3albion
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299
James Gould Cozzens 360x1000
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499
3confidencegames
Office of Chief Counsel 360x1000
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Edmund Burke 360x1000
2defense
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1defense
12albion
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George F Wil...360x1000
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11632
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399
The Devil And Lois Lerner

The Devil And Lois Lerner

When people asked me about applying for exempt status for fairly modest organizations I generally advised that I thought that the game might not be worth the candle.  Looking at how simple Form 1023-EZ has made things, I’m rethinking that.  For a long time, I have believed that the dose of credibility that organizations get from having 501(c)(3) status was largely unfounded. The new process means that it should confer no credibility at all.  If someone implies that their 501(c)(3) status is somehow a seal of approval, you need to put your bs detector on high alert.  A storm is coming.

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Quadratic Equations And Tax Benefits David Rockefeller In Tax History

I often remark that you learn all the math you need to do tax work by the fourth grade.  Here was a possible exception. Tax preparers with New York clients would have to dust off their high school math.  I actually had a client who got hit with the New York minimum tax, so this was not just a Rockefeller level problem.  (David Rockefeller had federal AGI of $7.7 million in 1976. In 1976, if I had eight dollars in my wallet, I thought I was ready for anything.

Math challenged tax preparers were spared relearning the quadratic formula by the Commission’s ruling that noted there was no authority in the statute for using New York AGI rather than federal AGI in computing the preference and no “tax benefit” rule.  Another illustration of Reilly’s First Law of Tax Planning – “It is what it is.  Deal with it.”

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Over and over again courts have said that there is nothing sinister in so arranging one’s affairs as to keep taxes as low as possible. Everybody does so, rich or poor; and all do right, for nobody owes any public duty to pay more than the law demands: taxes are enforced exactions, not voluntary contributions. To demand more in the name of morals is mere cant.