Tomorrow, Americans will buy somewhere in the ballpark of 200 million roses for their Valentine’s sweethearts. Except for Feb. 14th, most of us don’t really think about flowers. I’ll buy the occasional bouquet for a birthday party or a school play, but I usually grab the most colorful, reasonably priced arrangement at the grocery store on my way to an event. We recently ordered flowers for a party and we spent a long time weighing more than cost and color; it turns out flowers are a tricky business. Different flower species and colors are meant for certain occasions and relationships and while guys like me don’t tend to think about it, putting more thought than money into the purchase can really make the gift more special.
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We said previously that our tax rates are high and our code reflects the power center’s arrangements. Now, we discuss the complication of the code, the fairness issues and IRS collection practices that come with the territory.
No one needs to explain how complicated the code is with thousands of pages and the annual changes and modifications. It takes the highly specialized knowledge of a CPA or an IRS tax attorney to navigate through the maze of forms and complications in order to provide the tax help that citizens need.
An example of the complication is the alternative minimum tax system. It is almost a parallel system to the existing one. They figure the income tax under the regular system. T
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Enlarge Tim Boyle/Getty Images
Tim Boyle/Getty Images
Note: This is the first of two related posts.
In his latest New York Times Magazine column, Adam Davidson writes, “mobility has reached its lowest level in recorded history…This suggests, among other things, that people aren’t packing up for new economic opportunities the way they used to.”
To continue the discussion, we asked two demographic experts on different sides of the debate – Joseph P. Ferrie of Northwestern University and William H.
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Years ago, I found myself sitting in law school in Moot Court wearing an oversized itchy blue suit. It was a horrible experience. In a desperate attempt to avoid anything like that in the future I enrolled in a tax course. I loved it. I signed up for another. Before I knew it, in addition to my JD, I had a LL.M Taxation. I needed only to don my cape…. taxgirl® was born. Today, I live and work in Philadelphia, PA, one of the best cities in the world . I landed in the City of Brotherly Love by way of Temple University School of Law. While at law school, I interned at the estates attorney division of the IRS. At IRS, I participated in the review and audit of federal estate tax returns. I even took the lead on a successful audit. At
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The other day I was talking with an old friend who I hadnt seen in a few years. He shared with me that while things were going pretty well, he regretted the decision to buy a new house early last year.
I was puzzled too, because not long ago I remembered them buying a home, which at the time (maybe three or four years ago) was a major step up for them. It was a very nice home, and one that offered the space they needed for their growing family. I just assumed they would be there for years maybe decades.
Somewhere along the way my friend got a promotion and his wife returned to work.
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Social security is for some the only retirement income they will have. Two social security income checks may be sufficient to provide the basic needs of a couple at retirement. It is very hard to retire on one social security income.
This situation usually happens if one of the spouses has never worked and therefore is not part of the social security system. You need forty quarters to be fully vested in the system. For some this is very hard to get if they never worked.
Fortunately, for self-employed people this situation can be corrected. A couple can literally double their retirement income with the stroke of a pen. How does this happen? A little background can help explain this point.
First, social security retirement amounts are supposedly skewed against high income people. Fo
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