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"ChatGPT, the AI chatbot that's taken the world by storm, has already conquered numerous tests–the Wharton MBA exam, the Bar exam, and several AP exams among others. But the talking bot met its match when Accounting Today ran it through the CPA exam as an experiment: ChatGPT failed utterly in all four sections. — The experiment took place at the Arizent office in New York City's financial district on April 13 in collaboration with Surgent CPA Review. We used two laptops, each running a separate ChatGPT 3.5 Pro account (metering on free accounts, or on GPT 4, would have made the experiment impractical). One laptop ran the BEC and FAR section. The other ran the REG and AUD section. When all test sections were completed, its scores were: REG: 39%; AUD: 46%; FAR: 35% BEC: 48% The results indicate ChatGPT did not pass any part of the CPA exam." I wonder how ChatGPT would do on the EA Exam?

I thank all who replied which confirm my understanding of the law.

The IRS's Audit Techniques Guide states on page 14: https://www.irs.gov/pub/irs-utl/ministers.pdf "Ministers often pay a small annual renewal fee to maintain their credentials, which constitutes a deductible expense. However, ministers' contributions to the church are not deductible as business expenses. They may argue that they are expected to donate generously to the church as part of their employment. This is not sufficient to convert charitable contributions to business expenses. The distinction is that charitable contributions are given to a qualifying organization (such as a church) for the furtherance of its charitable activities. Dues, on the other hand, are usually paid with the expectation that a financial benefit will result to the individual, as in a realtor's multi-list dues or an electrician's union dues. A minister's salary and benefits are not likely to directly depend on the donations made to the church. They may still be deducted as contributions on Schedule A but may not be used as a business expense to reduce self employment tax."

I worked for a regional firm as auditor for a couple of years after college. (After interviewing at Pricewaterhouse, where I felt completely overwhelmed with their better than you attitude.) We had a fairly large company that we audited. They had a parent company with 4 subsidiaries. I learned how money was laundered, how profit sharing was manipulated, and how this company's employees could steal money on the lo from the company and customers, as long as it was "immaterial." My job was just to produce paper with checkmarks that indicated everything was good - or any impairment was immaterial. Their fav word.

We called it 'ticking and checking'.

I need to get the band back together.

Same sort of auditing is in place for SEC and FINRA. 30 years ago we had an SEC auditor in our offices and he tells us our books are clean, he can see it in 20 minutes because they are simple but still had 2 people auditing them for 2 weeks. His example was Prudential Financial but he said something like "we have auditors in their offices year round, we spend weeks figuring out where money was coming / going and by the time we figure it out they change their methods and we have to start over." Personally the FED audit is the one that should matter and the Fed knew Silicon Valley was about to blow up a year before it did and they did nothing about it. We had a former New York Fed Chairman who under Congressional testimony declared he'd never been a bank regulator. The New York Fed IS the primary bank regulator. We had a FINRA audit with 2 guys - one decided a client's kids were stealing from their mother's account and I was liable ($10k per month was being wired to her nursing home). After 6 hours the other auditor looked at it for 5 minutes and pointed to the line where they deposited more money than they withdrew. He declares "why would the daughters deposit an additional $500k into an account where they are stealing $10k per month?" Our last SEC (20 years ago) audit we had two auditors for Monday and Tuesday and one flies home. On Wednesday morning the remaining auditor looks at a money market account and wants proof we'd sent a prospectus to every client of the firm for that account. I told her we didn't and BLOW UP. All day Wednesday she's in conference calls to the home office. Thursday same thing and on Thursday afternoon she schedules us a conference call with management for the next day. On Thursday our secretary tells me something huge is up and we are in trouble. Friday morning I'm sitting in the conference room waiting on people to dial in and she tells me we were required to send out a prospectus. When I mention there is no client money in the account and it's all ours - you could almost see the blood drain from her face. We showed it as an asset of the firm on all our financial statements for years which they thought was also fraud. woops. She flies out 2 hours later having done absolutely nothing of substance.

I was able to login with MySocialSecurity User Name and Password since I created it back in 2016. Then I had jump through some identity verification questions and change my password. Now I have to wait for an Upgrade Code in the mail.

A minister for whom I have worked for a time brought me her list of amounts given back to her church during the course of 2022 in tithes and other cash gifts. She asked if these were not expenses of her ministry deductible against her social security tax. These are personal expenses deductible on Schedule A and deductible if along with other Schedule A deductions exceed the standard deduction. I can find no change that alters this but if anyone knows if this is incorrect please advise.

https://www.clergyfinancial.com/are-mandatory-tithes-a-deductible-business-expense/

Rather than giving money back to her church, she can pay less social security by reducing the amount she receives from her church.

NY mandates you do it through there website. NO paper or efile allowed

I worked in audit for a big CPA right out of college. A lot of it was tracing numbers from one source/report to another. It was terrible work. I am so glad I am on my own now doing taxes and small business accounting and payroll.

When I was in college I worked for a CPA. The Audit report said what the client paid for it to say, the higher the fee, the more items were passed on. As a 3rd year accounting student I could see what was going on. That is when I found the EA designation and decided the CPA route was not for me. Old, Jaded & Cynical. Sounds like a 80s rock band on their 2023 world tour. Tom Longview, TX

Sounds like deja vu all over again. I remember Arthur Andersen auditing companies that went kaput. Gave them clean audit reports. When I was young, I thought auditing was the thing. I never worked in a big firm but did audit work with a small firm auditing local government entities (school boards, cities, etc.). On my own, I audited some small non-profit organizations. I began to feel uneasy about the whole auditing function. I haven't done audit work in years but I am very skeptical about the whole thing. Maybe I'm just old and jaded. If I sound cynical, that's because I am.

The punishment for competence.

Thanks for the link to the bill. It passed the House and latest action in the Senate was in the fall of 2019. I'm not going to worry until it passes, at least not at this time.

The bill says "relationship". Are you wondering if both spouses have to be listed for a solely owned entity of one spouse? Or if two siblings have to be listed if their joint ownership exceeds 25%? https://www.congress.gov/bill/116th-congress/house-bill/2513/text “(d) Definitions.—For the purposes of this section: “(3) BENEFICIAL OWNER.— “(A) IN GENERAL.—Except as provided in subparagraph (B), the term ‘beneficial owner’ means a natural person who, directly or indirectly, through any contract, arrangement, understanding, relationship, or otherwise— “(i) exercises substantial control over a corporation or limited liability company; “(ii) owns 25 percent or more of the equity interests of a corporation or limited liability company; or “(iii) receives substantial economic benefits from the assets of a corporation or limited liability company. “(B) EXCEPTIONS.—The term ‘beneficial owner’ shall not include— “(i) a minor child, as defined in the State or Indian Tribe in which the entity is formed; “(ii) a person acting as a nominee, intermediary, custodian, or agent on behalf of another person; “(iii) a person acting solely as an employee of a corporation or limited liability company and whose control over or economic benefits from the corporation or limited liability company derives solely from the employment status of the person; “(iv) a person whose only interest in a corporation or limited liability company is through a right of inheritance; or “(v) a creditor of a corporation or limited liability company, unless the creditor also meets the requirements of subparagraph (A).