On April 8, 2014 the Senate Committee on Finance held a hearing entitled "Protecting Taxpayers from Incompetent and Unethical Return Preparers". This book describes the rules governing paid tax return preparers and provides background relating to Internal Revenue Service regulation of the conduct of paid tax return preparers. The first section of this book describes Internal Revenue Code of 1986 rules relating to tax return preparers. The second section describes Treasury regulations relating to tax return preparers, including Circular 230. The third section describes court cases related to the application of Circular 230 to tax return preparers.