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person household in Alaska at Motsko’s stated level of income,
according to the Commissioner’s guidelines,5 is $1,182.
Motsko also has many assets that he could likely sell
without undue hardship. He has $10,738 in cash or cash
equivalents,6 plus $285,105 of equity in his house and an
additional $10,000 of equity in an adjacent lot. He has an
unencumbered Harley Davidson motorcycle and a small all-terrain
vehicle. What looks to be either an understatement of income or
overstatement of expenses, when combined with these assets, leads
us to find that Motsko would not suffer economic hardship should
we deny his request for relief. These assets were tied up in the
divorce proceedings between Motsko and Manns when the case was
tried; that does not render them valueless without some showing
by Motsko that he would have no hope of regaining control over
them.
Significant benefit: The question here is whether Motsko
significantly benefited--beyond normal support--from the
underpayment of the 1993 and 1996 taxes. The couple owed 1993
taxes of $11,945 on AGI of $56,968. The high cost of living in
Alaska and the absence of any suggestion that Motsko’s standard
of living increased leads us to conclude that he did not
5 http://www.irs.gov/businesses/small/article/0,,id=
104935,00.html.
6 These assets include cash on hand, personal savings and
checking accounts, and other investments.
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Last modified: May 25, 2011