ordinary expense
Definitions from Case Law · United States Supreme Court
Definitions from Case Law
From 290 U.S. 111 - Welch v. Helvering · 1933Most cited · 14,753 citing opinions
Ordinary in this context does not mean that the payments must be habitual or normal in the sense that the same taxpayer will have to make them often. The situation is unique in the life of the individual affected, but not in the life of the group, the community, of which he is a part. At such times there are norms of conduct that help to stabilize our judgment, and make it certain and objective. The instance is not erratic, but is brought within a known type.
How often courts cite the cases defining “ordinary expense”
Court decisions citing the 2 opinions that defined “ordinary expense” — 19,166 in all, by decade. Counts are citations to the defining cases as a whole, not verified uses of the term. The dip in the most recent years is a data-coverage gap, not a real trend — our corpus holds fewer opinions from the latest years.
All 2 definitions, chronological · 1933–1940
Ordinary has the connotation of normal, usual, or customary. To be sure, an expense may be ordinary though it happen but once in the taxpayer's lifetime. Yet the transaction which gives rise to it must be of common or frequent occurrence in the type of business involved.