Originally Posted by
Blueskies21
I'm generally extremely conservative regarding tax, however I would say the audit risk related to occasional positive space (such as 9E's second commute in option) is basically nil.
At worst it would be imputed income at something like 10% of a Y class fare. Essentially the IRS would have to be targeting airline pilots LOOKING for this particular issue and they aren't likely to do that because of the effort involved and low taxes due/ penalties likely.
What you will find happens at some point again in the future as has happened in the past is the IRS attempts to tax all non revenue travel. This would fall in line with how similar items are handled by the tax code at other companies. We have managed to hold onto the exemption for pass travel for immediate families however I will be schocked if that is the case 10 years from now. Getting rid of exemptions is a easy way to raise taxes without appearing to do so. ALPA’s budget via the PAC to purchase politicians is very low and AFA is no help at all. They beat it in the past but doubt they will when it comes up again.