I seek a brief discussion of the major differences of sub s, c corp,
llc, and llp.  i am most interested in any differences of shared
responsibility for malpractice.  i am also interested in tax handling
of these vehicles.

Hi! Thanks for the question.

Before providing a rating, please ask for clarification if you will
need further assistance in the answers I have provided below.


The Howstuffworks website has a very nice explanation of the
differences between the different business legal structures you
mentioned.

Here are the short explanations used to differentiate the two forms on
matters of taxes and liabilities through debt or even malpractice.



General Partnership:
Taxes - ?Owner is only taxed once on his or her personal income tax return?
Liabilities ? ?Owner is personally liable for the actions of the company?


----------------
Limited Liability Partnership:
Taxes ? ?Owner is only taxed once on his or her personal return?
Liabilities - ?As opposed to a general partnership, a limited
liability partnership has two kinds of partners, general and limited.
General partners are similar to those in general partnerships they
operate the business and assume liability. Limited partners, on the
other hand, are merely investors and, therefore, have no control or
operational power. They do have limited liability.?


----------------
C-Corporation:
Taxes ? ?Owners are taxed twice? (One as a corporation and then on
personal income taxes)
Liabilities ? ?Shareholders are not personally liable?


-----------------
S-Corporation: 
Taxes ? ?Owners are only taxed one time?
Liabilities ? ?Shareholders are not personally liable?


-----------------
Limited Liability Company: 
Taxes ? ?Owners are only taxed one time?
Liabilities ? ?Shareholders are not personally liable?


Of course there are more advantages and disadvantages from setting-up
businesses in different structures such as regulations and
administrative costs. The link to the Howstuffworks.com website also
provides these inputs.

?How Business Legal Structures Work? by Michael Molnar
http://www.howstuffworks.com/biz-structure.htm/printable 


Our next links are additional resources providing explanations on the
different business forms mentioned above.

?What Form Will You Do Business In?? from Debra Bruce, JD, CPCC
http://entrepreneurs.about.com/cs/businessstructure/a/uc052203a.htm 

?C Corporation, LLC, or Sole Proprietorship?? BY GARY M. FLEISCHMAN,
CMA, CPA, AND JEFFREY J. BRYANT, CPA
http://www.dartmouth.edu/~econ36ks/assign_files/corporate_org.pdf 


Search terms used:
?business forms? differences liabilities malpractices
differences sub S corp llc llp 

I hope these links would help you in your research. Before rating this
answer, please ask for a clarification if you have a question or if
you would need further information.
                 
Thanks for visiting us.                
                 
Regards,                 
Easterangel-ga                 
Google Answers Researcher

---

Clarification of Answer by easterangel-ga on 15 Nov 2004 15:07 PST

Thanks nelson-ga for pointing out some of the confusion in the
definitions of  Howstuffworks.com.

I was able to find the following corrections.

Limited Partnerships:
Taxes - "The Internal Revenue Service generally treats limited
partnerships as partnerships for tax purposes. That means the limited
partners will be taxed on a proportionate share of any profits, and
they will be permitted to deduct a proportionate share of losses, all
at the individual partner's rate."

Liabilities - "The general partner is liable for the obligations of
the limited partnership. The limited partner is only liable for
obligations of the limited partnership if he leads others to believe
that he is a general partner. The most a well-behaved limited partner
will lose is the amount she contributed to the limited partnership..."


---------------------
Limited Liability Partnerships -
Taxes - Taxed like a general partnership wherein the owners are taxed once.

Liabilities - "The partners of an LLP are not personally liable for
the debts and liabilities of the partnership, unless the partner was
negligent or acted intentionally to cause the harm."

"How to Form a Business, Part 2: Partnerships and Variations" By Barbara Weil Gall
http://www.gigalaw.com/articles/2000-all/gall-2000-03-all.html


Thanks again!

Easterangel-ga, I believe the definition you gave for limited
liability partnership is actually the definition of a limited
partnership.  LLP and LP are two different things.  The LLP has only
one class of partner.