From the category archives:

retirement & pension

Deduct This: History of the IRA Deduction

27 June 2011

Remember Studebaker? Studebaker was a manufacturing company that started in 1852 in South Bend, Indiana, making wagons for farmers, miners, and the military. Ten years after the first gasoline-powered car was tested in the U.S., Studebaker entered the car manufacturing business and it was, at one point, the largest automobile maker in the world. By [...]

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Budget Vote Shows Medicare Plan Vulnerable

25 May 2011

When presidential hopeful Newt Gingrich first objected to House Budget Committee Chair Paul Ryan’s (R-WI) Medicare proposal, there was a collective gasp in the political sphere. Until a few weeks ago, many Republicans thought the budget, which included a controversial provision to overhaul Medicare, was untouchable. The proposal, which appeared to be endorsed by most of [...]

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Is Ryan’s Medicare Proposal the Right Kind of Change?

22 May 2011

It was one of those jaw dropping, rubbing your eyes, cleaning out your ears moments. Presidential hopeful Newt Gingrich, thought by many to be a frontrunner for the GOP nomination, went out on a limb and criticized his own party’s plans for Medicare reform. Speaking on Meet the Press, Gingrich said about the Republican plan: [...]

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Taxes from A to Z: Z is for Code Z

3 April 2011

The last of the Taxes from A to Z series is Z for Code Z. Code Z is a relatively recent addition to the tax world. It made its debut on the 2005 federal form W-2 (and the related federal form 1099-MISC) as part of the American Jobs Creation Act of 2004. The purpose of [...]

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Taxes from A to Z: R is for Roth IRA

20 March 2011

Every now and again, I write a piece knowing that there will be a backlash of some sort. This is one of those pieces. You’d think something like a retirement plan would be easy, with little to no controversy. But since its inception under the Taxpayer Relief Act of 1997, the Roth IRA has drawn [...]

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Taxes from A to Z: E is for Early Distributions

7 March 2011

Let’s face it… It’s been a tough couple of years for a lot of taxpayers. More and more taxpayers have reached into their savings, including their retirement savings, in order to pay bills and otherwise make ends meet. Unfortunately, pulling that money out before retirement may feel like a good idea at the time but [...]

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Taxes from A to Z: C is for Corrective Distributions

5 March 2011

Retirement plans can be great vehicles for tax deferrals – but they can also be giant headaches when it comes to reporting for tax reasons. This is because there are so many technical rules that the potential for making a mistake is fairly high if you don’t know what you’re doing (taxgirl PSA: your plan [...]

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Taxes from A to Z: A is for Applicable Federal Rates

3 March 2011

First in the series: A is for Applicable Federal Rates, or AFRs. Each month, the IRS provides various prescribed rates for federal income tax purposes; those rates are regularly published as revenue rulings. You can see the latest list of rates as a revenue ruling here (downloads as a pdf). If you browse the list, [...]

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Medicare and Self-Employed Taxpayers

28 February 2011

See folks, this is why you should always read the comments in the blog. We’ve been having a discussion about whether Medicare Part B is deductible as a self employed health insurance premium in the comments at this post: The A, B, C and Ds of Medicare. The old Pub 535 said no. And the [...]

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The A, B, C and Ds of Medicare

25 January 2011

Here’s your big disclaimer upfront: I’m not a Medicare guru. I don’t work for Medicare. I don’t receive Medicare. But I do know enough to see that there’s some pretty awful information floating around which has lead to some confusion on the tax side. Let me see if I can help sort some of it [...]

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