Taxes on Casino play

[broiler]

Bav,

There is an important point that you missed in your example. Gsmbling losses are not subject to the itemized deduction phaseout. Your example would yield zero tax liability, however most people would have other income and other types of itemized deductions which would be subject to the phaseout and would lose most, if not all, of those deductions because of the artificial increase in AGI.