Tax Aspects of Divorce May15

Tax Aspects of Divorce

My wife, Maurine, and I will be “celebrating” our 25th wedding anniversary next month, in October, 2010. In honor of this milestone, I decided to explore the Federal Income Tax aspects of divorce in this installment of Tax Law Explained. Generally accepted statistics show that, in the United States, roughly 50% of f...

Read More
Excise Tax May15

Excise Tax

In the first issue the IICLE “Tax Law Explained” FlashPoints (May, 2009) I showed how the Federal Tax laws are designed to encourage or discourage certain behaviors, not just raise money. Sure, the Federal government needs money, but they would not need thousands of pages of Federal Statute and Regulations to accomplish that goal...

Read More
Hobbyist Versus Businessperson May15

Hobbyist Versus Businessperson

When the neighborhood kids set-up a lemonade stand on the corner, no one expects to see an IRS agent stop by for a drink, let alone on official business. Do the kids have to report the income from sales? Can they take a tax loss if their costs exceed their income? Should there be a different answer if the lemonade stand was open ever...

Read More
Self-Employment Tax May15

Self-Employment Tax

Many people operate their own businesses. Many of those businesses are sole proprietorships, partnerships or LLC’s. Separately, many businesses are looking to get their workers “off the payroll” by treating them as independent contractors rather than as employees. These factors make it increasingly important to be aware of the ...

Read More
New 2020 Illinois Laws Jan20

New 2020 Illinois Laws

Every New Year brings a bevy of new state laws into effect, and 2020 is no different with over 250 new Illinois laws taking effect. The vast majority of these may have little impact on the daily life of most in Illinois, but there are always a handful that loom larger over Illinois residence. Here are some of the most impactful new I...

Read More
COVID-19 – PAID LEAVE & TAX CREDITS Mar27

COVID-19 – PAID LEAVE & TAX CREDITS

Whether you call it COVID-19 or Coronavirus, there is no deny that this global pandemic has begun impacting all of our lives in ways predictable and unpredictable. One predictable impact is the stress on employees and employers as they try to juggle work and taking care of their own health needs and care of family members. The fed...

Read More
CARES ACT – HOW DO SMALL BUSINESSES GET THEIR PIECE OF $2.2 TRILLION Mar31

CARES ACT – HOW DO SMALL BUSINESSES GET THEIR PIECE OF $2.2 TRILLION

In a historic piece of legislation the Coronavirus Aid, Relief, and Economic Security Act (“CARES Act”) was put into law to help combat the economic havoc that Coronavirus is doing to the economy. The CARES Act provides $2.2 trillion in economic aid to individuals, and businesses of all sizes. The question for small business owne...

Read More