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Most Recent Posts

This CPA Not Rooting For AICPA In Its IRS Lawsuit

This CPA Not Rooting For AICPA In Its IRS Lawsuit

The IRS had wanted to put some requirements around who could get a PTIN requiring an exam and continuing professional education for those without an existing recognized credential, but a lawsuit struck that down. So instead, the agency started an optional program – the Annual Filing Season Record of Completion. PTIN holders who jumped through the appropriate hoops would get one of those suckers (I don’t know whether they are suitable for framing) and, here is the big deal, be listed in this database along with the PTIN holders who are qualified to represent taxpayers before the IRS. That would be CPAs, attorneys, enrolled agents, enrolled actuaries and enrolled retirement plan agents.

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Republicans Want IRS To Target Hillary Clinton

Republicans Want IRS To Target Hillary Clinton

I leave it to the reader to determine how grave a matter this is, but I feel an obligation to be fair to the poor fellow who signed as paid preparer. I don’t know him personally but I recognize his firm’s name. You have to go look if you want to find out. Here is my confession. That error probably could have gotten by me too. The error would likely have been made by someone at a very low level, conceivably someone in India, although I’m not sure how much 990 outsourcing is going on. Ironically, if someone had entered $39,040,513 instead of $39,040,613, that would have been caught since it would make totals not agree, By transposing two numbers within a subtotal though only someone with a sharp eye would catch it.

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Taxing The Virtual World

Taxing The Virtual World

The terms of service that Blizzard lays out for Wold of Warcraft subscribers – more or less “What happens in Azeroth stays in Azeroth” make it a model of closed flow. Players can buy and sell things at an auction house paying with in-game gold and accumulate vast fortunes and rare items, but there is no mechanism for any of it to be translated into real money. You are not supposed to sell your in-game gold for real money or sell your whole account with its Level 80 warrior equipped with epic armor and weapons and a flying mount.

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Democratic Presidential Candidate Drops Out Without Releasing Tax Plan

The Bernie Sanders campaign sent me something pretty detailed, but there is still no word on what he is thinking for rates. Hillary Clinton has floated a couple of proposals – more than two holding periods for capital assets and a tax credit to encourage profit sharing plans – that make it clear that a vote for Clinton will not be a vote for tax simplification. I haven’t noted anything yet from O’Malley and Webb dropped with nary a word on tax, although he probably convinced the other candidates that if they didn’t pick him for VP, they should strongly consider him for heading up their Secret Service detail.

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Redstone Family Saga Writ Large In Favorable Tax Court Decision

Redstone Family Saga Writ Large In Favorable Tax Court Decision

Being in the movie business and all you would think the Redstones. would have been familiar with the remark attributed to Samuel Goldwyn – “A verbal contract isn’t worth the paper it’s written on.”

My own closing comment is that even though there was a favorable result here, I don’t think that it would be wise to attempt to do something like this on purpose.

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Interview With Student Loan Activist Alan Collinge On Bankruptcy Protection

Interview With Student Loan Activist Alan Collinge On Bankruptcy Protection

There is a larger, more sinister phenomenon at work here:   the student loan industry cherry-picks data like these and pushes them in the media for the sole purpose of keeping bankruptcy gone from student loans, something that has allowed them to rob billions of dollars from millions of people over the years.  This is a predatory cash cow for them, and they will grasp at the flimsiest of data in order to make the predatory student loan system look better, and to perpetuate the shocking financial carnage that is being inflicted upon millions and is poised to devastate far more Americans going forward, and to a far greater degree. 

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Maureen O’Hara’s Ill Fated Cuban Oil Tax Shelter

Maureen O’Hara’s Ill Fated Cuban Oil Tax Shelter

The top marginal rate in those days was 91%.  A big attraction of oil as an investment was the percentage depletion deduction.  What is great about percentage depletion is that you can keep deducting even after you have recovered your cost, which is why owning a gold mine is like owning a gold mine ,  while owning an oil well can be even better.  Percentage depletion for oil wells was 27.5% of revenue limited to 50% of net income from the property.  And this was before they started with all those silly alternative minimum tax things and passive activity loss rules were not even on the horizon.

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