Taxes

Every year, it seems like I talk to more people who are getting an additional tax bill thanks in part to the 3.8% Medicare surtax. They often call me after the fact, looking for ways to minimize the sting of this additional tax which they often weren’t even aware of. Proactive tax planning can help

The ability to exclude capital gain on the sale of qualified small business stock (QSBS) is one of the most powerful and exciting tax opportunities for business owners. It allows individuals to exclude from gross income the greater of $10 million or 10 times their initial investment in their company, with the potential to exclude

Are vaccine manufacturers profiteering on the COVID-19 pandemic? They’re certainly raking in some healthy profits amid a global disaster. And according to the dictionary, that sounds a lot like profiteering: “the act of taking advantage of a situation in order to make a profit, usually by charging high prices for things people need.” But is profiteering really the

Under President Biden’s new Build Back Better framework, the financial account information reporting proposal has been dropped from the budget reconciliation process. One of the chief concerns about that proposal was its potential to compromise taxpayers’ privacy interests. That concern is still relevant even though it is somewhat reduced because of the shift away from added reporting.

Depending on whom you ask, Call EnQ is either a brilliant time-saving technology for hardworking tax professionals or a company that is effectively mounting a denial of service attack on already clogged Internal Revenue Service customer service lines. It is either privatizing what many expect to be public resources or it is simply capitalism recognizing

SpaceX and Tesla CEO Elon Musk just launched a Twitter poll that is literally worth over $25 billion. Musk, who doesn’t take a significant salary and whose wealth is therefore protected from taxation as his companies’ valuations grow, is asking his Twitter followers if he should sell Tesla stock in order to pay tax. This

It is often said that investing is a bit of a science and a bit of an art. This applies to asset allocation, stock selection and managing risk. But the truth is, most investors often overlook one of the key elements in making sure their portfolio is running efficiently. That element is taxes. Can a focus

Topline The House passed one of the largest infrastructure packages in U.S. history Friday night after months of bipartisan negotiations and tense political infighting, shoring up $1.2 trillion in funds, including $550 billion in new investments, for the nation’s bridges, airports, waterways, public transit and more—here’s everything you need to know about where the massive

The November 3 version of the Build Back Better Act has resurrected retirement law changes that will curb high balance accounts and popular wealth building strategies including backdoor Roth IRAs and aftertax 401(k) contributions. There’s also a new $2.5 million retirement account reporting mandate, presumably to help the Internal Revenue Service with compliance. The changes

There is some good news from the IRS for retirement savers; they have announced an increase to the contributions limits for workers with a 401(k), 403(b) and 457 defined contribution plans for 2022. Larger contributions will allow you to defer more income from taxation. This will be great for high-income Americans who are facing potentially higher

Topline Democrats’ social spending bill, the Build Back Better proposal, currently comes with a price tag of $1.8 trillion, but a nonpartisan report Thursday said the package will also raise about $1.5 trillion in revenue through a slew of new taxes targeting corporations and ultra-wealthy Americans—findings that could help the package find the support it

Inflation means you can—and probably should—contribute more to your workplace retirement account in 2022. The Treasury Department has announced inflation-adjusted figures for retirement account savings for 2022. While contribution limits are up for workplace plans, contribution limits for Individual Retirement Accounts are stuck at 2019 levels. “The real question is whether people pay attention to this,”

The House Democrats’ latest plan to adjust the cap on the state and local tax (SALT) deduction would provide little or no benefit for low and middle-income households but generate a substantial tax windfall for those with much higher incomes, according to a new analysis by the Tax Policy Center. The latest plan would raise

Last week, a coalition of engineers released a report concluding that Florida cities needed to conduct more regular safety inspections of high-rise buildings near the coast. The report was in response to this summer’s horrific collapse of a beachfront condominium in Surfside that killed 98 people.  The recommendations should be no surprise to anyone who

National Taxpayer Advocate Erin Collins discusses the effect of the COVID-19 pandemic on taxpayers, recent IRS program changes, and what’s to come from the annual Taxpayer Advocate Service report to Congress. This transcript has been edited for length and clarity. David D. Stewart: Welcome to the podcast. I’m David Stewart, editor in chief of Tax Notes Today

Many taxpayers learned that unemployment benefits are taxable the hard way earlier this year when they filed their 2020 income tax returns. It came as such a blow to so many people, after what was a horrible year in so many other ways, that Congress included a tax exemption for the first $10,200 of unemployment

This segment of What’s Ahead lays out a tax idea that should please blue state Democrats bereft from the loss of the deduction for state and local taxes, or what is dubbed SALT.  Congressional Democrats are feverishly trying to figure out a way to restore the SALT deduction that was virtually eliminated in the 2017

Today’s Social Security column addresses questions about retirement benefit rates and whether they can be increased, what people could be referring to by the term “spousal bump” and when Social Security might review disability status. Larry Kotlikoff is a Professor of Economics at Boston University and the founder and president of Economic Security Planning, Inc.

While the $1.2 trillion infrastructure plan remains stalled on Capitol Hill, some are pushing for a faster way to get money to states and localities to respond to extreme weather events and improve their roads, bridges and transit. Legislation now making its way through Congress would allow governments to use some of their direct funding

One of the impacts of Brexit that some organizations may have overlooked relates to the movement of own goods/ the provision of goods within a corporate group and what happens when those goods cross a customs border.  The overlooked area Many multinational groups centralize functions such as IT and the provision of spare parts. It