Tax practice

The taxation of damages is a nightmare for taxpayers.

Thomson Reuters has released a new special report on year-end tax planning for 2013 for individuals and businesses.

Taxpayer data is vulnerable to inappropriate use, modification or disclosure, perhaps without being detected, according to a new government report that found problems with the Internal Revenue Service’s technology for configuration management and identity and access management.

The American Institute of CPAs has written a letter to the Internal Revenue Service identifying 17 areas in which the IRS should provide additional guidance to tax practitioners and taxpayers in the wake of the Supreme Court’s decision ruling section 3 of the Defense of Marriage Act unconstitutional.

Rep. Mike Thompson, D-Calif., a senior member of the tax-writing House Ways and Means Committee, has introduced legislation to expand the New Markets Tax Credit program to provide up to $100 million a year to help distressed communities whose military installations have been either closed or realigned.

On Sept. 13, 2013, two years after the 2011 temporary and proposed regulations, the Internal Revenue Service issued final and reproposed tangible property regs. There are a number of differences between the final and reproposed regulations as compared to the 2011 regs, with a stated goal of simplifying and clarifying them and making them more administrable.

A roundup of tax-related news

More and more companies are coming under scrutiny from tax authorities

Will implementation of the Affordable Care Act be a permanent burden on the Internal Revenue Service, an organization already strapped for cash? And how will it affect preparers and taxpayers?

Approximately 8,400 federal employees and contractors who were judged eligible for a security clearance from April 2006 to December 2011 owed approximately $85 million in unpaid federal taxes as of June 2012, according to a new government report.

It’s the time of year to again start thinking about expiring tax provisions. Usually the first thing that comes to mind is the alternative minimum tax, but this particular issue was “fixed” in January of this year by the fiscal cliff bill. That still leaves a number of expiring provisions, according to Robert Kerr, senior director of government relations at the National Association of Enrolled Agents.

The Treasury Department and the Internal Revenue Service have loosened the “use it or lose it” rule for flexible spending arrangements for health care, allowing participants in health benefit plan to carry over up to $500 from their FSA from year to year.

The IRS is warning consumers about a "sophisticated" phone scam targeting taxpayers, including recent immigrants, nationwide.

The Internal Revenue Service released the annual cost-of-living adjustments Thursday affecting dollar limitations for pension plans and other retirement-related items for tax year 2014, allowing taxpayers to contribute up to $17,500 to their 401(k) plans in 2014.

The Internal Revenue Service issued its annual inflation adjustments for more than 40 tax provisions, including the tax rate schedules, and other tax changes for 2014.

With the government shutdown having recently tested the preparedness of the Internal Revenue Service to deal with sudden downtime, a new report finds the agency needs to make improvements to ensure that timely resumption of critical business processes occurs after an emergency.

A pair of lawmakers have introduced legislation to simplify the Tax Code to enable families to more easily afford the cost of higher education.

The IRS has begun accepting applications and renewals of the Preparer Tax Identification Numbers required of professional tax preparers.

A measure that would put the brakes on the Department of Labor's proposal to establish a fiduciary standard for advisors to retirement plans was approved by the U.S. House of Representatives in a largely party-line vote on Tuesday.

Caesars Entertainment Corp. was cited by the Internal Revenue Service for Bank Secrecy Act violations, according to a letter from U.S. investigators notifying the company of a money-laundering probe.