How Education Tax Credits Can Help You Get To College!

Many students are scared away from pursuing postsecondary education by the perception that they cannot afford it. It is important to know that the federal government is currently offering two different types of tax credits – The American Opportunity Credit and the Lifetime Learning Credit – that may help you to offset high education costs. Both of the available education tax credits pay for eligible expenses up to a given amount, including tuition, books and equipment or material fees.

The Lifetime Learning Credit is also good for up to $2,000 in credit each year, and covers not only degree-seeking students, … Read the rest

Obama’s Purposed Tax Reform May Have Holes

Timothy Geithner, the Treasury Secretary, has presented Obama’s current plan for overhauling business taxes today. This plan includes eliminating loopholes and a reduction in tax rates by up to 28%. Critics, however, state this is not low enough.

Plans are also in the works to instate a minimum tax on foreign earnings, but no details have yet been given.

Geithner went on to say that the main goal of the Obama tax reform plan is to “restore a system” which allows American businesses to succeed or fail based on the services they provide or products they make, not on … Read the rest

Payroll Tax Cut Can Hurt Social Security

Payroll tax cut undermines the security of the Social Security Program

If lawmakers see Social Security as just one of the line items in the federal budget, there is not much to stop it from being caught up in an orgy of spending reductions.

When an economic agreement was reached in Congress recently which extended unemployment insurance, the Social Security payroll tax cut and retained present levels of reimbursement for doctors who accept Medicare, the response by many was a resounding “Hurrah.”

The perception was that Congress finally did something important with less posturing and brinkmanship and not quite as … Read the rest

How To Get The Most From Turbo Tax

People are wondering for 2012 tax season how they can get the most tax refund. The filing deadline is April 17. Even though, we are a few months away from submitting returns, getting yearly spending together might be haunting the mind.

Turbo tax is the best-selling tax software that offers a step-by-step guide on how to file your tax return to get the maximum refund at a low price.  Do not pay a high price to the tax office and still wonder if your savings were maximized.

To receive the highest refund, we should choose the cheapest and best option … Read the rest

Budget Seeks To Boost Tax Revenue

President Obama wants to adopt an idea put forth by Warren Buffet to raise tax revenue. The Buffet rule, as it is called, would target the wealthiest Americans for more taxes.

The White House is also proposing a higher tax on the oil and gas industry, fund managers and private estates. At the same time he would let the tax cuts to the wealthy from the Bush years expire. A further measure would raise dividend taxes on wealthy investors to the same level as ordinary income tax.

These tax proposals are part of his overall budget plan, which sets the … Read the rest

5 Reasons You Should Hire a CPA This Tax Season

Are you one of those do-it-yourselfers who believes it is always better to know than it is to pay someone else who knows? If so, it is likely that you also feel that you should be doing your own taxes. After all, how hard can it be? Millions of people do their own taxes. There are even easy-to-use software programs to help them through it. Well, while you may be right that you can do your taxes yourself, what you might not have considered are the reasons for why you might want to pass this job off to a professional. … Read the rest