Joe Bankman
| Joe Bankman | |
| Nationality | American |
|---|---|
| Occupation | Law professor, tax scholar, clinical psychologist |
| Known for | Ralph M. Parsons Professor of Law and Business at Stanford Law School; tax policy scholarship; advocacy for return-free tax filing (ReadyReturn) |
| Education | BA, University of California, Berkeley (1977); JD, Yale Law School (1980); PsyD, clinical psychology |
| Website | https://law.stanford.edu/joseph-bankman/ |
Joseph "Joe" Bankman (born 1955) is an American legal scholar and clinical psychologist who is the Ralph M. Parsons Professor of Law and Business at Stanford Law School. He is widely recognized as a leading scholar of tax law and tax policy, and is known for his research on tax shelters and the taxation of Silicon Valley enterprises, for his advocacy of return-free tax filing through the California ReadyReturn program, and for pioneering work applying clinical psychology to the study and teaching of law.[1][2]
Early life and education
Bankman was born in 1955; his full name is Allan Joseph Bankman.[2] He earned a Bachelor of Arts degree from the University of California, Berkeley in 1977 and a Juris Doctor from Yale Law School in 1980.[1][2] In addition to his legal training, Bankman later pursued graduate study in clinical psychology, earning a Doctor of Psychology (PsyD) through a joint program associated with Palo Alto University and the Stanford University School of Medicine.[1][3]
Academic career
Before entering academia, Bankman practiced law with the Los Angeles firm Tuttle & Taylor. He began his teaching career at the University of Southern California's Gould School of Law before joining the faculty of Stanford Law School in 1989, where he has taught for more than three decades.[2] At Stanford he holds the Ralph M. Parsons Professorship of Law and Business and is affiliated with programs including the Rock Center for Corporate Governance and the John M. Olin Program in Law and Economics.[1][3]
His teaching has centered on taxation and, later in his career, on the intersection of law and mental health. Courses he has taught include introductory taxation, tax policy, and mental health law and policy.[1] Stanford describes him as "a leading scholar in the field of tax law."[1]
Tax scholarship
Bankman is the co-author of two widely used casebooks on taxation, including the casebook Federal Income Taxation, and has written extensively on tax policy questions such as progressivity, the consumption tax, and the taxation of new enterprises and startups in Silicon Valley.[1][2] A significant strand of his scholarship examines how government can control the use of abusive tax shelters; his writing in this area includes work on what he termed the market in corporate tax shelters, and he has testified before Congress on tax compliance.[3] He has also drawn on social psychology in proposing approaches to reduce tax evasion.[1]
ReadyReturn and return-free filing
Bankman is best known to a general audience for his advocacy of return-free filing, a system in which a tax authority prepares a completed return for a taxpayer to review rather than requiring the taxpayer to assemble it from scratch. He collaborated with the state of California to develop ReadyReturn, a program under which the California Franchise Tax Board prepares a pre-populated return for eligible low- and middle-income taxpayers, who may then review it, make changes, and file it.[1][2] The program was launched as a pilot in 2004 and made available to eligible California residents on an ongoing basis beginning in 2007.[2]
The proposal drew sustained opposition from the tax-preparation software industry, most notably Intuit, the maker of TurboTax. Bankman made the defense of ReadyReturn a personal cause, spending on the order of $30,000 to $35,000 of his own money to hire a lobbyist to counter industry lobbying against the program.[2] He continued to support broader efforts to simplify tax filing, and was a lead signatory of academic support for Senator Elizabeth Warren's 2016 Tax Filing Simplification Act.[2]
Psychology and mental health work
Trained as a clinical psychologist in addition to his work as a lawyer, Bankman has applied psychology to legal education and the well-being of law students and lawyers. He developed a course on anxiety psychoeducation that has been taught at both Stanford and Yale law schools, and he has counseled first-year law students on managing anxiety.[3][2] He launched a pilot project on emotional health among law students, motivated by concern that capable students can struggle with the emotional resilience needed to cope with the stresses of legal study and practice.[3] He has also been associated with Stanford Law School's WellnessCast podcast, which addresses wellness and mental health within the legal profession.[2][3]
White Collar Conference
In 2025, Bankman took part in a fireside chat at the White Collar Conference, an event focused on white-collar criminal justice, reentry, and support for people affected by federal cases.[4]
Personal life
Bankman is married to Barbara Fried, a professor emerita at Stanford Law School.[2]
References
- ↑ 1.0 1.1 1.2 1.3 1.4 1.5 1.6 1.7 1.8 "Joseph Bankman". 'Stanford Law School}'. Retrieved 2026-07-23.
- ↑ 2.00 2.01 2.02 2.03 2.04 2.05 2.06 2.07 2.08 2.09 2.10 2.11 "Joseph Bankman". 'Wikipedia}'. Retrieved 2026-07-23.
- ↑ 3.0 3.1 3.2 3.3 3.4 3.5 "Joseph Bankman — Directory". 'Stanford Law School}'. Retrieved 2026-07-23.
- ↑ "Joe Bankman — White Collar Conference". 'White Collar Conference}'. Retrieved 2026-07-23.