Catherine

Hey, BooBoo, let's go find a pic-a-nic basket!

The folks who believe that only the police & military should have firearms make the point FOR us: the only thing that stops a bad guy with a gun is a good guy with a gun. They simply limit the definition of "good guy" to police and military. History shows, time and again over the millennia and as recently as the past decade, that the greatest number of civilian deaths in the world are at the hands of the peoples' OWN government. Always preceded by disarmament "for greater safety". Always. As a side story, the police are notoriously bad shooters. After watching the Cambridge MA cops use our (MIT's) range for practice one day, I used to tell people that if the Cambridge cops started shooting, go stand right in front of them as it was the ONLY safe place. Just watching them scared the dickens out of me and I was astounded that no one got hurt. My coach, who was retired from the Providence RI police force, had hours of hysterically funny, terrifying, stories about the Providence PD folks.

For that he (and we?) should be grateful - think of the mess he would have sent in!

Here in MA we've had health insurance non-coverage penalties for years. They are a ROYAL pita; charts up the wazoo by county, by income, by family size, all needing to be cross-correlated. Software doesn't do all those calculations very well (ATX didn't do them at ALL - I had to look up every piece separately on the MassDOR book that I downloaded; Drake at least is able to pull the county and income info over and you add in the family size since that can be [often is] different from the exemption number), so there is lots of do-it-by-hand nonsense. Folks most likely to be hit are low income or those who had jobs and lost them and decided not to pay for COBRA coverage. Plus in MA we also have a requirement for "minimum creditable coverage" so there are still folks who don't meet *that* criterion and get penalized. Some do it every year, as the insurance they have is sufficient for their needs and the penalty is less than the step-up in coverage. My recommendation is to buy your Motrin in the convenient 55 gallon drum package for next tax season. Perhaps install a dispenser like the ones for gumballs/Skittles/M&Ms you still see in stores.

Same reason elephants are wrinkly; they're filled by weight, not volume.

My "Latin" came from growing up speaking Italian, a stint in college doing medical transcription, and puzzling my way through Latin paragraphs a couple of times a year for several decades. But I do know the rules for masculine and feminine plurals! Also studied Russian in college; our textbook had a terrific story about Superman, all drawn in really poor stick figures by the author, that was just hysterically funny. I can still read and enjoy it, and recite the opening lines. Superman fighting for "Americanskii obraz zhizni" still makes me chuckle (the American way of life -- in Russian).

stylus --> styli standard Latin plural I do have the promo item expenses list. They really kept excellent track of everything - but I still had a three-page document of questions. Thanks!

Never would have thought Kickstarter had a tax help page. Thanks.

Client has a small business (Sch C). I see on his spreadsheet for 2013 a one-time, large (over $150K) receipt categorized as "Income" from Kickstarter. How does this get treated? It is not sales. Just "other income" -- or is there some other treatment I need to know about? I've never before seen crowdfunding sourced income and don't want to muck it up for lack of info. TIA, Catherine

Karl Denninger posted a beautiful picture that he took, last night. It's here: http://market-ticker.org/akcs-www?post=229481

Definitely! Why leave that mess on your nice floors?

Got the 8938; yes fortunately a checkbox as I don't know how long it would take to get account & balance details for calendar 2013 from Bermuda. Thanks to all for the help; there was mention in several places of exemptions for those with signature authority only in several cases but it took WAY longer to find the list of cases. All either banks or securities firms -- which seems to be even weirder, if they are looking for fraud, as folks with signature authority in those firms would have FAR more ability to hide fraud. Probably paid off several legis-vermin to get those written in...

Except no acks til Tuesday earliest -- and I for one will expect (/not be surprised by) a server crash Tuesday morning when the weekend backup hits.

That was _exactly_ the source of my confusion. Partial owner of a foreign asset which itself has a bank account (or accounts). NONE of those accounts are for personal use (that would be called embezzling, if I have the definition understood correctly); they are corporate accounts for corporate purposes. Yet he does have signature authority...

Odd one and I can't figure it out from IRS pubs. Client is part-owner of a hotel outside the country, with his brother. Brother lives there, runs the place, is subject to FBAR reporting etc. My client has signature authority over the *corporate* account - basically in case his brother gets sick or has to travel, so someone can sign checks. It is not his PERSONAL account; it is not titled in his name, etc. Since he is part owner of the company, he has to file the 8938 and also a 5471 (from which I get all the info from the corporate accountants). I sent him all the FBAR info to file online (hope he did; out of my hair though) -- but what do we put on the foreign accounts question? Again - NOT his name. Just signature authority. My thought is yes -- but as I was going to print, I am re-thinking myself. Thanks.

Who is paying the bonus? If it's his employer, it should be on a W-2. If it is the other firm, my first thought is Line 21 other income as he is not in the business of referring out business to other companies.

Duh! I do so few amended returns I didn't even know that existed. Will try it; thanks.

Anyone know how long the IRS is taking to process amended returns these days? Client sent one in in July and has heard nothing from either the IRS or the CA FTB. Thanks!

Ah, that's why it won't happen. Power and re-election for themselves is ALL the various legis-vermin care about. Even the ones who went to DC as "reformers". Remember that tax cheat Rangel was the anti-corruption candidate who unseated Adam Clayton Powell. Back while I was still learning to read...

They've been doing it in MA for several years now. First couple of years were rough. Some providers were sluggards but mostly it was the taxpayers who didn't know what the 1099-HC was, or what it was for, who either didn't bring it, or threw it out because they didn't understand it. What REALLY gets people angry is when they get hit with the penalties.

And folks get SO excited getting a discount!

I charge full freight for each and every form -- and then discount (shown on the bill) for simple forms. Say for example my Sch B fee is $50 -- and someone has one account at Bank X that earned $135 interest. I will discount that form $45 (down to $5). Same with the AMT form -- prepare it and charge it on EVERY return -- then discount it for the simple returns (the just-out-of-college kid who makes less than the AMT personal exemption, etc). Clients LOVE seeing that discount. I also have additional fees for any accounting that needs doing - that gets added as an hourly charge or is charged separately (depending on the client). Sch D/Form 8949 is $3 per item. So if someone sells one share of IBM, it's $3. If someone has a managed account with hundreds of trades -- well, you can multiply. Even when the info is provided in a spreadsheet, I charge -- because I check it, line by line. And find (rare) errors.

Since I (generally) charge by form, my prices go up with each new form required. The very few questions I have had on price I have pointed to the additional forms required this year and told the clients to take up the issue with their legis-vermin.

I use a gmail account for newsgroup postings from various tax newsgroups. (Not this one, obviously.) It was not one of those affected, but I changed the password anyway.

Even if not, just from the title they could look it up for themselves. Thanks to Judy for posting the text of the article. The original includes a link to see if your account is one of the ones affected.