Cite as: 515 U. S. 323 (1995)
Opinion of the Court
III
Respondent seeks to circumvent the plain language of § 104(a)(2) by relying on the Commissioner's regulation interpreting that section. Section 1.104-1(c) of the Treasury Regulations, 26 CFR § 1.104-1(c) (1994), provides:
"Section 104(a)(2) [of the Internal Revenue Code] excludes from gross income the amount of any damages received (whether by suit or agreement) on account of personal injuries or sickness. The term 'damages received (whether by suit or agreement)' means an amount received (other than workmen's compensation) through prosecution of a legal suit or action based upon tort or tort type rights, or through a settlement agreement entered into in lieu of such prosecution."
Respondent contends that an action to recover damages for a violation of the ADEA is "based upon tort or tort type rights" as those terms are used in that regulation, and that his settlement is thus excludable under the plain language of the regulation.
Even if we accept respondent's characterization of the action, but see infra, at 336, there is no basis for excluding the proceeds of his settlement from his gross income. The regulatory requirement that the amount be received in a tort type action is not a substitute for the statutory requirement that the amount be received "on account of personal injuries or sickness"; it is an additional requirement. Indeed, the statutory requirement is repeated in the regulation. As the Commissioner argues in her reply brief, an exclusion from gross income is authorized by the regulation "only when it both (i) was received through prosecution or settlement of an 'action based upon tort or tort type rights'. . . and (ii) was received
such harms may be excludable under § 104(a)(2). However, to acknowledge that discrimination may cause intangible harms is not to say that the ADEA compensates for such harms, or that any of the damages received were on account of those harms.
333
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