Professor Morris on tax cheating

Meet Donald Morris ,
Associate Professor,
Accountancy

E-mail:

• dmorr2@uis.edu

Degrees:

• B.A. in Philosophy, California State University, Los Angeles 1968
• M.A. in Philosophy, DePaul University 1970
• Ph.D. in Philosophy, Southern Illinois University at Carbondale 1978
• M.S. in Taxation, DePaul University 1986

Personal:

• While working on my Ph.D., I taught philosophy courses at a community college in southern Illinois, including extension courses in ethics at the Marion Federal Penitentiary.
• I changed careers in my 30s and worked for 18 years as a CPA in the Chicago area, specializing in small businesses and entrepreneurs.
• I have helped raise five children from whom I have learned a great deal about myself. I enjoy travelling and most recently visited Korea with my wife Myong-Ae.

Interesting Facts:

• I ran for Illinois State Comptroller in 1986 and lost in a landslide to Roland Burris.
• As a runner, my best performance was completing the Chicago Marathon in 3 hours and 25 minutes.

Learning philosophy:

• Never be satisfied with what you know; always look for new understandings and additional dimensions of what you have learned. Be a “fallibilist”—someone more eager to know the truth than to defend an accepted position. Embrace risk, but be prepared to acknowledge failure. Seek out what is unique yet enduring.

Research interests:

• My recent projects involve taxation and moral dimensions of taxation; I enjoy collaborating on research with my graduate students.

Professor Morris on tax cheating:

Major project underway:

• A paper entitled, “Same-Sex Marriages, Civil Unions and the Income Tax Marriage Penalty: The States’ Impact on the Tax Law” with graduate student Jing Wang
• A paper entitled, “State Corporate Income Tax Incentives for Achieving Clean and Renewable Energy” with graduate student Pingjing Qiao
• A book: Moral Money Laundering: Does the Way Money is Earned Impact its Value?
• A book recently completed: Tax Cheating: Illegal—But is it Immoral? SUNY Press, June 2012.

Advice to prospective students:

• Rely on others to help you become independent.

Best thing about UIS:

• UIS is comprised of first-class, caring teachers and staff who want students to succeed.