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Robert Duquette

Teaching Full Professor

Robert Duquette

Accounting
Office: RBC 447
red209@lehigh.edu
215-275-0189

Courses Taught

  • Auditing
  • Advanced Federal Income Taxation
  • Fundamentals of Federal Income Taxation
  • Intermediate Accounting I
  • Intermediate Accounting II
  • Introduction to Financial Accounting
  • Introduction to Managerial Accounting
  • Accounting for Decision Making (Graduate)
  • Financial Reporting and Analysis (Graduate)
  • Financial Reporting for Managers and Investors (Graduate)
LinkedIn

Curriculum Vitae

Professor Duquette has been teaching at Lehigh University since 2009, first as an adjunct, and most recently as a teaching full professor in the accounting department. He has also been a full time instructor in the state university system until accepting a full time position with Lehigh. He holds a BA with highest distinction and high honors in economics (1975) and an MBA of highest distinction (1976), both from the University of Maine, Orono, where he earned membership in three honor societies, including Phi Beta Kappa, Beta Gamma Sigma, and Phi Kappa Phi. After graduation, Professor Duquette became a CPA, and served in public practice for over 30 years, primarily with Ernst & Young (EY), where he started in their audit practice until becoming senior audit manager in 1984. He then transferred to their tax consulting practice in 1986 after graduating from their accelerated tax training program in their national tax office, where he was that year’s highest ranked graduate in a program designed to be the equivalent of a masters in tax degree. He was elected to the partnership in 1990, and began serving as EY’s managing tax partner for central Pennsylvania until 2002, during which time his practice was consistently ranked first in performance for the entire east region. In 2002, he was named the leader of the Philadelphia area transactions tax practice, and taught in the National EY University career path training program, until his retirement in 2009. Since then, in addition to teaching, professor Duquette has consulted part time to local, regional, and national CPA firms, and most recently serves as a member of the Griffin/Stevens & Lee Tax and Consulting Network and is CPA-Of Counsel to William Koch & Associates.

Over these almost 20 years as a Partner, professor Duquette specialized in mergers and acquisitions and was responsible for leading and growing a tax practice of over 20 tax professionals, including: the overall quality control of the advice, preparation and review of all significant tax opinions, the coordination of all client tax services, deal structuring, review of all deal related agreements, due diligence of target company tax history and disclosures, and the coordination with financial and legal due diligence teams. Over his career, professor Duquette advised on over 300 corporate transactions, both domestic and cross border, aggregating over $50 billion in volume for large Fortune 1000 companies, and many middle market companies, and mostly with cross border operations.

Professor Duquette has also served on the board of directors of his local chamber of commerce, the national boards of the American Institute of Certified Public Accountants and the Institute of Management Accountants, and has led his Pennsylvania Institute of CPAs state wide and local federal tax committees, including and especially as co-chair, researcher, publisher, and speaker representative for  their federal budget and tax reform subcommittee. In this role, professor Duquette has distinguished himself in the region as one of the experts on the implications of the federal national debt and the role of tax reform. His research and presentations at professional conferences is consistently ranked by participants as the highest rated and most insightful. His research and presentations uniquely focus on  the substantial misconceptions and misleading information surrounding the topic of the national debt and tax reform; reviews the relevant facts regarding what’s driving the national debt and the complexity of tax law; presents the debt forecast and implications of inaction; and discusses the leading proposed solutions and their implications. His work is frequently published in the Pennsylvania CPA Journal, and in other publications.

Education

  • University of Maine, Orono 1975, B.A. (Economics)
  • University of Maine, Orono 1976, M.B.A. (Accounting concentration)

Practice Areas

  • Practical Accounting for decision makers 
  • Federal income tax policy and planning 
  • National debt—drivers and solutions

  • Author: “The Inflation Reduction Act of 2022 and the Corporate Alternative Minimum Tax"; September 26, 2022; Pennsylvania Institute of CPAs, CPA Now Blog 
  • Co-author: “The New & Improved CPA Exam: A Look Inside the CPA Evolution Updates”;  Pennsylvania CPA Journal;  Winter 2022
  • Presenter: “COVID-19: CARES Act - Federal Tax Individual Benefits”; Lehigh University Kitchen Table Talks & ilLUminate Blog; Apr. 27, 2020
  • Author: “What You Need to Know Before You File Your 2019 Tax Returns”; ilLUuminate: Lehigh University Thought Leadership;  Jan. 20, 2020
  • "Tax Reform: Intent vs Results—Part 5 of 5: Substantially Increase GDP Growth and Not Increase the Federal Debt", August 2, 2019;  Pennsylvania Institute of CPAs, CPA Now Blog   
  • "TaxReform: Intent vs Results—Part 4 of 5: Bring Jobs Back from Overseas, End Inversions, Free Up $3 Trillion of Overseas Cash", August 1, 2019;  Pennsylvania Institute of CPAs, CPA Now Blog  
  • “Tax Reform: Intent vs Results—Part 3 of 5: Increase Wages, Accelerate Capital Spending, and Achieve Tax Code Permanency",  July 31, 2019;  Pennsylvania Institute of CPAs, CPA Now Blog  
  • "Tax Reform: Intent vs Results—Part 2 of 5: Lower Rates, Small Business Tax Relief, and Multinational Competitiveness",  July 30, 2019;  Pennsylvania Institute of CPAs, CPA Now Blog 
  • "Tax Reform: Intent vs Results—Part 1 of 5: Protect American Jobs, Make Taxes Fairer, Make Taxes Simpler”,  July 29, 2019;  Pennsylvania Institute of CPAs, CPA Now Blog 
  • Author: "Tax Considerations When Making a Choice of Entity in Pa," March 22, 2019, PICPA
  • Author: “2019 Federal Tax Guide for Businesses: What Business Owners Need to Know about Tax Reform”, December, 2018, PICPA
  • "Tax Reform 2.0 - Already?" Aug. 24, 2018; Pennsylvania Institute of CPAs Blog
  • Article author: "The Pros and Cons of the New Section 199A Pass- Through Deduction" Pennsylvania Institute of CPAs, April 25, 2018, pages 9-13.
  • Quoted in "10 Tax Deductions That Will Disappear Next Year"; US News and World Report, February 9, 2018
  • "Massive New Tax Law A Win for Most Businesses"; Jan 8, 2018; Lehigh Valley Business Journal
  • "Robert Duquette: What do Republican tax proposals mean for Americans?" Nov 28, 2017; Lehigh Valley Morning Call
  • "Is Tax Reform Still Possible This Year?" Nov 1, 2017; Pennsylvania Institute of CPAs Blog
  • “Is Tax Reform Still Possible This Year?”, Published blog; Pennsylvania Institute of CPAs, July 12, 2017 
  • "Tax reform proposals: An effective prescription or snake oil" OP-ED, Lehigh Morning Call, May 16, 2017
  • Quoted in "These 25 Companies Could Get a Big Profit Boost From a Little Known Part of Trump's Tax Reform" March 16, 2017; The Street.com
  • Speaker: Prospects for Tax Reform Under the Trump Administration (1 Hr Podcast) Jan 20, 2017; Pennsylvania Institute of CPAs Podcast
  • Lead author: Can A Value-Added Tax Put Our Debt in Order?, Dec 1, 2016; PICPA Journal
  • Personal Tax Tips 2015,  Wallethub.com, March 31, 2015
  • Lead author: Income Tax Reform Is Integral to Cutting the Federal Debt, Pennsylvania CPA Journal Winter 2015 
  • Lead author: Corporate Tax Avoidance Trends: Facts and Misconceptions, Northeastern Association of Business, Economics and Technology Peer Reviewed Proceedings 37th Annual Meeting, October 23rd and 24th , 2014, pages 68-82.
  • Co author: Corporate Income Tax in Desperate Need of a Makeover, Pennsylvania CPA Journal Fall 2013 
  • Co author: Personal Income Tax Returns Tax-Saving Tips and Updates, PICPA, 2013 - 2016 
  • Federal Tax Reform & Tax Planning, Pennsylvania CPA Journal, and Berks County Chamber of Commerce Newsletter series of articles, 1990 – 1996
  • CPAs, CEOs Survey on Income Tax Reform, Lincoln Institute Sindlinger  Economic Report, Winter 1997
  • Pennsylvania CPAs and CEOs Champion Substantial Federal Tax Reform, Pennsylvania CPA Journal, October 1996
  • Lead author: VEBAs: An Old Idea Makes a Comeback, Management Accounting, December 1992

Review Acknowledgments

  • Corporate Tax Aggressiveness – Recent History and Policy Options; by Richard Harvey, Jr., National Tax Journal, November 2014 
  • 2023 and 2013 textbook editions of Essentials of Federal Taxation and Taxation of Individuals and Business Entities, by Spilker et.al. McGraw Hill

Awards

  • Graduate Faculty "Excellence in Teaching Award” 2021-2022; MS in Management Program
  • Graduate Faculty "Excellence in Teaching Award” 2020-2021; MS in Management Program
  • College of Business Undergraduate "Excellence in Teaching Award” 2019-20
  • Graduate Faculty "Excellence in Teaching Award” 2018-2019; MS in Management Program
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