## Facts

- Married taxpayers employed nursemaids to care for their infant child.
- The wife had outside, income-producing employment; the childcare was arranged so she could work.
- The taxpayers claimed the nursemaid costs as deductible “ordinary and necessary” expenses of the wife’s trade or business.
- The Commissioner disallowed the deductions as personal expenses under the Revenue Act of 1936 § 24(a).
- The taxpayers petitioned the Board of Tax Appeals to redetermine the deficiency, arguing the expenses were required to produce the wife’s income.

## Issues

1. Whether payments for nursemaids to care for the taxpayers’ child, incurred so the wife could work, are deductible as “ordinary and necessary” business expenses.
2. Whether such childcare payments are nondeductible personal or family expenses under the Revenue Act of 1936 § 24(a).

## Decision

- The Board of Tax Appeals sustained the Commissioner’s determination.
- The Board held the nursemaid/childcare expenses were personal expenses and therefore nondeductible under § 24(a).
- The Board rejected the taxpayers’ “but for” causation theory that expenses necessary to enable earning income are deductible.
- The Board concluded childcare is a domestic and household concern whose character does not change because the wife chose outside employment and hired others to perform childcare.

## Legal Principles

- An expense is not deductible as a business expense merely because it is a practical precondition to earning income; otherwise ordinary living costs would become deductible.
- Childcare and similar household services are personal or family expenses, even when incurred to permit a taxpayer to work for pay.
- The business/personal line turns on the character of the expenditure (domestic living versus carrying on a trade or business), not on a “but for” connection to income production.
- In the absence of specific statutory authorization, general business-expense provisions do not allow deductions for ordinary household and family maintenance costs.

## Conclusion

The Board treated nursemaid/childcare payments made to enable a working spouse to earn wages as nondeductible personal expenses, reinforcing the statutory separation between business expenses and family living costs.


Smith v. Commissioner, 40 B.T.A. 1038 (B.T.A. 1939)