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effect at the time each respective revenue procedure was
released.
Maersk furnished petitioner with lodging and meals without
charge while he was working on its vessels during the years in
issue. Although petitioner did not pay for his meals while at
sea or while docked in foreign ports, he argues that he is
entitled to deduct the full M&IE per diem rate for those days for
which he must include income earned in international waters.
Petitioner asserts that the applicable revenue procedures permit
him to deduct the full applicable M&IE rate for work-related
travel even though all of his meals were provided to him free of
charge by Maersk, but his only argument in support of this
assertion rests on the absence of any explicit requirement in
Internal Revenue Service publications that a taxpayer actually
pay for his meals in order to qualify for the standard meal
allowance deduction.
Petitioner argues further that this issue is novel to the
Court. We disagree. In Johnson v. Commissioner, supra, the
taxpayer, also a merchant seaman, deducted the full Federal M&IE
rates on his return even though all of his meals were provided to
him free of charge by his employer. We held that, because the
taxpayer’s actual expenses consisted solely of incidental
expenses, his use of the M&IE rates to calculate his deductions
for business expenses due to travel away from home was limited to
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