Finance

The American Institute of CPAs has sent a letter to the Senate Finance Committee recapping its recommendations on tax reform as the committee moves closer to drafting a tax reform bill.

It is time that all governments started keeping their books using the same accounting system that for-profit businesses use.

Congress gave final approval to legislation that would peg the interest rates on government-sponsored student loans to a market-based rate, ensuring that almost 9 million undergraduates will pay 3.86 percent interest on their next loan.

Self-described conservative and Tea Party groups seeking tax-exempt status were asked more questions by the Internal Revenue Service and had longer delays than progressive organizations, according to an analysis by the House Ways and Means Committee.

President Barack Obama, prodding Congress to consider fresh economic proposals after two years of gridlock, called for restructuring business taxes so long as the initial revenue generated goes toward job creation.

The leaders of Congress’s two main tax committees continued their tax reform road show tour with a stop at a New Jersey small business that makes kitchen appliances.

David A. Vaudt, the new chairman of the Governmental Accounting Standards Board, plans to closely monitor the impact of GASB’s new pension accounting standards on the finances of state and local governments.

There’s a tie that binds the Securities and Exchange Commission’s separate probes of SAC Capital Advisors LP founder Steven A. Cohen and Fabrice Tourre, the former Goldman Sachs Group Inc. vice president.

About 11 million U.S. students who need to borrow to cover their college costs would pay 3.86 percent on their next loans under legislation now headed for final passage by Congress.

Senators Tom Harkin, D-Iowa, and Chuck Grassley, R-Iowa, led a bipartisan group of five senators in introducing legislation to increase the alternative tax liability limitation for small property and casualty insurance companies.

The deadline is coming up this week for lawmakers in Congress to submit their preferences for the “must have” tax breaks that need to be kept in the Tax Code under Senate Finance Committee leaders’ “blank slate” approach to tax reform.

Last month’s Supreme Court decision in U.S. v. Windsor held section 3 of the Defense of Marriage Act to be unconstitutional.

The chairmen of the House Ways and Means Committee and the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee have written to the head of the Internal Revenue Service about the status of several of the officials who resigned or were placed on administrative leave in the wake of the Tea Party targeting scandal.

A pair of lawmakers plan to introduce bipartisan legislation in the House that would provide permanent tax incentives to family farmers, ranchers and other land owners who choose not to develop their land and instead preserve their property for conservation.

A pair of congressional subcommittee chairmen are asking the head of the Internal Revenue Service about a recent report that the agency accidentally posted thousands of Social Security numbers on the Internet.

The Internal Revenue Service’s inspector general told Congress he’s “disturbed” that he didn’t receive until this month a July 2010 document that mentioned scrutiny of “progressive” nonprofit groups.

The American Center for Law and Justice, which has filed a federal lawsuit on behalf of 41 Tea Party and other conservative groups that claim to have been unlawfully targeted by the Internal Revenue Service, said Wednesday it is rejecting the government's offer for "expedited review" of applications for some conservative groups that have been waiting for years for a determination on their tax-exempt status, calling the offer “deeply flawed.”

A group of House Republicans whose committees have been investigating the Internal Revenue Service said Wednesday they have found evidence of delays created by the IRS Chief Counsel office in the screening of applications for tax-exempt status by Tea Party groups.

The Internal Revenue Service told its employees and the union representing them Tuesday that it has taken various budget-related steps that will enable the IRS it to cancel the next planned unpaid furlough day for employees on Monday, July 22.

Nearly two-thirds of accounting professionals in a new poll believe the Affordable Care Act will make it less likely for businesses to hire new employees in the next year.