Archive for February, 2010

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The Cubs Tax

Sunday, February 7th, 2010

I’m a Cubs fan. I grew up in Chicago, and I loved going to games at Wrigley Field. The Cubs will start spring training in a couple of weeks in Mesa, Arizona. And that’s what this story is all about.

The Cubs stadium in Arizona, Hohokam Stadium, is old (by Cactus League standards). The training complex isn’t up-to-date either. So the Cubs want to modernize, and the estimated cost is $119 million. The Cubs and other private entities would contribute $60 million; the public (in Arizona) is being asked to contribute $59 million.

That $59 million would come through bonds and be paid back through new taxes: a higher car rental tax and a surcharge on spring training tickets. Legislation to put this into law will be introduced in the Arizona House on Monday by Majority Leader John McComish (R-Ahwatukee Foothills).

The legislation is opposed by 14 of 15 Cactus League teams according to Derrick Hall, the President of the Arizona Diamondbacks. (Presumably, the Cubs are in favor of it.) The Cubs are the biggest draw in the Cactus League, with games at Hohokam drawing nearly 11,000 fans while the average Cactus League games draws 6,400.. “The Cubs are the linchpin of the Cactus League, McComish told the Arizona Republic.

Of course, there is some irony in all of this. Jerry Reinsdorf, owner of the Chicago White Sox, criticized the Cubs’ deal. Scott Smith, Mayor of Mesa, noted, “Is this the same Jerry Reinsdorf that skipped out on Pima County taxpayers who had spent tens of millions of dollars to provide him with a taxpayer-funded stadium, to come to Glendale, where Maricopa County taxpayers provided him a Taj Mahal spring-training facility?”

Given the current budget and anti-tax increase climate, it will be interesting to see how this plays out.

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Posted in Arizona | Comments Closed

What €2.5 Million Buys You

Sunday, February 7th, 2010

You can buy a lot with €2.5 Million. That’s about $3.41 million, about the salary of a typical major league baseball player. It can also buy you one cd, normally priced at about $0.35 (or about €0.26). Why the mark-up? The data on the cd, of course.

The German government bought the cd; it supposedly has information on 1,500 individuals who have evaded German taxes at Credit Suisse’s Zurich offices. The Süddeutsche Zeitung says that the cd contains information on 1,500 individuals evading €400 Million. (It’s unclear from the news story whether that’s €400 Million in income or tax being evaded.)

The files on the cd were allegedly stolen from Credit Suisse. Wolfgang Schäuble, the German Finance Minister, noted that when similar data was purchased on Liechtenstein it resulted in 200 court cases, including the conviction of the former chairman of Deutsche Post, Klaus Zumwinkel. There is some good news for Germany. This cd cost only €2.5 Million; the Liechtenstein data cost €4 Million. It appears that the price for data on German tax evaders is falling.

Posted in Tax Evasion | Comments Closed

Falling from the Summit

Sunday, February 7th, 2010

Roger Shoffstall ran the Summit Telephone and Telegraph Company in Alaska. The company serviced areas north of Fairbanks. As I reported last September, Mr. Shoffstall wanted his after-tax profit to be the same as his before-tax profit. That’s tough to do when you have a profit.

Mr. Shoffstall’s methods were decidedly illegal. He mailed tax protester garbage to the IRS. He lied on his W-4 forms. He put a stop on the IRS levying his wages by being President of the business.

The comes the moment that cements Mr. Shoffstall’s nomination to the Bozo Taxpayer Hall of Fame. “[W]hile attempting to come to a settlement with the IRS, purchased a $225,000 house and other items on installment plans to keep the IRS from collecting the property.” Mr. Shoffstall was found guilty of felony tax evasion; he’ll be sentenced in April.

Posted in Tax Evasion | Comments Closed

There Is an Income Tax and You Must Pay It

Saturday, February 6th, 2010

When I ran West Coast operations for a telecommunications company, we hired a new employee. As per company policy, before he started work we had him fill out all the company paperwork. That individual handed the customer service manager a W-4 that said he was a citizen of California and not a citizen of the United States and, thus, exempt from income tax. My manager was confused, so asked me what to do. I told the new hire that he had a choice: He could correctly complete the W-4 or we would hire someone else. We hired someone else.

That was my first exposure to frivolous tax arguments (but definitely not my last). The IRS has just come out with an 80-page release titled, The Truth About Frivolous Tax Arguments. The argument that I saw back in the 1990s is debunked on page 21 of the IRS’ release. This new publication joins the Tax Protester FAQ as rebuttals to the trash being peddled by the unscrupulous.

Meanwhile, from the TaxProf Blog we learn that the new budget contains a proposal to increase the penalties on tax protesters.

Any person who willfully fails to file tax returns in any three years within any five consecutive year period, if the aggregated tax liability for such period is at least $50,000, would be subject to a new aggravated failure to file criminal penalty. The proposal would classify such failure as a felony and, upon conviction, impose a fine of not more than $250,000 ($500,000 in the case of a corporation) or imprisonment for not more than five years, or both.

If there was ever a time to start realizing that the tax protesters are peddling snake oil, it’s now.

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Posted in IRS | Comments Closed

“Shhh: The Middle Class Tax Hikes Are Coming”

Thursday, February 4th, 2010

Most of us are in the middle class: That’s a fact. If taxes are going to go up, taxes on the middle class are going to go up. It’s an inconvenient truth that the current Administration would prefer not to acknowledge.

So Reuters publishes a story earlier this week that states that the middle class will see large tax hikes under President Obama’s budget. (You can find the text of the Reuters story here, via the PowerLine Blog.)

The targeted tax provisions were enacted under the Bush administration’s Economic Growth and Tax Relief Reconciliation Act of 2001. Among other things, the law lowered individual tax rates, slashed taxes on capital gains and dividends, and steadily scaled back the estate tax to zero in 2010.

If the provisions are allowed to expire on December 31, the top-tier personal income tax rate will rise to 39.6 percent from 35 percent. But lower-income families will pay more as well: the 25 percent tax bracket will revert back to 28 percent; the 28 percent bracket will increase to 31 percent; and the 33 percent bracket will increase to 36 percent. The special 10 percent bracket is eliminated.

Middle-class families also will find fewer tax breaks available to them in 2010 if other popular tax provisions are allowed to expire. Among them:

* Taxpayers who itemize will lose the option to deduct state sales-tax payments instead of state and local income taxes;

* The $250 teacher tax credit for classroom supplies;

* The tax deduction for up to $4,000 of college tuition and expenses;

* Individuals who don’t itemize will no longer be able to increase their standard deduction by up to $1,000 for property taxes paid;

* The first $2,400 of unemployment benefits are taxable, in 2009 that amount was tax-free.

As I’ve said before, when a tax cut is eliminated you have an increase in taxes. I’m not going to play semantics. Bluntly, that’s a tax hike. I doubt that middle-America cares what it’s called; there’s less in their pockets.

Arthur Laffer, the renowned economist and inventor of the Laffer Curve (which showed that decreasing tax rates leads to an increase in tax collections), doesn’t like where this Administration is taking the economy. In an interview with Human Affairs, Dr. Laffer made some pointed remarks:

“Obama is a fine, very impressive person. He really is. Unfortunately, everything that he is doing in economics is exactly wrong. He is a crappy president,” Laffer said.

“Whenever a country is in the throes of spending too much and raising taxes, it’s a fiscal catastrophe in the making and this is what is happening now,” he said.

What will the impact of all this be? Dr. Laffer believes the economy might improve remarkably this year; however, such improvement would be a mirage. Companies may move income into 2010 from 2011 because of the likelihood of higher taxes next year. Dr. Laffer believes that 2011 will be a disastrous year for the economy.

In any case, higher taxes are coming. All those of you who think that only the guys behind the trees will be taxed, well, you’ve got about a 0% chance of being right.

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Posted in Federal Budgeting | 1 Comment »

Radio Russ

Tuesday, February 2nd, 2010

I am the guest on this week’s Deuce Plays podcast with Bart Hanson. The focus of the podcast is poker and taxes. You can also download it to your computer by clicking on this link.

Posted in Gambling, Taxable Talk | 2 Comments »

Taxing the Man Behind the Tree

Tuesday, February 2nd, 2010

Don’t tax me; don’t tax thee; tax that fellow behind the tree. — Senator Russell Long

It appears that the President’s budget aims to copy California and Oregon in spending our way to bankruptcy. Additionally, the philosophy noted above is ever-present in the budget.

Increasing taxes in a recession—even threatening to do so—will cause business owners to change their actions. “Why should I expand my business when the government will just take more and more of my money?” This will continue the economic slowdown, causing the need for more spending (in the view of the current Administration) and lead to more tax hikes. It’s a never-ending spiral.

The Tax Lawyer Blog has more on the bad budget coming out of Washington.

The big tax increase is the elimination of the Bush Tax Cuts. Let me be blunt: The ending of a tax cut is a tax increase. President Obama can say that he has never raised taxes, but he’s about to. I’ll have more on this as the year moves forward.

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Posted in Legislation | 2 Comments »

Online Gambling Addresses

Tuesday, February 2nd, 2010

This list has been superseded by the 2011 list. Click here to look at the 2011 list.

The IRS and Department of the Treasury stated in January 2009 that online gambling websites are considered to be foreign financial accounts. If you have $10,000 or more in one or more foreign bank and/or financial accounts, you must report them on Form TD F 90-22.1.

There’s a problem, though. Most of these entities don’t broadcast their addresses. Some individuals sent email inquiries to one of these gambling sites and received politely worded responses (or not so politely worded) that said that it’s none of your business.

Well, not fully completing the Form TD F 90-22.1 can subject you to a substantial penalty. I’ve been compiling a list of the addresses of the online gambling sites. It’s presented below.

Note: This list is presented for informational purposes only. It is believed accurate as of January 1, 2010. However, I do not take responsibility for your use of this list or for the accuracy of any of the addresses presented on the list.

The list is in the cut text below.

If anyone has additions to the list feel free to email them to me.

Posted in Gambling | 3 Comments »

IRS Street Addresses

Tuesday, February 2nd, 2010

A reader emailed me today and said, “Why haven’t you posted your list of IRS street addresses this year?” Well, the answer is that none have changed. Still, it’s time again for the list.

Most taxpayers use the Postal Service to send their returns to the IRS. However, you can use Federal Express or UPS. The problem is the IRS hides the street addresses of their service centers on their website if you need those to use a private delivery service. (They’re listed in the back of Publication 1546.) As a public service, here are the street addresses of the Service Centers.

Andover Service Center
310 Lowell St
Andover, MA 01810
[978-474-9701]

Atlanta Service Center
4800 Buford Hwy
Chamblee, GA 30341
[770-936-4500]

Austin Service Center
3651 S IH 35
Austin, TX 78741
[512-460-0176]

Brookhaven Service Center
1040 Waverly Ave
Holtsville, NY 11742
[631-654-6583]

Cincinnati Service Center
201 W. Rivercenter Blvd
Covington, KY 41011-1424
[859-292-5185]

Fresno Service Center
5485 E Butler Ave
Fresno, CA 93727
[559-454-6334]

Kansas City Service Center
333 W Pershing Rd
Kansas City, MO 64108
[816-823-2076]

Memphis Service Center
5333 Getwell Rd
Memphis, TN 38118-7733
[901-546-4115]

Ogden Service Center
1973 N Rulon White Blvd
Ogden, UT 84404
[801-620-4249]

Philadelphia Service Center
11601 Roosevelt Blvd
Philadelphia, PA 19154-2100
[215-516-5994]

Franchise Tax Board
9645 Butterfield Way
Sacramento, CA 95827

It’s very important to note that these addresses should be used only for private delivery services. Regular mail sent to these street addresses may be rejected as sent to a non-deliverable address and returned to the sender! Mail sent to a service center should be sent to the “normal” address of the service center; for example, here is where taxpayers filing their own Form 1040 returns should mail the returns to (look at page 174 of this pdf).

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Posted in IRS | 2 Comments »

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