Can I deduct business expenses if someone else pays for them?

[thetman76]

I'm a performing musician so I intended to deduct my private instrumental lessons as a work-related education expense on my schedule C. However, I have found Pub. 970 to be slightly vague in addressing who must pay for the incurred expenses. My parents would give me a check made to my teacher each week for me to pay for my lesson with. In this instance, does that count as a gift since they are paying my "bill" for the lesson without any compensation in return? Similar to how the educational exclusion works for tuition to a qualifying school. Pub. 970 states that expenses paid with funds received as gifts should not be excluded from the viable work-related education so I'm still a little unsure on the matter.

[DMarkM1]

No, in your scenario, there would be no business expense on your Schedule C for that item as you did not pay anything.

The gift exclusion in Publication 970, Tax Benefits for Education, that you refer to is for an education credit or deduction calculation.