Spotlight on New York Corporate Tax Attorney Kara Mungovan

Our Spotlight series highlights the careers and lives of tax professionals around the world. This week’s Spotlight is on Kara Mungovan, a partner in Davis Polk & Wardwell LLP’s tax practice in New York.

Mungovan advises clients on the tax aspects of complex mergers and acquisitions, capital markets transactions, and bank financings, both in the US and internationally. Her work spans industries such as consumer products and retail; energy; financial services; health care; and tech, media, and telecom. She is a member of the executive committee of the New York State Bar Association Tax Section and a member of the New York Tax Forum.

When she’s not working, you’ll likely find Mungovan caring for her two young children, watching “Severance,” or enjoying a bit of dark chocolate.

What’s your official title and what does it mean? I’m a partner in Davis Polk’s tax practice. We are all about teamwork, and being a partner is really about the role I play on the team. We think of ourselves as partners with our clients, providing them with practical and thoughtful advice to help them take their businesses where they want them to go. I am ultimately responsible to the client for our work product, and that is both an enormous responsibility and an enormous privilege. Being part of a team means I’m also responsible to my teammates—the well-being of our colleagues and their career development are huge priorities for us as partners.

Free time: book, audiobook, or podcast? Free time? I have two children under 5. Just kidding—book.

Tax is a huge subject. What’s your area of special interest? Mergers and acquisitions. I help clients structure corporate transactions in a tax-efficient way, taking into account their commercial goals.

What’s the last movie or show that you watched and loved (DVD, Netflix, or in the theater)? Just finished Season 1 of “Severance,” and I can’t wait for Season 2.

What college did you attend and what did you study? I studied biochemistry at Harvard. To me, tax law is a logical progression from there, but people are often surprised.

Go-to pick-me-up: Coffee or tea? Mostly coffee, but sometimes tea. Always decaf, though—for me, it’s all about the ritual.

What’s the best tax or financial advice that anyone ever gave you? My mom is English, and she has an expression: “Take care of the pennies and the pounds will take care of themselves.” It doesn’t take much effort to be careful about large expenditures, so I try to be mindful about the more mundane, day-to-day things.

If you weren’t working in the tax profession, what would your dream job be? I’d love to be a schoolteacher. I can’t imagine anything much more exhausting than working with large numbers of children day in and day out, but guiding kids as they learn and develop, and seeing how they see the world, are just fascinating to me.

If you had the opportunity to make one change in the tax world—an extra credit, a disallowed deduction, whatever—what would it be? I saw a very interesting (but heartbreaking) presentation a couple of years ago by a tax law professor about how people who claim the earned income tax credit are relatively likely to be audited. Those audits are easy and efficient for the IRS, but the people being audited are often not well-positioned to respond for a variety of reasons and they can end up losing benefits to which they were actually entitled. If I could change one thing, it would be to address the unfairness of that system.

Favorite food, snack, or candy during tax season or other busy time? Dark chocolate.

What tax news or move made the most impact on your practice or clients this past year? The enactment of the Inflation Reduction Act last August. We now have a whole new tax regime—the corporate alternative minimum tax—and a stock buyback excise tax, not to mention all the new energy credits. These changes will have sweeping consequences for many of our clients across industries and circumstances, and will need to be taken into consideration in all of our corporate transactions. So we are devoting significant resources toward making sure we are well-positioned to provide comprehensive, thoughtful, and practical advice on these topics.

If you received a big tax refund check right now, what would you do with it? Invest some and donate some to City Harvest, New York City’s largest food rescue organization. They help feed the millions of New Yorkers across the five boroughs who are struggling to make ends meet—I really admire their work.

You can find out more about Mungovan on LinkedIn.

You can learn more about Mungovan’s law firm, Davis Polk, here.

If you’d like to recommend a tax pro to be featured, send your suggestion to rbaker@bloombergindustry.com with the subject: Spotlight. Please include the following information: tax professional’s name, title, email address, and geographic area (city/state/country).