Tax Court: Cost Of Ralph Lauren Salesman's Polo Wardrobe

[grmy2h]

This could be useful - framed in the waiting area.

"This week, the Tax Court reminded us that even though your boss may have an expectation that you dress a certain way while at the office or while working the assembly line at the cracker factory, that doesn’t necessarily mean you can claim a tax deduction for your work “uniform.”

http://www.forbes.com/sites/anthonynitti/2016/04/29/tax-court-cost-of-ralph-lauren-salesmans-polo-wardrobe-was-not-tax-deductible/#4d3915b96eb2

[ILLMAS]

This story  reminds me of the lady who didn't  know  McDonalds coffee was hot.

[JohnH]

It would qualify as a uniform for me, because I think it's foolish to pay extra money just to have someone's emblem on my clothing.  I don't waste my money on this sort of vanity.  But I guess that would automatically rule me out as a sales rep for the company in the first place. 

[Gail in Virginia]

i love this quote from the article:

The lesson, of course, is that in order to get a tax break for work clothing, the clothing must be so specific, awful, or embarrassing that no well-adjusted person would dare to wear it outside of employment.

I would like to quote that in my newsletter this fall.

[Abby Normal]

11 hours ago, ILLMAS said:

This story  reminds me of the lady who didn't  know  McDonalds coffee was hot.

That's a myth. The coffee was so ridiculously hot, it gave her severe burns and she had to be hospitalized. McDonalds was serving a dangerous product.

[Jack from Ohio]

1 hour ago, Abby Normal said:

That's a myth. The coffee was so ridiculously hot, it gave her severe burns and she had to be hospitalized. McDonalds was serving a dangerous product.

Seriously?

[Catherine]

2 hours ago, Abby Normal said:

That's a myth. The coffee was so ridiculously hot, it gave her severe burns and she had to be hospitalized. McDonalds was serving a dangerous product.

I think anyone who puts a freshly-made hot coffee between her legs and drives off, cover off, to add sugar and milk while driving *definitely* needs hospitalization.  But not for the only-to-be-expected burns.  

[Roberts]

1 hour ago, Catherine said:

I think anyone who puts a freshly-made hot coffee between her legs and drives off, cover off, to add sugar and milk while driving *definitely* needs hospitalization.  But not for the only-to-be-expected burns.  

 

Common sense isn't common. Seriously, we have government advertising, warning labels and calorie information all over the place documenting a proper diet and what not to eat repeatedly. To eat a candy bar you literally have to tear through the warning labels. With all this information over 1/3rd of Americans are morbidly OBESE. We all pay the price in higher taxes and insurance premiums because they can't figure out when to stop eating. Common sense is something people without it think they have.

The reason McDonalds lost that lawsuit (and had settled hundreds previously) was because their own people and their own documents showed they recognized they were serving a dangerous product and failed to provide a warning even though they recognized a warning was probably a good idea. Oh and, not all coffee is served hot.

[Abby Normal]

3 hours ago, Jack from Ohio said:

Seriously?

Yep. It was a valid lawsuit. That's why she won.

[Catherine]

44 minutes ago, Roberts said:

not all coffee is served hot

Hot coffee almost always is.

Yes, common sense isn't very.  [There are also strong indications that obesity (and its health issues such as diabetes) is strongly related to government recommendations/requirements to increase carbs and decrease fats (especially saturated fats).  See Karl Denninger of market-ticker.org's many blog posts on the topic.]  But by babying people too much you prevent them from learning whatever they are capable of learning.  We used to learn about sharp knives by cutting ourselves as kids.  Now as kids we don't learn (too dangerous!  don't touch!) and then as adults sue the knife manufacturers.  Same thing with hot foods/beverages. Starbucks and Peet's and the like use extremely hot water for coffee prep.  Use that same water for tea and it's dangerous.  One sip, once, from over-hot Peet's tea and I learned to approach with caution.  If you order HOT coffee - anywhere - you should treat it as being hot.  Perhaps McD's should have been more open about how hot -- but my opinion remains that if YOU order something hot, it's up to YOU to expect it to BE hot and to treat it as such.  But then, I was raised by my Italian grandmother and had plenty of run-in's with the "what, are you stupid!" until I learned not to be.

[Abby Normal]

https://www.caoc.org/?pg=facts

[FDNY]

Now that we're on to hot coffee I would like to insert my two cents.  I do a lot of traveling during the off season, Boston to NY and back, but I drive in  the middle of the night to avoid traffic.  I like to start out with a hot cup of coffee that I buy at different locations early in the trip, usually around 2am.  Once I put the cup to my lips and it feels too hot, I wait awhile and try later.  For the woman winning a case against MickeyDs  more power to her, they were wrong in serving extremely hot coffee, but should not she be partially at fault.  Doesn't everyone check the coffee, or soup, or pizza before they dive in?  I don't know, but maybe Catherine's Nonna's thoughts should be something that has some basis here.  Common sense, such a rarity these days.

[joanmcq]

Before cup holders were common, I'd often keep my beverage between my legs, and everyone I knew did too. This lawsuit was from the non cup holder era.

Also, McDs had been warned about serving scalding hot coffee several times before this one. I burned my lips on it once, it was scalding. Would put ice in it just to get it to a drinkable temperature. The lawsuit wasn't that the woman didn't know that hot coffee was hot, it was that it was so hot she ended up needing skin grafts. 

[jklcpa]

25 minutes ago, joanmcq said:

The lawsuit wasn't that the woman didn't know that hot coffee was hot, it was that it was so hot she ended up needing skin grafts.

Adding to what Joan said, it was also because there were over 700 prior complaints and McDs settled many of those for a few hundred dollars each and did nothing about the temperature of its coffee, and some of those people also had 3rd degree burns as well.   McD's coffee was served at ~ 180-190F, and home brewed coffee is typically about 40 degrees lower than that.  After the case, that McDs in Albuquerque lowered the temp of its coffee to around 158F.

This wasn't just some burn that irritated the lips and mouth that people typically recover from fairly quickly and without complication. Third degree burns damage or destroy the entire layer of skin to its full depth and possibly that of underlying tissue.

http://www.lectlaw.com/files/cur78.htm

[Patrick Michael]

Bought a new snow blower and in large, bold type there was a warning "WARNING.  DO NOT OPERATE SNOW BLOWER ON THE ROOF".  After reading it, all I could see is some idiot hauling his snow blower onto the roof and then falling off.  Must have happened for them to put the warning in the instructions.

[ILLMAS]

I was a teenager back in 1992 and now have read the full story about the coffee lady, but if water boils at 100 degrees, wouldn't the water evaporate at anything above 100?  For anyone that drinks coffee, when the coffee pot is on the warmer, is it bubbling?

[Pacun]

I normally don't see any articles from Forbes because they want me to disable my ad blocker. Can someone paste the important part of the article?

[Catherine]

46 minutes ago, ILLMAS said:

boils at 100 degrees,

100C but 212F.  It won't exceed that temperature as it there undergoes phase change to gas (unless you do weird things with higher pressure).  Water at higher altitudes boils at a lower temperature, which is one of the reasons you have to make corrections in cooking times (especially for canning!) at high altitudes.  

[GeneInAlabama]

1 hour ago, Patrick Michael EA said:

Bought a new snow blower and in large, bold type there was a warning "WARNING.  DO NOT OPERATE SNOW BLOWER ON THE ROOF".  After reading it, all I could see is some idiot hauling his snow blower onto the roof and then falling off.  Must have happened for them to put the warning in the instructions.

I got a good laugh from this.  Like Patrick said, someone must have fallen off a roof using a snow blower at some time.  Maybe I should put a warning sign on my pencil sharpener, "WARNING - Do Not Put Finger In Pencil Sharpener."

[Jack from Ohio]

Sign in front of a large bin of peanuts in the grocery:

WARNING!  This product contains peanuts.

[ILLMAS]

For your enjoyment:

 

 

[Catherine]

3 hours ago, ILLMAS said:

 

For your enjoyment:

 

Some of those were laugh out loud funny!

[joanmcq]

I actually dated the guy whose lawsuit caused the pop bottle warning. 

[Roberts]

I did the hair dryer thing (when I had hair). When sick with a high fever - I would use the dryer to head up the bed - never fell asleep with it and would only use it for a minute maybe.

[Catherine]

For years (before we re-did the bathroom) my hairdryer was the bathroom heat.  Just a couple of minutes turned it from an icebox to bearable.  Ten minutes to toasty warm.  But you couldn't leave it on; too loud!