Deep dives into tax policy — the laws, proposals, and reforms shaping the tax code, explained without the jargon.
New Jersey is one of the first states in the country to pass a fairly comprehensive Domestic Partnership Act that would allow couples who register as domestic partners to receive the same benefits as a married couple under state law (not federal law). This applies to taxation, too. Married couples are allowed to file tax…
It’s the post holiday season, which means post credit card season. A lot of folks would love to deduct the interest on personal credit cards on their own taxes. Years ago, you could: personal loan interest was completely deductible. That was eliminated in the late 1980s. Today’s Fix the Tax Code Friday question is: Should…
Money, of course. And what drives money? Apparently, these days, it seems to be about tax policy. A catch 22? Toyota seems to think so. This summer, Toyota hit their production limit of 60,000 for tax credits for buyers. And it hurt. The $3600 tax credit is only guaranteed to a certain number of buyers…
NCAA President Myles Brand has (finally) responded to the ongoing inquiry into the tax-exempt status of the organization in a 25-page letter posted on the organization’s web site. The response initially had an October deadline – I guess somebody forgot to tell the folks in Committee that it’s college football season. You can’t expect a…
Following up on my recent post about the NCAA, college sports and tax-exempt status, take a look at this tidbit in USA Today which reports college coach salaries. I’ll bet Jim Tressel thinks his approximately $500k advantage over Lloyd Carr is worth it following this weekend’s Ohio State-Michigan game… Of course, that begs the question,…
It’s Fix The Tax Code Friday! This week’s question: Earlier in the week, following the elections, Nancy Pelosi indicated that she would make it a priority to scale back tax cuts for higher income taxpayers and distribute those to middle class taxpayers. If you were making the cuts, would you opt for cuts across the…
My real anniversary, that is, not a blog anniversary. I’ve been married for six years. And the notion of my anniversary got me to thinking. You know, about marriage and what drives people to marry and to divorce. It should come as no surprise to anyone in the modern world that finances are often cited…
In more news about international taxpayers, the IRS has apparently decided to make US residency issues a priority in 2006. To that end, they have been sending out notices to expatriates who have not complied with the requirements to file federal form 8854, Initial and Annual Expatriation Information Statement. The form is intended for US…
Changes to the Tax Code, tax reporting, and tax policy are generally reflective of the state of mind of the country at any given time. In other words, Congress uses taxes to modify your behavior (gasp). Think about it… We tax cigarettes and alcohol (sin taxes) to discourage those behaviors and we call those taxes…
Okay, who other than Senator Frist will admit that they thought the newly packaged estate tax reduction/minimum wage increase bill was going anywhere? Every practitioner that I spoke with saw the tacking on of the estate tax reduction to the minimum wage increase as both a death knell for the bill and politicking. Nothing more….