Voices

In the blogs: Just following borders

Roads vs. taxes; stopgap budget planning; Obamacare’s good and bad; other highlights from our favorite tax bloggers.

Bozo tax tips

  • IRS Tax Trouble (http://www.irstaxtrouble.com/category/tax-blog/): Bitter v. Commissioner addresses how the Sec. 6707A reportable transaction penalty can be difficult to work with given limited avenues for contesting the penalty.
  • Procedurally Taxing (http://www.procedurallytaxing.com/): The unusual tale of how Estate of Sager v. Commissioner got to Tax Court via interest abatement.
  • Bloomberg BNA (http://www.bna.com/news/#!topic=istax&type=isblogpost): As North Carolina marched to the crown, “a buzzer beater over the so-called bathroom bill played out off the court between the state of North Carolina and the NCAA and ACC.” (B-ball metaphors bounce like rim shots.)
  • Federal Tax Crimes (http://federaltaxcrimes.blogspot.com/): “Collections, Penalties and Criminal Investigations” from the latest IRS Data Book, plus a bonus subset of these statistics since 2005.
  • Due Diligence (http://www.mahanyertl.com/mahanyertl/): In this week’s collection: “Unwanted Mortgage Company Telemarketing Calls” (“Despite the FTC’s ‘Do Not Call List’ being around for over 25 years, telemarketers just won’t stop. And they almost never call at a good time ...”); “Government Cybersecurity Vendor Defense Point Hacked”; “21% of Lawyers Engage in Bill Padding”; “ING Bank Subject to Dutch, SEC Probe;” and “A Banking Nightmare That Only Insiders Will Believe.”
  • Taxable Talk (http://www.taxabletalk.com/): Bozo Tax Tip #9 aims at the business owner who’s got troubles meeting payroll. One extremely un-recommended strategy: not remit the payroll taxes, even if the government can print money and the biz owner can’t.

Just following borders

  • Tax Analysts (http://www.taxanalysts.org/tax-analysts-blog): Favorite opening of the week: “Some mysteries are better left unresolved. Did FDR know in advance about Pearl Harbor? Did Lee Harvey Oswald act alone? Was Tony Soprano bumped off in that Jersey diner?” From bombers and book depositories we move to tax reform and the hotly debated border-adjusted tax.
  • Tax Policy (http://taxfoundation.org/blog): Those clamoring over a border adjustment might want to take a lesson from the example of Australia’s “The New Tax System” in July 2000.
  • Mauled Again (http://mauledagain.blogspot.com/): Fix the roads or hold fast on taxes? That’s the golden question now facing California, which by some reports needs $52 billion for potholes and the like and is turning to gas taxes, upped car registration fees and charges for emission-free vehicles.
  • Roth & Co. (http://rothcpa.com/blog-index/): A look at Iowa’s recent updating of guidance for state taxpayers receiving Sec. 179 deductions from non-Iowa partnerships and S corporations. Note: “The results can be harsh.”

Especially

  • Tax Vox (http://taxvox.taxpolicycenter.org): Success is often in the eye of the instigator – especially if you’re talking budgeting and the parties most deeply involved hold office in Washington. How our stopgap spending measure expires late this month.
  • AG Tax (http://agtax.ca/tax-tips-and-articles): The U.S. market must look like a tempting amplitude of customers for Canadian companies. Not all up-north enterprises, however, properly consider various U.S. tax laws that can apply on Canadian business, especially laws on the state level.
  • Rubin on Tax (http://rubinontax.floridatax.com): How an adoption can turn estate and trust beneficiary status into real pretzel logic, especially if one sib doesn’t know what the other, adopted sib is doing.

Taxing questions

  • The Income Tax School (http://www.theincometaxschool.com/blog/): Feeling sociable? This “Social Media Guide for Tax Business Owners” starts with the eye-opening tidbit that the average person spends nearly two hours on social media every day – a lot of screen time your practice could capitalize on.
  • Dinesen Tax (http://dinesentax.com/blog): Question from a Web visitor: “If I receive a fiscal year K-1, do I prorate the income?” Answer? Depends on the start and end of the fiscal year.
  • Intuit Proconnect (http://taxprocenter.proconnect.intuit.com/): Your key compliance dates and tax to-dos this month.
  • H&R Block (http://blogs.hrblock.com/): Sooner or later some client is going to ask whether Social Security benefits are taxable. What to tell them about the facts and figures involved.
  • Turbotax (http://Blog.turbotax.intuit.com): Four things to tell your recently unemployed clients about deducting travel or vehicle expenses in a job hunt.
  • The Wandering Tax Pro (http://wanderingtaxpro.blogspot.com/): Blogger Robert Flach takes a brief break from tax-season posting to spell out the good and bad of Obamacare. (Don’t forget that many people think ACA and Obamacare are two different things…)
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