It's a career devoted to helping a very large enterprise with diverse interests comply with a very complicated, fact-intensive, and generally multinational set of regulations in the same manner as every tax professional since Learned Hand: diligently paying the lowest amount consistent with the law.
Substantially every business owner you know -- the ones with top line revenues of $100k, $1 million, $10 million, and $100 million -- employ 0.05 to 100+ full-time accountant equivalents for the same purpose.
I am on uncomfortably good terms with my friendly local tax office and they're all but begging me "Mr. McKenzie, it will be easier for all of us if you just get a pro to do it for you this time." (Tax agencies essentially delegate surveillance duties to CPAs; a Japanese CPA signing off on my return means the Meguro tax office doesn't have to trouble their heads about how Japanese tax law interacts with an American LLC owned by a Japan-resident American covered by a really complicated treaty.)
I have a really good CPA in the US. I simply have not been able to locate one in Japan yet, because my requirements are rather esoteric: table stakes is "bilingual; you need to know the difference between on-premises and off-premises software or be able to retain a working model of that difference after having it explained to you once; you must be comfortable working in the intersection of Japanese and American tax law; you need to be comfortable doing business over email and Dropbox; please don't charge me $2k per hour as that will eclipse the profits of the business before my taxes get filed."
I don't know who best fits these criteria in Tokyo yet but would welcome an introduction. I have a strong suspicion that I was the best qualified person in Gifu.
Hence me trudging down to the tax office a few times a year with a notebook, a stack of forms, and a highlighted copy of a National Tax Agency publication with the query "So I've got an odd one for you..."
Substantially every business owner you know -- the ones with top line revenues of $100k, $1 million, $10 million, and $100 million -- employ 0.05 to 100+ full-time accountant equivalents for the same purpose.
I am on uncomfortably good terms with my friendly local tax office and they're all but begging me "Mr. McKenzie, it will be easier for all of us if you just get a pro to do it for you this time." (Tax agencies essentially delegate surveillance duties to CPAs; a Japanese CPA signing off on my return means the Meguro tax office doesn't have to trouble their heads about how Japanese tax law interacts with an American LLC owned by a Japan-resident American covered by a really complicated treaty.)