Most Recent Posts
TheDirty.com Editor Nik Richie Loses In Tax Court
If you are as evil-minded as I am it might occur to you that a General Partner might stick it to you by “specially allocating” income to you while making it clear, off the record, that there will never be any distributions. If you have a good reason for disagreeing with a K-1, one form of recourse is to file Form 8082 and report what you think is right. Unless you do that not following the K-1 is close to per se negligence.
Panama Papers – Much Foreign Ownership Is Innocent
Form 5471 requires a lot of information about the foreign corporation. In my experience, the challenging part for American accountants is getting the information. Much gets lost in translation. Sometimes it is difficult to determine what kind of an entity it is that your client owns. Sometimes the people overseas controlling the books and records are less than cooperative.
If you are getting involved in overseas transactions of any sort, try to get your advisors on both sides of the border to coordinate things. This is one area where the national accounting firms really shine, but you may find that they are too expensive if you are involved in relatively modest transactions.
Freedom From Religion Foundation Attacking Clergy Housing Tax Benefit Again
In 2002 the IRS and mega church pastor Rick Warren were dueling about the fine points of the allowance. The Ninth Circuit decided that there was a question about the statute’s constitutionality and had Erwin Chemerinsky acting as amicus curiae, but arguably more like advocatus diabloli, start briefing the argument that the exclusion was unconstitutional, something not raised by either side in the case. Congress acted with alacrity to amend the statute to make the dispute moot and that was the end of that.
Is Block Advisors A Threat To CPAs?
If Block Advisors has a good research platform and good preparation software, equivalent to what you might get from Thompson Reuters or Wolters Kluwer and their brand could draw in the business, they could probably hire away a lot of frustrated people who have gotten as far as they are ever going to get in accounting firms, because they didn’t realize when they went to Bentley and majored in accounting that selling skills would be really important if they wanted to get to the top. Block is a public company so maybe there could be stock options and the like or maybe just reasonable hours. If in an appropriate manner, they focused their recruiting on the 60% of CPAs who are women, who probably do 80% of the actual work, they might build a great team fast.
We Didn’t Start The Fire – 1970-The Xavier Class Lamented By Antonin Scalia – Part IV
My memoir of the final days of Xavier High School as, in the words of Antonin Scalia, "a thoroughly military academy" has expanded a bit thanks to one of my classmates...
Humanity Of Warfare Is Not An Oxymoron
As I often note sometimes the story behind the story on tax decisions I write about is much more interesting than the underlying than the tax issues. That was...
IRS Turns To Crowdsourcing To Improve Systems
There will be prizes for Overall Design $10,000 and $5,000 – Best Taxpayer Usefulness $2,000 and $1,000 – and -Best Financial Capability $2,000 and $1,000-. It says the awards “may be subject to federal income taxes”, but if you are smart enough to redesign the whole system, maybe you will be smart enough to figure out a way around that.
No Diamonds On Our Shoulders – 1970-The Xavier Class Lamented By Antonin Scalia – Part V
Whatever Regimental glory I won when I graduated in 1953 is unrecorded. The one item I can point to is that I rose to the rank of Lt. Colonel, commanding officer of...
The Final Revenge Of Corporal Burns – 1970-The Xavier Class Lamented By Antonin Scalia – Part III
You'll never outrank me, Tom. Cadet Staff Sergeant Peter Reilly to Cadet Corporal Thomas Burns sometime in 1969. Famous last words. Most young men - mercifully, they...
Estate Denied Discounts For Marketable Security Family Limited Partnership
The Holliday decision does not make me despair when it comes to marketable security family limited partnerships, but advisors should really push for strong execution.I mean if you are saving near a million or more in transfer taxes, spring for a couple of thousand to get a good general ledger. Have a couple of meetings. And make sure you read that partnership agreement and do what it says.