Image from IRS Publication/Poster 5731-B Tax law changes often cause filing problems for taxpayers when they try to determine how they are affected. Things can get even more complicated when the Internal Revenue Service steps in with its take on a confusing law. That's exactly what's happened and still happening with Form 1099-K, Payment Card and Third Party Network Transactions. This tax form is supposed to be issued to individuals who get money via a third party processor for goods or services the taxpayers provided customers. 1099-K history: For more than a decade, online apps and marketplaces (think PayPal, Venmo,... Read more →
Federal Budget Spending
The United States avoided defaulting on its debt, thanks to last-minute deal reached by President Joe Biden and House Speaker Kevin McCarthy and grudgingly agreed to earlier this month by Congress. Park of the package was a $21.4 billion cut to money the Internal Revenue Service was supposed to use for tax enforcement. The agreement called for an immediate $1.4 billion reduction, plus the loss of $20 billion over the next two years, most of that coming from the nearly $80 billion in extra funding the IRS was given as part of the Inflation Reduction Act. Critics of the hit... Read more →
Photo by Gustavo Fring Millions of Americans are worrying about the damage to their retirement accounts if the United States (aka Congress) defaults on the country's debt. But there's another retirement fear that could put federal and state governments on the hook for trillions more dollars. Many Americans aren't saving enough for retirement, and new research says that if the trend continues unabated, the country could by 2040 face a retirement savings gap and resulting economic burden of almost $1.3 trillion. The federal government would bear the bulk of the saving shortfall, $964 billion. The remaining $334 billion burden would... Read more →
White House Budget video screenshot. Full video is available at Facebook and Twitter. The Biden Administration released its fiscal year 2024 budget today (March 9, 2023). Thanks to previews from President Joe Biden, there are no surprises as far as taxes. "I want to make it clear I'm going raise some taxes," Biden to told a group in Virginia Beach, Virginia, who gathered Feb. 28 to hear about healthcare. "Many of you are billionaires out there. You're going to stop paying at 3 percent. Not a joke." The president's promise was put in writing today with the issuance by the... Read more →
A fully functioning Internal Revenue Service is critical to the success of the United States. That assessment comes from IRS Commissioner Charles Rettig. It's not just a personal view, but part of Rettig's official opening message in the agency's just-released Strategic Plan for Fiscal Years 2022-2026. To get to that point, the report says the IRS' goal must be "putting the interests of our taxpayers first in everything we do." I know. Cynics are clicking away right now. The IRS hasn't had the best record here. To be the agency's devil's advocate — or, as a reader once described me,... Read more →
President Joe Biden's fiscal year 2023 budget proposal of a minimum tax on the wealthiest Americans, as well as a levy on unrealized gains on assets (including stock holdings), is getting the most attention. Biden's plan to collect at least a 20 percent tax on U.S. households worth more than $100 million would apply to about 20,000 households, but more than half the revenue would come from households worth more than $1 billion, according to White House estimates. It also would, says the administration, help reduce the nation's budget deficit by $1 trillion over the next decade. Wish list only:... Read more →
Technology, not heavy equipment, can close the Tax Gap, according to two former IRS commissioners. The Tax Gap has always been a concern of the Internal Revenue Service, Congress, and taxpayers who pay their taxes. Basically, it's the amount of money the IRS figures it is due from filers, but which it's been unable to collect. Two former IRS execs say they know a way the agency can collect more unpaid taxes. Even better, write former IRS Commissioner Charles Rossotti (he was head honcho from 1997 to 2001) and Fred Forman, former associate commissioner for modernization from 2000 to 2004,... Read more →
Sin taxes, those government levies on products or activities generally deemed as not good for us, typically are a favorite revenue raiser for states. Now Uncle Sam, or at least Capitol Hill Democrats looking for ways to pay for their proposed $3.5 trillion economic package, are taking a page from their state tax counterparts. One of the suggested taxes is a hike of the current federal excise tax on cigarettes and cigars. Another is a new tax on vaping. The House Ways and Means Committee summary of the taxes says: This provision doubles the current rate of excise taxes on... Read more →
Capitol photo by Scrumshus via Citypeek-Wikipedia As Capitol Hill creeps toward further consideration of the Biden Administration's $3.5 trillion spending bill, the focus is narrowing on just how to pay for Uncle Sam's fiscal year 2022 budget. One of the ways the White House wants to pay for the measure's climate initiatives, paid leave, child care, education, and health care is by raising the top marginal individual income tax rate to 39.6 percent. That's the tax rate the wealthiest paid until the Tax Cuts and Jobs Act cut it in tax year 2018 to 37 percent. That tax reform change... Read more →
UPDATE, Aug. 9, 2021: A last-minute push to limit new cryptocurrency tax reporting requirements in the $1 trillion infrastructure package (see Aug. 4 update below) failed today, despite a bipartisan agreement and a frenzied lobbying push, per The Washington Post. UPDATE, Aug. 4, 2021: In response to the concerns elaborated on in the rest of this post, a bipartisan group of lawmakers has offered an alternative cryptocurrency revenue-raising plan. The amendment was crafted by Senate Finance Committee Chairman Ron Wyden (D-Oregon) and Republican Sens. Pat Toomey (more on his complaints later in this post) of Pennsylvania and Cynthia Lummis of... Read more →
Joe Biden's campaign slogan "Build Back Better" now is part of his presidency's agenda. Many promises he made in 2020 now are part of the Biden Administration's first federal budget proposal. President Joe Biden's first federal budget proposal, which is for the 2022 fiscal year that starts Oct. 1, comes in at $6 trillion, detailed in more than 1,700 pages. The White House projects its changes will bring $3.6 trillion to the Treasury over the next decade. It also projects a $1.84 trillion deficit. That's a substantial number, up from 2019's $984 billion deficit, but a sharp decrease from the... Read more →
During the height of the COVID-19 pandemic, airline health protocols got most of the attention. That's not surprising, since when flying, we're all trapped for hours with strangers in a metal tube with recycle air. Now, with more of us vaccinated and ready to get out again and see sights beyond our homes, the travel focus has shifted. It's Memorial Day weekend, the unofficial start of summer and a major road-tripping holiday. Highway bound: AAA expects Memorial Day 2021 travel to rebound substantially. The national motoring membership organization predicts 60 percent more travelers this long holiday weekend than last year's... Read more →
President Joe Biden's proposal to give the Internal Revenue Service an extra $80 billion over the next decade to go after tax cheats — which the ol' blog talked about earlier this month in this post — is getting a lot of attention in advance of his nationally televised speech night. I suspect the current IRS hierarchy is pleased, despite the comments to The New York Times by a former commissioner that an extra $25 billion over a decade would be sufficient. "I'm not sure you'd be able to efficiently use that much money. That's a lot of money," said... Read more →
Even though we definitely are more than ready for 2020 to end, the celebration of its official departure in a few hours — that's for us here in the United States; Happy New 2021 to all y'all on the other side of the International Date Line — likely will be subdued. Thanks, no thanks, COVID-19. May you, too, be gone soon in the coming 12 months. But even if the ringing in the New Year will be in smaller, pandemic-precautioned pods, some adult beverages will be raised as the clock strikes midnight. And among those celebrating the most will be... Read more →
The Trump Administration plans in the next few weeks to announce a $1 trillion infrastructure bill, according to Bloomberg and Financial Times. The proposed spending on roads and bridges is seen as a way to further jump start the COVID-19 hobbled U.S. economy. The money reportedly would be spent over 10 years, but those familiar with the White House thinking say the plan is still "fluid and could take time." It also would go head-to-head with not only a sizable Democratic highway bill now before a House subcommittee, but also a GOP version that cleared the Senate last summer. Mapping... Read more →
Treasury was one of only five departments or major agencies — the others are Defense, Veterans Affairs, National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) and Homeland Security — that got budget bumps in the Trump Administration's Fiscal Year 2021 budget request. (Screen shot of CQ/Roll Call video of delivery of budget books to Capitol Hill) The annual presidential wish list, formally known as the administration's fiscal year (FY) budget, is public. Bottom line, and it's a big one, is the FY 2021 proposals top out at $4.8 trillion. When it comes to this funding exercise, regardless of which president or party... Read more →
Congress played Santa this week, averting a government shutdown and approving a wide variety of anticipated tax breaks. Merry Christmas U.S. taxpayers. H.R. 1865, the Further Consolidated Appropriations Act, 2020, is now law. In a surprise move earlier this month, House and Senate negotiators cobbled together a massive bill that not only, as the name indicates, assures that the federal government stays open, but which also included some long-awaited (at least by those who will benefit) expired tax provisions. In addition, lawmakers corrected — and by corrected, I mean repealed — some obvious — and by obvious, I mean universally... Read more →
Congress just came up with more tax breaks to wind down 2019 than the number of ornaments we have on our upstairs' mini Christmas tree! (Photo by Kay Bell) Congress finally decorated its Christmas tree early this morning. The ornaments were myriad tax breaks. Or, in some cases, elimination of taxes. With Dec. 25 bearing down and special interest groups sending more requests to Capitol Hill than kiddos' letters to Santa, the House and Senate negotiators finally agreed on, among other things, what to do about those expired tax provisions popularly known as extenders. They OK'ed a handful of them... Read more →
The White House's fiscal year 2020 budget proposal was delivered to Capitol Hill today. (Screenshot from AP video via USA Today) The Trump White House today released its fiscal 2020 budget request. The annual fiscal request for money is a month later than usual this year because of the 35-day government shutdown. In his latest budget proposal, Donald J. Trump asks for $8.6 billion for the border wall. He's also calling for spending cuts of $2.7 trillion, the largest proposed reduction ever by an administration. The math involved also is monumental. The budget forecasts trillion-dollar deficits for four straight years,... Read more →
On top of everything else, the Texas floods have produced rafts of floating fire ants. Click image to see KVUE News Twitter video of this monstrosity! There are new stories every day about folks working to reclaim a semblance of normal after the massive destruction of Hurricanes Florence and Michael. Here in Central Texas, hundreds of homes and businesses were (and some still are) under water. Our governor is considering whether to ask Uncle Sam for federal disaster relief to help affected folks get back on their feet. If the Lone Star State does ask and get federal disaster relief,... Read more →