Tax strategies

Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, D-Nev., has introduced a bill to extend the Bush tax cuts and unemployment benefits.

House Democrats met Thursday and overwhelmingly voted to block the Bush tax cut extension compromise announced earlier in the week by President Obama and Republican congressional leaders.

President Obama’s announcement on Monday of a compromise agreement with the Republican leadership should bring some end-of-year certainty to the tax landscape, but questions remain.

Edward S. Karl, vice president of taxation for the American Institute of CPAs, will host the U.S. Small Business Administration’s year-end tax-planning Web chat on Thursday.

President Obama held a news conference in which he sought to quell criticism from lawmakers from his own party of the deal he had struck with Republicans to preserve the Bush tax cuts even for upper-income earners for two more years.

Despite confusion created by recent and probable year-end tax legislation changes, the 2010 federal income tax environment is still quite favorable.

CCH, a Wolters Kluwer business, has entered into a partnership with Comtax, a provider of international tax planning software, to offer the Comtax System, which helps tax professionals reduce the tax costs of cross-border transactions.

The Senate failed on Saturday to overcome Republican-led opposition to two bills extending the Bush-era tax cuts to taxpayers making less than $250,000 and $1 million a year, prompting leaders to talk Sunday of progress toward a deal extending tax cuts for people at all income levels on a temporary basis, along with unemployment benefits.

Senate Finance Committee Chairman Max Baucus, D-Mont., has introduced a package of tax cuts for middle-class families after the House passed tax cut legislation Thursday extending the Bush-era tax rates.

House Democrats passed a tax cut package on Thursday aimed at extending the Bush-era tax cuts for taxpayers who earn below $250,000, but the prospects for passage in the Senate will depend on the deal worked out by a bipartisan group of four lawmakers and two Obama administration officials.

House Ways and Means Committee Chairman Sander Levin, D-Mich., introduced legislation Wednesday that would extend the Bush-era tax cuts only for those making less than $250,000 a year, and provide a two-year AMT patch.

One promising sign of President Obama’s meeting with congressional leaders Tuesday was that he didn’t emerge with his lip bleeding from a fresh elbow jab in the face.

The Senate voted Monday evening on a competing pair of amendments to repeal the expanded 1099 information reporting requirements that were included in the health care reform bill, but failed for the second time this fall to roll back the controversial requirements.

California’s Franchise Tax Board said it would no longer directly mail tax booklets to taxpayers in the Golden State, as more taxpayers and preparers migrate to electronic filing.

A group of 45 millionaires has signed a letter to President Obama urging him to allow the Bush tax cuts to expire for those earning over $1 million a year.

Warren Buffett said that wealthy people should be paying “a lot more” money in taxes, and that the Bush tax cuts should expire for “people at the high end.”

As 2010 winds to a close, tax and accounting information and software provider CCH, a Wolters Kluwer business, has released a short list of four tax-planning moves for companies to make the most of current federal tax laws.

The Internal Revenue Service failed to ensure that only eligible taxpayers received education credit tax relief that was only supposed to be available to taxpayers in Midwestern disaster areas, according to a new government report.

Continued growth in the do-it-yourself tax prep market, ongoing federal and state e-filing mandates and the Internal Revenue Service's discontinuation of a debt indicator to facilitate refund anticipation loans will affect both preparers and their software providers during next year's filing season.

Where the tax burden falls