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AICPA Versus Block Advisors In Spat I Hope They Both Lose
So why am I just getting out the popcorn rather than taking sides in this conflict? What Block Advisors is promising is giving people access to the type of relationship that many people have with CPAs and EAs and even the occasional preparer, like Bob Flach, the Wandering Tax Pro that earned us the title “Trusted Advisor”. Somebody who knows the tax law in a practical sense and knows and understands you and tailors their practice to your foibles or perhaps practices tough love to get you more organized. If you are ever audited they will defend you tenaciously and if necessary fall on their sword for you. When it works really well they will complement your personality, reassuring the timid and restraining the overly aggressive.
IRS And Liquor By The Wink
This little comedy may seem far removed from the interminable IRS scandal now on Day 1043 by TaxProf Count. We privilege not for profit organizations in a variety of ways, not just through federal tax benefits but also by letting them sell liquor, where others cannot, run gambling, or make significant political expenditures without disclosing donors. There is even an entirely unmerited dose of credibility that organizations get for having achieved exempt status.
Yet we lay the regulation of entities seeking exemption from a variety of rules at the doorstep of our tax collection agency, even when the status has little or no tax significance as was the case with the 501(c)(4) organizations that made up the core scandal and this particular attempt at 501(c)(7) that just wants to serve liquor.
Sales Tax Collection By Out Of State Vendors May End Up At Supreme Court Again
“Why would we continue to work under an antiquated court ruling? Look how old Quill was,” Magee told Tax Analysts in September, echoing an argument state representatives have been making about physical presence for at least the last 15 years. “Times change, and things were once constitutional and they’re not constitutional anymore. It is time for some sort of paradigm shift, and we can’t continue to remain under the Quill ruling.”
Gay Marriage Constitutional Crisis?
There is a little bit of confusion about what Alabama is up to in its response to Obergefell v Hodges, the US Supreme Court decision that affirms the right of people of...
The PLoS One Hand Of The Creator Debacle – Or Sometimes Things Are Found In Translation
Whenever I start warming up to Kent Hovind, he'll do something to aggravate me. In Scientists' "Human Hand Designed by Creator" Causes Uproar in Evolutionism Community...
Reenactor Argues That Confederate Battle Flag Was Always A Symbol Of Hate
I met Michael Schaffner (center in picture above) at the absolutely final Civil War Sesquicentennial event - The Grand Review in Harrisburg in November. Black troops...
Why I Like Kent Hovind
I have been following the travails of Young Earth Creationists Kent Hovind since 2012. It was a legitmate tax story and I continue to follow it mainly because I find...
Chasm Of Class And Privilege – Clinton Tax Plan Hits Top 1% – Sanders Plan Hits Top 5%
In a previous post, I noted that Bernie is probably harder on millionaires than billionaires at least while the billionaires are alive and I think the Tax Policy Center Analysis drives the point home. The top corporate rate remains untouched at 35%, so if the Sanders plan or something like it were to go into effect, we would see a renaissance of C corporations that went out of favor after the Tax Reform Act of 1986. C corporations will be the way to accumulate wealth, although it will be challenging to figure out how to spend it.
I doubt very much that there is any monied interest supporting Sanders, but if there were one, it would be the life insurance industry. His tax plan does not address the inside buildup of life insurance value or its income tax free payment at time of death and the level of estate tax he is proposing will create severe liquidity strains. And I said I wasn’t going to get into planning. Just can’t help myself.
How Much Personal Use Of Airplane Is Too Much For Tax Free Exchange?
In summary, there is no legal support for treating the relinquished aircraft as two properties for purposes of § 1031. In addition, the position that property either meets or fails to meet the “held for” requirement of § 1031(a)(1) and should not be treated as two properties is consistent with the safe harbor published in Rev. Proc. 2008-16. Consequently, the relinquished aircraft should be treated as one property that either meets “the held” for requirement of § 1031(a)(1) or fails to meet the requirement
Tax Losses From Genetically Engineered Deer Allowed
Deer farms and genetically engineering deer to have impressive racks turns out to be very controversial. I have to admit when I read “The Taxpayer has four small two and one-half acre pens on the property where he keeps the genetically engineered deer that have been bred”, I started thinking that this might be the setting for an F. Paul Wilson novel. You will see critics of the practice using the term “Frankendeer”to describe some of the outcomes of breeding programs. There is also a sense that fenced preserves are kind of unsporting and that the people taking the trophies are more shooters than hunters.
This piece quotes Brian Murphy of the Quality Deer Management Association – “Most hunters find great disdain in a known outcome. That is not hunting. There has to be a high degree of not being successful. The deer has to have a fair chance to escape.”