them—are getting a new gloss. Some job applicants are intentionally adding typos to their cover letters to prove that they, and not an AI program, wrote them. Celebrities and CEOs are sending out error-ridden emails and Instagram Stories, and instead of getting a scolding, they are praised for sounding authentic. On some dating apps, where people are, somewhat absurdly, prompted to compose their profiles with AI, typos are apparently no longer an automatic repellant. Nicole Ellison, a University of Michigan professor whose 2006 studyshowed that dating profiles with spelling mistakes turn people off, now thinks people are warming to the Tinder typo.

 “A typo maybe signals that you actually do care,” Ellison toldTime recently, “because you took the time to write it yourself.” A 2024 study even found that people view customer-service chatbots more warmly when they make and correct errors: A spelling mistake, it seems, is a kind of anthropomorphizing event. A peculiar reconfiguration of what people consider careless writing is taking place. 

Although typos and other mistakes don’t suddenly mean that a piece of writing is good or praiseworthy, to some people, they are at least signs that it is worth reading. On a base level, many of us are willing to invest time in reading a long email if we sense that someone actually wrote it, line by line…”


Opinion | AI-writing scandals are becoming common. Proving them is another matter.

May 22, 2026
  


Estimating the Present Value of R&D Tax Benefits

Brandon Pecoraro (Joint Committee on Taxation) et al, “Estimating the Present Value of R&D Tax Benefits in the United States” (NBER May 2026):

Using a panel of confidential corporate tax returns, we provide the first direct estimates of the realized present value of corporate tax benefits from R&D credits and deductions in the United States. Realized tax benefits can deviate from statutory tax benefits because firms in loss status are typically unable to fully utilize credits and deductions to offset current-year taxes and instead must carry these attributes forward. We develop a novel procedure to track the intertemporal firm-level utilization of tax attributes generated by corporate R&D spending, and find that the present value of R&D tax benefits varies substantially with firms’ loss status, age, and size. Old and large firms typically use R&D tax benefits quickly, while young firms – especially those that are small – frequently operate in loss status and use tax attributes more slowly. From 2012–2016, the average firm generated $0.41 in statutory tax benefits per dollar of R&D investment, with a realized present value of $0.36. Young and small firms in a loss position realized only $0.23 per dollar, a 44% decrease relative to the statutory benchmark.

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