Highlights of some of our favorite tax-related blogs from the past week.
Resolutions
TurboTax : “Five Tax Tips for the New Year Tax Planning,” from staying current with estimated taxes to early funding of retirement accounts, makes fine fodder for your next client reminders.The Income Tax School : Five resolutions to help your practice ease into tax season, including learning and earning and considering raising rates.Taxjar : A look at the perfect sales tax storm season that is January for everybody from the multi-million-dollar merchant to your middle-class client selling stuff online. Includes January deadlines and what and how to report.Tax Girl : People have twins. Sometimes twins are born a few minutes apart. Sometimes years end at 11:59 p.m. on December 31. And sometimes the tax implications for twins born in different years are staggering.
Capitol improvements
Don’t Mess With Taxes : So is aflat tax a good idea, a universal fix to stem income inequality? Nah, and here are a half dozen reasons why not.Tax Vox : Howard Gleckman discusses what Congress and President Obama can accomplish this year for the November scene change. After seven years of policy battles, can the two sides kiss and cooperate on key tax issues? Well, notes Mr. Gleckman, “to ask the question is practically to answer it … start by building a Venn diagram that describes the priorities of Obama, House Speaker Paul Ryan and Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell.” Good snow day project.Bond Beebe’s It’s Taxing : A look at our good and kind lawmakers recently making qualified transportation benefits permanent for those employers providing mass transit and qualified parking benefits to employees. Don’t congressmen already get those benefits?
Fault in our stars
IRS Problem Solver Blog : Real big programs, real big problems: “Real Housewives of New Jersey” stars Teresa and Joe Diudice have been slapped with a tax lien of $551,563 for many unpaid years. “Once again, did [Joe] have bad advice from his financial advisors, or did he simply ignore good advice?” Stars are just like the rest of us!Federal Tax Crimes : A Minnesota opinion, United States v. Belfrey, involves a superseding indictment of two brothers with the principal charge health-care fraud and, “as with many types of financial crimes, tax misconduct is involved.”
Limitless information
Liberty Tax : What changes this tax season for same-sex couples.Taxes at About.com : If you’ve got a client who earns gas money renting their car through the likes of JustShareIt, Getaround or Turo, here’s what to tell him or her about the tax impact. Note: “The IRS has only a limited amount of information about this topic.”Solutions for CPA Firm Leaders : You can’t say it enough: Don’t be afraid to ask questions, but think before you speak if you’re the new kid in the firm.Backtaxeshelp : We all know the benefits (and maybe drawbacks, as in use it or lose it) to FSAs, but can these slippery accounts actually help save on taxes?H&R Block : Probably no question about deductions confuses more of your clients – especially the aging ones – than medical expenses. Here’s what to remind them about.The Tax Times : Bloggers Robert Feinschreiber and Margaret Kent look at how transfer-pricing methodologies are beginning to spread far beyond the narrow confines of Section 482, with two recent examples.
