Deduct the cost of a husband-wife business meal?

June --

I am a consultant on higher education . When husband and wife are professionals with separate self-employed businesses, can they deduct costs of meals where they go out to dinner to get away from household distractions and discuss each other's work. For example, where one spouse acts as an editor/critic of the other's research paper to be submitted for for-profit publication?

Any IRS cases that you can cite on this?

Velma from California

Dear Velma,

Neither I nor my tax service could find any IRS case or regulation prohibiting the deduction of the meal if the circumstances meet all the meals & entertainment requirements.

In my book, Self-employed Tax Solutions, I explain it this way:

A carpenter deducts not only the tools that she buys, but also the expense of dining out. Why? Because during the meal with her husband, an ad agency guy, she explains the timetable for her new business, gets his input on questions of scheduling, picks his brain about various proposals, and tests his reaction to her brochure. She could not have had this business discussion at the family dinner table with her three children in attendance and so the gift given to her brother as thanks for baby-sitting while she was at this dinner is also a business expense.

-- June