Faculty/Staff Directory

Biography

Department Chair Lillian F. Mills is the Wilton E. and Catherine A. Thomas Professor of Accounting. She joined University of Texas at Austin in 2006 and served as Graduate Advisor for the accounting doctoral program during 2009-2010. Her research interests in tax compliance, accounting for income taxes and effective tax rates, and international taxation arose through her professional experience, where she was a senior manager in taxation for Price Waterhouse. Professor Mills especially values her continuing working relationship with the IRS Large Business and International division. In 2003 and 2004 she was a consultant to the IRS/Treasury workgroup developing Form 1120 Schedule M-3. In 2005 and 2006 she was a Stanley Surrey Senior Research Fellow at the Office of Tax Analysis for the U.S. Department of Treasury. In 2007 she was appointed to the IRS’ Information Reporting Program Advisory Committee as a member of the Tax Gap Measurement subcommittee. She earned her Ph.D. at the University of Michigan and worked at the University of Arizona from 1997-2005. She received the 2000 Arizona CPA Foundation Excellence in Teaching Award and the 2004 Eller College Dean’s Award for Excellence in Teaching. In 2005 she and co-author George Plesko were awarded the American Accounting Association Deloitte Wildman Medal for “Bridging the reporting gap: a proposal for more informative reconciling of book and tax income,” National Tax Journal, December 2003. The Wildman Medal is awarded to the published paper that has made or is likely to make the most significant contribution to the advancement of the practice of accounting. Her paper, “Last chance earnings management: Using tax expense to achieve analysts’ forecasts,” co-authored with Dan Dhaliwal and Cristi Gleason, won the American Taxation Association 2007 Manuscript Award. She served as 2009-2010 president of the American Taxation Association. She has served on numerous other American Accounting Association, American Taxation Association, and National Tax Association committees, including the AAA Doctoral Consortium Committee, the AAA New Faculty Consortium Committee, and the selection committees for the AAA Notable Contribution Award and the Deloitte Wildman Award. She chaired the inaugural 2005 KPMG/ATA Tax Doctoral Consortium. She serves or has served on the editorial boards of The Accounting Review, Contemporary Accounting Research, National Tax Journal and Accounting Horizons and The Journal of the American Taxation Association. She is currently an Associate Editor at Contemporary Accounting Research. Lillian and her husband Jim Mills enjoy golfing and visiting their grown children and grandchildren in AZ, MI, NJ and WI. Lillian plays the piano at St. Michael’s Episcopal Church and enjoys swing dancing.

Publications

Professional Awards

Teaching Awards