It seems like something out of “Ally McBeal” (yes, I’m dating myself here) but this Boston legal battle is the real deal. In US Tax Court in Boston, 63 year old Rhiannon O’Donnabhain, pictured above, is challenging a decision not to allow the $25,000 cost of her 2001 sex-change and breast augmentation surgeries as a tax deduction. According to the Internal Revenue Service, both surgeries were elective and cosmetic, and therefore not deductible as medical expenses.
O’Donnabhain argued that the procedures were medically necessary and not for cosmetic reasons. She claims, “If I didn’t have the surgery, I would have been on drugs or an alcoholic, or I would kill myself. There was no other way.” She claims that her prior existence as a father, husband and male had left her incomplete and that the surgery was the only way to make her whole. She had been diagnosed with a gender identity disorder in 1996 and had the surgery in 2001 as a corrective procedure, which she believes is fully deductible.
However, the IRS disagreed. This is not the IRS’ first involvement with this issue, though the Tax Court has never ruled on the matter. In 2005, the IRS similarly denied a deduction for a woman’s transgender surgery, citing authority that cosmetic surgery or similar procedures are deductible only when they are needed to “improve a congenital abnormality, an accident or trauma, or a disfiguring disease.”
Advocates for the transgendered hope for a favorable outcome which will force the IRS to treat sex-change as medically necessary and deductible.
And people think that tax law is boring…
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That’s a good question – and a good debate – I’d be interested to hear what your take on it is..
Gosh, Randi, I don’t know.
I really don’t know anything about “gender identity disorder” and what the potential remedies/cures are. So, I’m really just speaking from the gut. And my gut is that it’s both cosmetic and elective and should be disallowed as a medical expense.
I fear that allowing it as a deduction may open the floodgates to other elective procedures being made deductible – what about liposuction or weight reduction even when the “disorder” (obesity) is not life threatening? What if I hate my life because my boobs are too small and I feel suicidal as a result? Does that mean I’m entitled to deduct the cost of my implants? What about penis enlargement? Nose jobs for cosmetic reasons? Face lifts?
I think you can argue that many things cause depression and a sense of desperation for individuals who feel afflicted. I think this case will hinge on whether the court finds the disorder to be a real, medical condition that could only be cured with this surgery (or surgeries, since I believe the plaintiff grew breasts with hormones but wanted them enlarged with augmentation surgery).
I would really be interested to hear what other people think…