Reviewed by Gary L. Maydew Iowa State University

This very comprehensive index of tax articles covers federal income, estate, and gift tax articles that have been published since 1913. The periodicals indexed include, in addition to the legal publications, a number of accounting and economic journals.

The index consists of:

(1) a user’s guide, which includes a list of the topical index headings, a key to the abbreviations of periodical titles, and a list of the periodicals searched, with the dates of the first and last article cited from each periodical,
(2) volumes I-Ill which are the author and topical indexes, and
(3) a one year supple-mentation index. Quarterly supplements have been issued since.

I used the series to do research in some areas of taxation and found the topical index relatively easy to use. A table of contents would have been helpful, but the lack of it is not a serious hindrance, given the comprehensive topical index. The cross-indexing appears to be thorough; i.e. all of the logical title descriptions to the areas I researched were indexed.
An interesting feature of the index is that the articles within each topic are listed in reverse chronological order. This will aid the researcher in deciding which articles are relevant to his problem. The cumulative index is also in reverse chronological order, and appears equally thorough. Given the dynamic nature of tax, the quarterly supplements are a valuable feature of the service.

It seems likely that tax practioners would find the various tax services to be a more efficient means of answering most technical questions than would be this index. However, with respect to tax planning and explanations of the significance of litigation, the articles indexed would be of great assistance to tax practioners. For those doing academic research, the index promises to be an invaluable ti me-saver.