When Lloyd Wilson of San Francisco, publicity man for the Y.M.C.A., made out his income tax for 1936, he wondered how much to deduct for his baby daughter, Helen. Had she been born in January of that year he would have deducted the full $400 allowance for a dependent. But she had been born in August. That certainly entitled him to deduct five-twelfths of $400.
Then it occurred to Taxpayer Wilson that his new dependent had been living, at least since her moment of "quickening" as a three-month-old embryo, in February 1936. Father Wilson allowed himself a deduction of eleven-twelfths...
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