Saturday, November 13, 2010

WHAT’S THE BUZZ? TELL ME WHAT’S A HAPPENNIN’

* TAX PROF Paul Caron brings us some IRS statistics on 2010 returns in his appropriately named post “2010 Tax Filing Season Statistics”.

* Joe Kristan reports that a variation on the TURBO TAX Defense has again failed in Tax Court in “'TurboTax Defense’ Not Golden for AU” at the ROTH AND COMPANY TAX UPDATE BLOG.

The Moral? Unless you are bucking for a cabinet position, don't bother to blame the software.”

* And Joe weighs in on the discussion of the draft report on tax reform that I blogged about on Thursday in “Zero Option”.

* Joe has a BUZZ Trifecta! I include his post “Waterloo, Iowa Preparer Gets 30 Months for Earned Income Tax Credit Fraud” for the moral –

The Moral? Refundable tax credits like the EIC are a massive temptation to cheat.”

* Daniel Stoica, to whom I owe a big thank-you for “re-tweeting” my tweets, provides us with “Tax Information for Veterans with Disabilities” in honor of Veterans Day at his blog.

* “Blowing Up the Tax Code” by Jeanne Sahadi at CNNMONEY.COM discusses the draft report on tax reform. It has an excellent bottom line -

Taxes are going up one way or the other. The question is will those higher taxes be levied in a system that is widely considered to be outdated, overly complex and highly inefficient, or in a system that is simpler and smarter?

* Trish McIntire throws some cold water on those of us who are hopeful for a serious discussion of tax reform resulting from the recently released draft report of the co-chairmen of the President’s commission in “Not Going to Happen” at OUR TAXING TIMES. The sad thing is she is most likely correct.

We don't have the politicians who can pull it off right now. Congress is full of men and women who are more interested in grandstanding and partisanship than solving the country's problems.”

I do agree with Trish that to get real reform passed – “We would need old school politicians who understand compromise not officials who are more interested in making points for their party than helping all Americans.”

Unfortunately, as I have shown here at TWTP, the cafones currently in Washington are idiots.

* The JOURNAL OF ACCOUNTANCY tells us that “New Rules Require Rental Property Owners to Issue 1099s” to those who they pay $600 or more for services beginning with tax year 2011.

Another ridiculous poorly thought out requirement by the idiots in Congress who probably don’t know they voted for it. Hopefully this will be repealed when Congress finally gets around to repealing the new 1099 requirements for 2012, as it says it wants to.

* Now don’t forget to check out the MISSOURI TAX GUY’s “Week In Perspective” tomorrow morning for items I missed here at the BUZZ!

TTFN

2 comments:

Anthony said...

Regarding 1099s from Rental Property Owners, I had thought that was already the rule. After some research it turns out it wasn't, but it seems to be accidental more than intentional.

Are you also against 1099s being required from sole-proprietors? Isn't that pretty much the same thing?

Maybe they should have made the requirement only for *active* rental property owners, but passive rental property owners are unlikely to have any 1099s to report anyway (maybe if their property manager is unincorporated).

Robert D Flach said...

Anthony-

My concern is with the "casual" landlord - i.e. owner-occupied 2 or 3 family house or vacation rental. It means they have to apply for a federal EIN for themselves, and get EINs from all those who do repair work.

Obviously the "professional" landlords - apartment houses, commercial property - would not feel the added burden as much, and would probably already have a separate EIN.

I am not against sole-proprietors issuing 1099s - but only for services and not for purchases, as the probably unintended new rules will require,

TWTP