Hooked on Tax Law
This fall Miranda Stewart LLM ’98 returns to Law as a visiting professor of tax law to direct the International Tax Program.
When an acquaintance asked LLM ’98 recently if she had always wanted to be a tax lawyer, Stewart says her response was an immediate, emphatic denial. Nobody sets out to be a tax lawyer, she says, “even people who really are passionate about tax. And I guess I probably am one of them.”
Stewart, who is now directing Law’s International Tax Program during a three-year term as a visiting professor of law, is passionate enough about tax law to have authored or edited 12 books on the subject. Among her areas of focus are understanding the role of taxes in financing government budgets and contextualizing how states operate in an international tax environment.
Originally from Melbourne, Australia, Stewart grew up in Hong Kong and studied law and math at the University of Sydney on a scholarship from the Australian Taxation Office. After graduation, she worked at the Taxation Office on detailed policy and law design relating to business and corporate tax. “So then I was hooked, I guess,” she says. Stewart also practiced as a solicitor at Australian law firm Arthur Robinson & Hedderwicks, advising large corporations on tax.
A mentor suggested that she apply to the tax program at Law. “He opened my eyes to the possibility of coming to the [United States],” she says. Stewart became one of the first graduates of the International Tax Program, receiving her LLM in 1998, and then taught at the Law School for nearly two years as an acting assistant professor in the Graduate Tax Program.
Back in Australia, Stewart taught at the University of Melbourne Law School, becoming a tenured professor, before serving as the inaugural director of the Crawford School of Public Policy’s Tax and Transfer Policy Institute at the Australian National University, where she is still an honorary professor. She returned to Melbourne Law School and became director of the research program in tax law and policy within the Melbourne Centre of Commercial Law. In 2024, Stewart was an in-house visiting scholar in the Australian Treasury, advising the government on tax policy.
Stewart’s research spans topics that include venture capital tax concessions in Australia, the relationship between tax and the environment, and taxation in aging societies. Her book Tax and Government in the 21st Century (Cambridge University Press, 2022) surveys the ways that taxes finance government budgets and interact with families, working people, business, and charities.
Some of Stewart’s work centers on taxation in relation to gender and family units. “I was always interested in gender inequality in the sense of the impact of a tax system on people who are lower-waged and on people who do care work within the household or in low-paid work in the market,” Stewart says. “Some of these structures that look neutral in our tax law—they look like they treat everyone the same—actually have differential impact and tend to overtax, in particular, women’s market labor income.”
“It is wonderful news that Miranda Stewart will be rejoining us at ,” says , Herbert Peterfreund Professor of Law and Professor of Philosophy. “I first had the benefit of her thoughts about tax policy when she was last our colleague some 25 years ago. I was struck then by her combination of doctrinal expertise, pragmatic good judgment, and a deep commitment to issues of justice in taxation.”
“I was struck…by her combination of doctrinal expertise, pragmatic good judgment, and a deep commitment to issues of justice in taxation,” says Liam Murphy, Herbert Peterfreund Professor of Law and Professor of Philosophy.
Stewart says that she looks forward to returning to Law. “My memory as a student and a junior faculty member was how much is going on—[the] wonderful work and contributions by students, and visiting speakers, and all the exciting things that happen at Law,” she says. The urban energy of New York is also a draw. “It’s always super busy, and I just love that,” she says. “I like being in a place where there are lots of people living their lives, trying to fulfill their own ambitions.”—Addison Dunlap