How is Washington going to raise legal fees? Quite simple: just raise the costs for lawyers to do business by raising taxes substantially on many law firms.

The Federal Government has two bills pending, each of which would require law firms with gross receipts in excess of $1 Million to report for tax purposes using the accrual method of accounting. Most such law firms currently report on a cash basis. Consequently, if passed, all such law firms would have to report as taxable income monies which were billed, but not yet received. That would have the effect of causing a large amount of taxes to be paid by all such firms, which essentially means that in order to continue to meet all their other expenses, including payroll, such firms would be left with one option: raise fees.

If you may be opposed to such action, please consider writing your Senators and Representatives, mentioning the Tax Reform Act of 2014 and Section 51 of a similar Senate draft bill.