Insights

As we gear up for year-end tax planning, we take a look at Trump’s recently-released tax reform proposal and a few key time-honored approaches to guide your planning strategies. Tax Reform Proposal The Trump administration released the Unified Framework for Fixing Our Broken Tax Code on September 27, 2017. This initial proposal provided a general…

As many are aware, tax scams are on the uptick. What you may not know is there is a new twist on an old scam. The IRS issued an alert to taxpayers to raise awareness of a new telephone scam. The new twist involves scammers calling taxpayers claiming that two certified letters were returned undeliverable…

In a unanimous ruling, the Tax Court has made it easier for employers to absolve income tax liability for reclassified employees. A recent court case set a key tax decision that allowed an employer access to IRS tax records of previous employees to determine whether they had paid income taxes on their earnings. In the…

The U.S. Tax Court recently ruled in support of the Los Angeles County Tax Assessor’s valuation of rental property improvements over the property owner’s proposed values. In the case of Nielsen v. Commissioner, the court found that the county assessor provided a more reliable appraisal of land and improvement values than that of the owner’s…

The Social Security Administration released a few changes to the program making an impact in 2017. These changes include a slight increase in payments, rise in earnings limit, a higher tax cap and more. Slight Increase in Payments The beginning of this year brought a slight increase in social security payments by 0.3 percent. This…

The construction industry has discovered that greening its energy sources with renewable energy initiatives is good not only for the global environment, but also for the bottom line. Many construction companies took their cue from Ray Anderson, the late CEO of Atlanta-based global carpet company Interface. When Anderson decided to move Interface’s manufacturing operations toward…

The IRS recently provided interim guidance to qualified small businesses on a new option for claiming the research credit. Eligible businesses are now able to offset payroll taxes by applying the research credit against their payroll tax liability, something that could only be applied toward income tax liability prior to 2016. As part of the…

Not-for-profit organizations will see big changes coming soon to their financial reporting. After years of discussion, the Financial Accounting Standards Board (FASB) issued a new accounting standard aimed to improve not-for-profit financial reporting. The new standard intends to help not-for-profits provide a clearer picture regarding net asset classifications, create more consistency in reporting, including enhanced…

Due to recently finalized regulations, companies that develop software for their own internal use may now be able to qualify for the Research and Development (R&D) credit. Under T.D. 9786 Section 41, R&D expenditures that were previously excluded under the Internal-Use Software (IUS) rules may now be eligible for valuable tax credits. The final regulations…