IRS Inflation Adjustments for New Year
The IRS has announced annual inflation adjustments for tax year 2013, including the tax rate schedules, and other tax changes from the recently passed American Taxpayer Relief Act of 2012. Some of...
View ArticleOn Your Mark, Get Set, File!
Today is the first day that most tapayers (and the CPAs that hire them) can file their returns with the IRS.read more
View ArticleProsecutor Tapped for SEC
In late January, President Obama nominated attorney Mary Jo White to lead the Securities and Exchange Commission. In his January 26 weekly address discussing the appointment, he cited a reforming...
View ArticlePTIN Is Back On as IRS Loses Again
As noted in an earlier blog post, the IRS was planning not only to appeal the Loving v. IRS ruling that effectively dismantled its Registered Tax Return Preparer (RTRP) system, but to get the court to...
View ArticleNY & Federal Filing Guidance for Sandy
The NYSDTF has posted guidelines for Sandy-related claims, for both federal and New York state tax returns. The instructions also apply to other types of losses and disasters. read more
View ArticleNew York Cracks Down on Payday Loans
Governor Cuomo and the state Department of Financial Services have found another way to battle against payday loans, the short-term, high-interest loans that are already illegal in New York. In a Feb....
View ArticleTax Filings Behind 2012 Numbers
Perhaps it's because the filing season got off to a late start, thanks to ATRA, but whatever the reason, stats released by the IRS show that in a number of key areas, the current tax season is lagging...
View ArticleCan the IRS Read Your Emails?
The American Civil Liberties Union has reported that the IRS may be able to legally access taxpayers' emails without the use of a warrant, according to Slate.read more
View ArticleIRS to Furlough All Its Employees
With the stress of tax season now out of the way, the IRS has furloughed all of its 89,000 employees in response to budget cuts, according to ABC News.read more
View ArticleCourt Rules on Starbucks Tips
As noted in a recent E-zine article, there was some confusion about which levels of employees were entitled to a share of the cash in the tip jars at Starbucks. Two cases were before a federal court,...
View ArticleHealth Exchange Regulations Relaxed
With an eye toward administrative and bureaucratic hurdles that will come with setting up and regulating insuranceexchanges as part of the Affordable Care Act, the Obama administration on Friday pushed...
View ArticleGuilty Plea from 'Rebecca' Fraudster
As noted in an earlier NYSSCPA blog, Long Island resident Mark Hotton was accused last year of conning producers of the musical mystery "Rebecca" in a plot as elaborate as the show itself. At the end...
View ArticleJudge Slams Fed's Debit Card Rules
The U.S. District Court in Washington on Wednesday criticised the Federal Reserve for, in its view, caving to lobbying from the banking industry as it set the rules capping debit card interchange fees,...
View ArticleSovereign Citizen Leader Gets 18 Years
James Timothy Turner, a leading member of the Republic for the united States of America (the lowercase 'u' is intentional), an organization that promotes the sovereign citizen movement, has been...
View ArticleBill: No Internet Tax Ever
A bi-partisan bill making its way through the Senate would, if enacted, make permanent current rules that forbid direct taxation on Internet services, removing the need to renew the policy every few...
View ArticleFeds Crack $7M Tax Fraud Case in N.Y.
Tax fraud is nothing new, unfortunately, but for sheer gall, it's hard to beat the case of Mark Goldberg, a Bronx-based preparer who recently pled guilty in Manhattan federal court to charges relating...
View ArticleSenate Comes to Deal on Shutdown
The U.S. Senate has come to a deal that would re-open the government and raise the debt ceiling as the legislature races the clock to avoid the first default in the country's history, according to CNN....
View ArticleSCOTUS Turns Down N.Y. Stripper Case
The case's salacious details actually obscured what was an interesting and instructive lesson in the application of tax and the limits of judicial decisions. As noted in an earlier NYSSCPA E-zine...
View ArticleShutdown Ended, Debt Ceiling Lifted
The weeks long game of chicken between the Democrats and Republicans has ended with the Republican Party swerving first: the House approved the Senate's compromise bill that would keep the government...
View ArticleGovt. Shutdown Cost: $24B
Although the government has re-opened and the debt ceiling extended, at least for a little while, the struggle has apparently taken an expensive toll, according to the Wall Street Journal: $24 billion....
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