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When it comes to fixing things in my home, I hail from the Woody Allen school of repair. I try something twice. After that, I start to hit. When it comes to my car, I often ignore it and hope that it goes away - sort of like many Americans when it comes to the fiscal spending crises in Washington.The budget-depleting hulks known as Medicare, Medicaid and Social Security comprise about 40 percent of a much larger fiscal contagion that threatens to literally break the national bank as the Baby Boomer generation begins the retirement process.

There is a confluence of events brewing, equal to an organizational version of a perfect storm, and it will have consequences that are difficult to pinpoint. The elements coming together include the following: a wave of Baby Boomers set to retire; increased entrepreneurship, as measured by business start-ups; foreign students leaving after graduation; a dearth of students in science, mathematics, accounting and other rigorous disciplines; and a shift in wealth creation from the tangible to the intangible.The final element is the most critical of all. It represents a sea change in how businesses function and prosper. This epic shift in wealth creation, from the tangible to the intangible, is the source of much consternation and stress all on its own, and deserves a critical examination.

PRIVATE COLLECTION PROGRAM SURVIVES HOUSE VOTEBy a margin of 240-179, House lawmakers approved funding for the Internal Revenue

It is always difficult to get the Supreme Court to review a case, but this seems especially true for tax cases. The recent court term just ended proved to be no exception. Of several cases practitioners were hoping that the court would accept, only one received a grant of certiorari in the closing days of the term.It is the decisions for which the court grants certiorari where the fight, and the hope, goes on. It is, however, in the cases with respect to which certiorari is denied where taxpayers must finally face the facts or explore other remedies.

When the Institute of Internal Auditors reached out to the world in an effort to understand the nature of internal auditing, it hoped to get comments from 20 countries.It heard from 91.

CVB ENGAGES KPMGCVB Financial Corp., an Ontario, Calif.-based holding concern for Citizens Business Bank, has hired Big Four firm KPMG as its independent accountant, replacing McGladrey & Pullen.

By now, your clients should have heard the term "REIT," or real estate investment trust, in the investment world, but they may be wondering what one is and how it works.First, they should know that REITs are not new. They've been around for more than 45 years. However, it has only been since the 1990s that REITs have gained popularity.

IRS RULES ON PARTIAL TERMINATIONThe Internal Revenue Service ruled that a partial termination of a qualified plan occurred where 23 percent of a plan's participants were no longer active due to the closing of one of the employer's four locations. Therefore, all plan participants were fully vested.

In 2007, it's clear that payroll processing has become better, cheaper and faster - particularly at the small-business end of the marketplace.Companies like Intuit and Sage are building payroll into their accounting products for all but the very tail end of the market, while Sage, Thomson and Microsoft are beefing up their ERP and human resources offerings for the mid-range and enterprise markets.

SAGE RELEASES TIMESLIPS 2008Sage Software has released the latest version of its billing application, Timeslips by Sage 2008. The new offering allows greater capability for determining when clients should be billed based on billing criteria set up by users.