It's that time of year we all love so dear - tax season. We dutifully go about collecting our W-2s and 1099s while swearing under our breath about The Taxman and vowing this year we won't wait until April 14th to get started on our returns. It's an annual event on par with New Year's resolutions [...]
The year-end battle between President Obama and Congress yielded a two month extension of the rate reduction for the employee portion of Social Security taxes. For January and February the rate remains at 4.2% instead of returning as scheduled to the traditional 6.2% rate. Under the terms negotiated by Congress, however, some employees won't fully [...]
For all the talk of class warfare dominating Beltway politics and the popular press an equally important issue seemingly gets little to no mention - war between the generations. No, we're not talking about the old man yelling at the kids to stay off his lawn nor do we mean the teenager who knows everything [...]
Here's a situation sure to make President Obama's head spin. In his assault on and vilification of "millionaires and billionaires" (you know, all of us "rich" folk who fly around in our private jets) there's been a call for the payment of our "fair share" of taxes. The operative word is PAYMENT. Does a millionaire's RECEIPT [...]
According to IRS data for 2008 nine of the ten most heavily taxed neighborhoods in the U.S. were in and around NYC. Neighborhoods ranging from Manhattan to Fairfield County, Connecticut accounted for 0.2% of all federal income tax filers. These folks paid Uncle Sam $16.5 billion representing 1.6% of all individual income taxes collected by [...]
It's that time of year again. No, not the changing of the leaves (although that's well underway) but year-end distributions. Mutual fund giant Vanguard kicks things off with a preliminary estimate and calendar of events.
Millionaire's Surcharge Although Obama's jobs bill was killed in Congress some components may resurface in future proposed legislation. Initial proposals included a series of tax increases on individuals making more than $200,000 and families making more than $250,000. Among them was a 28% cap on the tax exemption for muni bond purchases. Senate Democrats replaced these [...]
While not a complete list the following are some figures of interest: 401(k): The maximum contribution in 2011 is $16,500. For 2012 it will rise to $17,000. Estate Tax Exemption: The maximum in 2011 is $5,000,000. For 2012 it will rise to $5,120,000. The benefit may be short-lived as the $1,000,000 exemption under the previous [...]
Today the Social Security Administration announced that the 55,000,000 recipients of OASDI ("old age, survivor and disability insurance") will receive a 3.6% cost-of-living adjustment. The average transfer payment will increase by $43/mo. bringing average benefits to $1,229/mo. Similarly 10,000,000 of the 161,000,000 workers paying into the program will find their taxes increased as the cap [...]
The folks at Morningstar have taken a stab at quantifying and ranking the upfront tax breaks available at the state level for contributions to §529 college savings plans. The results are based on a hypothetical couple earning $100,000 with two children each receiving a $2,500 contribution over the course of a year. As such the couple's total [...]