by Leif Jensen | Feb 20, 2011 | General |
The Affordable Care Act’s reporting requirement for the reporting of medical insurance costs on W-2’s has been delayed until 2012. After that I have some predictions of what may come next. Now, it is my belief that once this reporting is under way the benefits will...
by Leif Jensen | Feb 14, 2011 | General |
IRS has announced a new limited amnesty program for secret foreign accounts. The program will allow taxpayers to pay penalties and avoid jail time. The penalties are 25% of foreign account assets, not the 20% of the prior amnesty. The program applies all years since...
by Leif Jensen | Feb 8, 2011 | General |
As the tax season progresses for small business owners, I want to remind them to monitor their ‘basis” in their businesses. Basis is the initial investment, plus any subsequent investments and profits; minus distributions and losses. Owners need to maintain a...
by Leif Jensen | Jan 30, 2011 | General |
The IRS is imposing Revenue Ruling 74-44 very aggressively. Revenue Ruling 74-44 basically states that an S Corporation owner must take reasonable compensation subject to payroll taxes and not dividends. There was a recent case of a CPA who took $24,000 as income and...
by Leif Jensen | Jan 12, 2011 | General |
Well, we got what we asked for. Pat Quinn campaigned on the basis of an Illinois income tax increase and he delivered on his campaign promise. Never mind that the initial talks were for a temporary 33% increase. Much too low! But our valiant politicians fought to...
by Leif Jensen | Jan 10, 2011 | General |
Over 7.5MM returns for 2008 were nontaxable. So 15.6% of all filers did not have to pay any federal income taxes. Over 3MM returns or over 6% of the population had taxable income of under $20,000. Total returns for 2008 were $48,167,224 per the IRS...
by Leif Jensen | Jan 9, 2011 | General |
Since Congress dragged their feet on the final approval in late 2010 of the 2010 tax rules, this has delayed the IRS. So the IRS is still working on reprogramming their computers. The IRS estimates that they will be unable to accept returns that itemize deductions...
by Leif Jensen | Jan 9, 2011 | General |
Congress is seriously considering the elimination the mortgage interest deduction on individual returns (Schedule A). This would be the first step in the elimination of the Alternative Minimum Tax (AMT); kind of sort of. Without the mortgage interest deduction most...
by Leif Jensen | Dec 11, 2010 | General |
To whom it may concern, the recently passed Small Business Jobs Act that was passed earlier this year in September, has a series of interesting new perks which can be greatly used to your advantage. For instance, under the new law, businesses are no longer requiredto...
by Leif Jensen | Oct 15, 2010 | General |
According to data from the IRS for 2008 the bottom 50% of all taxpayers paid a mere 2.7% of the total income tax bill. Many qualify for the earned income credit , so they get refunds of income tax and payroll taxes, instead of having to pay their fair share.
by Leif Jensen | Oct 11, 2010 | General |
Determining basis is importance for a multitude of reasons beyond the IRS investigations. The three most important reasons are: it limits the amount of corporate loss that can be deducted it’s key to determining a gain or loss when stock is disposed of it sets the...
by Leif Jensen | Oct 11, 2010 | General |
S Corporations are now the second most common business entity after sole proprietorship. Based upon their popularity the IRS has increased its scrutiny of them. The three areas they are focusing on are as follows: Misreporting items Personal expenses on the S corp...
by Leif Jensen | Oct 5, 2010 | General |
The sky is not falling. Quite frankly nothing is being done there is no movement at all. Congress gave up and walked away for the issues it faces. The Bush tax cuts will expire for all tax brackets. The Estate Tax will have a million dollar exemption and then be...
by Leif Jensen | Sep 10, 2010 | General |
Now that “King Richard” is not running all politicians seem to be lining up according to ethnicity lines. All coalitions are looking to back a single candidate along their ethnicity in a bold attempt to grab the keys to the city. We are also seeing politicians...
by Leif Jensen | Sep 10, 2010 | General |
I had recently read an article that struck me for being so basic that most people probably don’t even think about it. The basic function of running a business to generate a profit for the owner(s) period. Businesses are not run for the governments benefit to generate...
by Leif Jensen | Sep 1, 2010 | General |
As noted in Thomas Friedman’s “The World is Flat” white collar jobs are very easy to transfer to other countries. The US is projected to lose $136 billion in wages by 2015. This is from Forrester Research who states that the jobs will go to low cost countries such...
by Leif Jensen | Aug 31, 2010 | General |
It seems that women paychecks are finally going to exceed total male paychecks. Of the 122 million women age 16 years and over in the U.S., 72 million, or 59.2 percent, were labor force participants—working or looking for work. Women comprised 46.8 percent of the...
by Leif Jensen | Aug 31, 2010 | General |
The days are starting to get shorter. The kids are back in school. Fall is on its way and it is time for the Lightning Rod Salesman to come to town. The best time of year. Time to get back to work…
by Leif Jensen | Aug 1, 2010 | General |
I went to a GOA event a couple of weeks ago regarding the monetizing of LinkedIn. The event was a waste of time and I left after half an hour of a two hour event. All comments of those who stayed agreed and wished they left. Having further discussions with those...
by Leif Jensen | Aug 1, 2010 | General |
The unemployment rate in Illinois dropped to 10.4 percent in June from 10.8 percent in May, the biggest decline since 1983. But was this a real drop of did more people drop of the listing and stop looking for work. I know my guess of the actual rate of unemployment...
