"The Witch Trial," an 1848 painting by William Powell Frith via Wikimedia Commons Witch hunt. It's been one of Donald J. Trump's favorite phrases for more than two years. He's used the term 310 times, according to Factba.se, the website launched in January 2017 by Virginia husband and wife team Bill Frischling and Jennifer Canty as a way to track and share all of Trump's utterances, be they verbal, written or, most frequently, on social media. The last time Trump invoked witch hunt to decry investigations linked to him was in a Tweet the afternoon of May 12: ....employment numbers... Read more →
Global
Children celebrate May Day by dancing around a maypole on the Village Green in Tewin, near Welwyn Garden City, Hertfordshire, England. (Photo by Paul Barnett via Wikimedia Commons) Happy May Day! It's the annual May 1 global holiday celebrating the contributions of workers. But the other mayday often comes to mind when taxes are involved. If it's a tax distress signal you're sending out as the merry month of May begins, here are some moves that could help ease your tax trepidations. 1. File your 2018 return. If last month you didn't file your 2018 tax return, either because you... Read more →
Tax Day every April is the biggie for individual taxpayers. That's when our annual Form 1040 is due. And yes, I know this year there are two Tax Days, since Patriot Day celebrants in Maine and Massachusetts get until April 17 to send in their federal returns. But most of us must meet the April 15 deadline, so that's what I focus on in this post. Completing a 1040, however, is not the only mid-April tax deadline. It's just one of the 10 tax tasks listed below that many taxpayers also must make by next Monday, April 15. 1. File... Read more →
It's official. House Democrats have formally requested copies of the last six years of Donald J. Trump's personal and business federal tax returns. Trump has steadfastly refused to make public his taxes, breaking a modern-day tradition set by presidential candidates — and in-office presidents (and vice presidents) — of letting the public have a glimpse of White House 1040s. The main reason Trump has given for keeping his taxes private is that his personal and business filings are under audit. Tax experts throughout the media agree that no sane person would give their tax returns during an audit. After the... Read more →
The rate of Americans giving up their citizenship has slowed in the last few years. Are lower taxes a reason for fewer expatriations? Immigration remains at the top of most news lists, especially since the Democratic-controlled House and Republican-led Senate both rejected Donald J. Trump's emergency declaration to shift funds to build a U.S.-Mexico border wall. But the reverse phenomenon of U.S. citizens formally leaving the country forever isn't getting as much attention as it has in the past. Perhaps that's because the number of American expatriates is falling. The Treasury Department on March 12 published its quarterly list of... Read more →
That's me in mid-February doing my personal Groundhog Day shadow prediction that warm weather was back to stay. (The full image is on my Instagram page.) I was sooooo wrong. A couple of weeks ago, ecstatic over the return of warm weather and sunshine to Central Texas, I celebrated the arrival of spring. Was I ever wrong. Today is cold, wet — I swear it was sleeting when I ran to my car this morning after yoga class! — and downright dreary. And it's only supposed to get worse, with local meteorologists predicting the latest hard freeze ever for the... Read more →
One of my favorite recent TV shows was The Americans, FX's series on embedded Russian spies during the 1980s Cold War. For six seasons, we fans watched the couple known to their suburban Washington, D.C. neighbors as Phillip and Elizabeth Jennings raise their two U.S.-born children, run their small travel agency and spy, sometimes in deadly fashion, for their native U.S.S.R. One of the underlying themes was how well and easily the Jennings assimilated into the America they were trying to bring down. It's a common trope, but one done well and with nuance by the television program. A radio... Read more →
Welcome to Part 8 of the ol' blog's 2019 series on tax inflation adjustments. Today we look at considerations of U.S. taxpayers living and working abroad. You can find links to all 2019 inflation posts in the series' first item: income tax brackets and rates. Note: The 2019 figures apply to 2019 returns that are due in April 2020. For comparison purposes, you'll also find 2018 amounts to be used in filing this year's 2018 tax return due April 15, 2019. Where's the best place for the world's estimated 57 million expatriates? InterNation's latest annual Expat Insider Survey says it's... Read more →
The poppy was adopted as the official memorial flower of the Veterans of Foreign Wars in 1922. One century ago today, history's bloodiest war to date ended after more than four years of slaughter. The Veterans Day holiday was conceived as Armistice Day to honor the 4.7 million Americans who served — and the 116,500 who died — in World War I, or what was then called the Great War. The original specificity has a solemn meaning. It marks the armistice between World War I's Allied forces and Germany ending the fighting on the Western Front at precisely 11 a.m.... Read more →
This dog might not feel as guilty as he looks, but shame can be useful in some tax collection situations. (Photo by Ansel Edwards/Flickr) When I was a kid and did something I wasn't supposed to, all it took was one quick glance from my mom to make me feel so ashamed. I'm not sure even my mother's steely look would work nowadays on kids who've grown up on reality TV and who make their every move, good or bad, public on social media. But when it comes to taxes, shame seems to work. Many U.S. jurisdictions post the names... Read more →
Canadian taxpayers have been victims of a telephone tax scam in which identity thieves purport to be from the Canada Revenue Agency. Tax and law enforcement authorities hope recent arrests at Indian call centers will at least slow the scam. (Screenshot from the joint The National/CBC Marketplace report. Click image to watch full video.) Despite some recent diplomatic and trade strains in the United States' relationship with Canada, the two countries share a lot of things, including tax scams. The most pervasive tax scam in America is telephone calls made by crooks pretending to be Internal Revenue Service agents. The... Read more →
The World, Mostly by Leif Kurth via Flickr CC Donald J. Trump got a lot of attention when he popped down to Texas last week for a midterm campaign rally. He told the Houston crowd that he was a nationalist. That term, he explained, describes the philosophy he's espoused since the get go of his presidential political life. He wants to put America first. There's nothing wrong with wanting your country to get the best deals and treatment in international relationships. But Trump also narrowly, and to my thinking incorrectly, defined globalists as people who want to put global issues... Read more →
Got enough money that you've diversified by investing in some international accounts? Good for you. If, however, those non-U.S. holdings are, shall we say, designed to be ultra-private, you might want to think about opening them up. Specifically, tell the Internal Revenue Service about that money you've been hiding from Uncle Sam or pay a big price when your tax haven money is discovered. One way to do that is by taking advantage of the IRS' Offshore Voluntary Disclosure Program (OVDP). That opportunity, however, is about to end. Closing OVDP: Back in March, the IRS announced that it was giving... Read more →
An EU sign greets international travelers at a passport control checkpoint at Tegel Airport in Berlin, Germany (Voice of America News photo) Many folks are taking one final quick vacation this long Labor Day weekend to mark the end of summer and beginning of the school year. But some folks who are crossing international borders might find they're not welcome. It has nothing, however, to do with the country they want to visit. It's because of their passports have been revoked because they owe big tax bills. How tax bills hamper travel: Since the December 2015 enactment of the federal... Read more →
One, in addition to being the loneliest number, also soon could cost some Chinese taxpayers when it comes to their family size. Three years ago, China abandoned its policy, which had been in place since 1979, of fining people for having more than one child. Now Chinese leaders want to encourage people to have more kids. The reason for wanting more babies is that China's previously restrictive family planning policy has produced a growing aging society and a shrinking young population. That's not healthy for any economy. To remedy that situation, China is exploring a variety of proposals, including a... Read more →
The trade war with China is on. At midnight on Friday, July 6, the $34 billion tit-for-tat between the world's two largest economies took effect. The Trump Administration placed added charges mostly on Chinese aerospace products, information technology, auto parts and medical instruments. Beijing retaliated with its own tariffs primarily aimed at on American farm products, cars and crude oil. But if China doesn't blink, the White House says it could ultimately impose charges on up to $500 billion of Chinese goods. Business opposition continues: For months, potentially affected U.S. companies and the organizations that represent their economic sectors have... Read more →
Instead of my usual cup of coffee, I'm celebrating America's 242nd birthday this July 4th with a spot of tea. Yes, the British beverage and phrasing is intentional, since as we all know, the taxation of tea without representation was the final act of tyranny that sparked the American colonies' revolt. Tea other British taxes: Our colonial forebears had long dealt with British taxes. The passage in 1767 of the Townshend Revenue Act imposed taxes on glass, lead, oil, paint, paper and tea. But while all those other duties were repealed in 1770, the British decided to keep the tax... Read more →
Real Madrid teammates Cristiano Ronaldo, left, and Luka Modrić go against each other in a Portugal vs. Croatia friendly match in June 2013. (Photo by Fanny Schertzer via Wikipedia) I'm not a soccer or World Cup fan, but many of my social media pals are. That's why my Twitter feed is full of updates on upsets and expected results from this year's tournament hosted by Russia. But those sports fans have overlooked one thing. Some of soccer's — football to the world beyond the United States — biggest global stars also have faced serious international tax battles. Portugal star fights... Read more →
June's a busy month for me. Lots of family birthdays. Father's Day. Graduations. Taxes. Yep. Taxes. In June. Specifically, June 15. The midpoint of the first month of summer is a major tax deadline. Estimated taxes: The biggie for a lot of taxpayers (including me) is the second installment of 2018's estimated taxes that's due by June 15. You have several ways to make this payment — six, actually, according to the current Weekly Tax Tip. I'll let you check out the details in that other post at your leisure, but here are some of the more popular options: Credit... Read more →
Donald J. Trump arrived in Quebec for the G-7 meeting with some controversial ideas (notably, letting Russia back in the club) and he left the international meeting the same way. Tweeting from Air Force One as he headed to Singapore to meet with North Korea's Kim Jung Un, Trump gave notice he's ready to escalate trade disagreements with Canada by imposing automobile tariffs. The initial reaction has been what such a move could actually mean to the U.S. automotive industry. Tax cut tariff costs: But auto tariffs also could undermine any gains from the TCJA, according to a Washington, D.C.-based... Read more →