Tax Strategies

The Internal Revenue Service has granted further relief for taxpayers in New York State in the Presidential Disaster Area of Orange, Rockland and Westchester Counties that was struck by severe storms and flooding during the period from April 14-18, 2007. Deadlines for affected taxpayers to file returns, pay taxes and perform other time-sensitive acts falling on or after April 14, 2007, and on or before June 23, 2007, have been postponed to June 23, 2007. In addition, the IRS will waive the failure to deposit penalty for employment and excise deposits due on or after April 14, 2007, and on or before April 30, 2007, so long as the deposits are made by April 30.

After learning that more than 450,000 federal workers and retirees owe a whopping $3 billion to the Internal Revenue Service in back taxes, the Senate Finance Committee is urging the president to step up efforts to collect from those delinquent employees.According to the Washington Post, Senate Finance Committee chairman Max Baucus, D-Mont., and ranking Republican member Sen. Charles Grassley, R-Iowa, sent a letter to President Bush requesting that he remind the delinquent federal employees and warn them of the consequences of non-compliance.

Distilling the nation's complex tax code is the key to reducing the $290 billion tax gap, the American Institute of CPAs told lawmakers. In a hearing before the House Small Business Committee, James Brennan, chair of the AICPA's IRS Practice and Procedures Committee, said simplification should be the foundation to begin stripping away the mammoth deficit.

Sen. Chuck Grassley, R-Iowa, ranking member of the Senate Finance Committee, has sent a letter to his chamber colleagues in an attempt to blunt what he termed "inaccurate claims" about the private collectors employed by the Internal Revenue Service. In a "Dear Colleague" letter, Grassley pointed out that the IRS's own collection infrastructure is better set up for placing liens and garnishing wages than making initial phone calls to delinquent taxpayers to set up a payment plan. Grassley wrote that the private debt collection program consists of having contractors make basic phone calls to taxpayers, contrary to the images of thuggish collection agents using questionable tactics, as has been portrayed by opponents of the program. As evidence, he said that of 24,000 cases of collection just 36 inquiries have been registered. Grassley said there is roughly $90 billion in unpaid taxes that is languishing instead of being collected. His letter said that some of that money is best collected by the "tough cops" of the IRS, fully empowered to seize property, garnish wages, freeze bank accounts and sell the family home or business. However, a large percentage, typically the smaller, newer debts, is better obtained by a modern outbound calling system -- a system that the IRS currently doesn't have, nor are its employees trained for it.

I’m a sucker for financial calculators -- you know, those little widgets that help you find out how much you’ll pay monthly on your 30-year mortgage, how long it’ll take to pay off your student loans, or what you can save when you switch your balances to a new credit card.So it was with some interest that I came across a little application last week, courtesy of journalist Kay Bell’s “Don’t Mess with Taxes” blog (http://dontmesswithtaxes.typepad.com), that allows users to calculate what their income tax liability would have been under the original Form 1040 -- issued in1913. (The calculator can be accessed directly at http://politicalcalculations.blogspot.com/2007/04/income-tax-original-form-1040.html).

Liberty Tax Service reported a 20 percent increase in the number of tax returns prepared at its franchises for the 2007 fiscal year.

According to Vertex Inc.’s annual Sales Tax Rate Report, the average number of U.S. sales tax rate changes per year has grown by 28 percent since the late 1990s.Based on a comparison of the number of state, county, city and district sales tax rate changes during the six-year periods between 1995 and 2000, and 2001 and 2006, the study found that the average number of rate changes per year was 610 and 779, respectively. According to the report, the number of rate changes decreased for the earlier period, while the number of yearly rate changes fluctuated for the later period.

At first glance, the recent testimony of Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson, Jr. before the Senate Finance Committee on ways to reduce the tax gap was fairly typical, in that he urged Congress to approve the Presidential-submitted budget with increased IRS funding, and to pass 16 legislative proposals aimed at narrowing the tax gap.

The leaders of the Senate Finance and the House Ways and Means Committees have reached agreement on a tax package aimed at providing nearly $5 billion in tax relief for small businesses.

A Greenwich, Conn., investment banker was convicted on charges of evading millions of dollars of taxes, according to the U.S. Attorney for the Southern District of New York.A jury found Richard Josephberg guilty on a total of 21 charges, including three counts of tax evasion, four counts of failure to file tax returns, five counts of failure to pay taxes, two counts of subscribing to false tax returns, and single counts of conspiracy to defraud, health care fraud and obstructing the due administration of the Internal Revenue Service.