Mary Bennett is a partner in Baker & McKenzie's Tax Practice Group and chairs the Firm's Global Tax Policy Group. She has more than 35 years of international tax experience, including senior positions with both the US Treasury and the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD). Ms Bennett has been recognized as a leading tax lawyer by Chambers USA, The International Who's Who of Corporate Tax Lawyers, and Euromoney's Guide to Women in Business Law.
Ms Bennett advises US and foreign based multinational clients on international tax planning, controversy, and policy matters. She has particularly deep experience in tax treaty, transfer pricing, and international dispute resolution issues and has been very active in representing clients in connection with the OECD/G20 Project on Base Erosion and Profit Shifting (BEPS). In addition to her more than 25 years of private practice, Ms Bennett served for six years (2005-2011) as the Head of the Tax Treaty & Transfer Pricing Division at the OECD in Paris, leading that organization's work to achieve international consensus on policies to avoid double taxation and to apply the arm's length principle. She also served as the US Treasury's Deputy International Tax Counsel in the 1980's, with responsibility for heading tax treaty negotiations with numerous countries and developing US legislative and regulatory policy on international tax questions. In her career in private practice, Ms Bennett has advised companies on the structuring of international operations and represented clients in private letter ruling, competent authority, and tax controversy matters before the IRS and in tax policy matters before the Treasury Department, Congress, the OECD, and the UN.
Ms Bennett is a frequent speaker and writer on international tax issues and an active member of several tax professional organizations, including:
- American Bar Association – Committee on U.S. Activities of Foreigners and Tax Treaties, Tax Section
- American College of Tax Counsel – Fellow
- BIAC – Tax Committee and FATCA Business Advisory Group/TRACE Expert Group
- International Fiscal Association – Council Member for the U.S.A. Branch
- National Foreign Trade Council – Tax Committee
- NYU International Tax Program Practice Council
- United States Council for International Business – Tax Committee
- Washington International Tax Study Group
She received an AB from Radcliffe College in 1976, a JD from Columbia University in 1979, and an LLM in Taxation from Boston University in 1985. Ms Bennett was an Adjunct Professor of Advanced International Tax at Georgetown University Law Center (2001-2004) and has lectured at New York University, the University of Leuven in Belgium, the University of Leiden in the Netherlands, and the Singapore Tax Academy.
