Posts

IRS Revokes Conservative Group’s Tax-Exempt Status Over Anti-Clinton Statements

/10 Comments/in , /by

Photo Credit: AP

Photo Credit: AP

The Internal Revenue Servicehas revoked the tax-exempt status of a conservative charity for making statements critical of Hillary Rodham Clinton and John Kerry, according to a USA Today report.

The Patrick Henry Center for Individual Liberty, based in Manassas, Va., “has shown a pattern of deliberate and consistent intervention in political campaigns” and made “repeated statements supporting or opposing various candidates by expressing its opinion of the respective candidate’s character and qualifications,” according to a written determination released Friday by the IRS.

The IRS said the center acted as an “action organization” by publishing alerts on its website for columns written by its president, former FBI agent Gary Aldrich, the Washington Free Beacon reported.

The IRS pointed out a column that appeared to be published by Townhall on April 2, 2004, in which Mr. Aldrich wrote, “if John Kerry promises otherwise ill-informed swing-voters lower gas prices at the pump, more than a few greedy, registered ignoramuses will follow him anywhere,” the Free Beacon reported.

Read more from this story HERE.

Government Suspends Controversial Program to Recover Money from Adult Children of Dead Taxpayers

/3 Comments/in , /by

Photo Credit: AP

Photo Credit: AP

The Social Security Administration announced Monday it is suspending a controversial program that goes after adult children of deceased taxpayers who the government claims were recipients of overpayments more than a decade ago.

Acting Social Security Commissioner Carolyn W. Colvin said she has directed an immediate halt to the three-year-old program while the agency does a review. The controversial program seized tax refunds in an effort to recoup the funds.

The move to halt the program came after many of the recipients and members of Congress complained to the federal agency.

“While this policy of seizing tax refunds to repay decades-old Social Security overpayments might be allowed under the law, it is entirely unjust,” Democratic Sens. Senators Barbara Boxer of California and Barbara Mikulski of Maryland said in a letter to Colvin.

After Colvin’s announcement, Boxer said in a statement: “I am grateful that the Social Security Administration has chosen not to penalize innocent Americans while the agency determines a fair path forward on how to handle past errors.”

Read more from this story HERE.

Obamacare Taxes Add BILLIONS to Rising Premiums

/1 Comment/in , /by

Photo Credit: REUTERS / Kevin Lamarque

Photo Credit: REUTERS / Kevin Lamarque

On top of rising premiums, Obamacare taxes are adding hundreds of dollars per year onto customers’ costs, according to new study from the American Action Forum.

Those who braved the health-care law’s exchanges will have to pay an extra $354 on average in 2014, reports the free-market D.C.-based think tank, just due to seven taxes included in Obamacare.

The vast majority of the country covered by employer-sponsored health insurance will be forced to pay a somewhat lower tab of $196 to cover the taxes. Those with self-funded employer-sponsored insurance are exempt from several of the largest culprits and will have the lowest added cost at $94 in 2014, which will drop to $59 by 2016.

One is aimed at the insurance companies, forcing them to pay the federal government for the privilege of selling health insurance — an ironic touch for a law meant to make health coverage cheaper. AAF estimates that this tax alone, which will be passed onto consumers, will cost an extra $101 in 2014; in 2015 and 2016, it’ll be increased to $143 on average as the federal government ups their funding requests every year.

In 2014, the total tax will amount to $8 billion; in 2015 and 2016, it’ll be $11.3 billion, and the current plan comes it at $14.3 billion in 2018.

Read more from this story HERE.

Senate Report Claims Caterpillar Avoided $2.4bn in US Taxes

/1 Comment/in , /by

Photo Credit: Eric Vidal /Reuters

Photo Credit: Eric Vidal /Reuters

One of the world’s biggest manufacturing companies diverted more than $8bn in profits to Switzerland in order to avoid US taxes, according to investigators working for the Senate.

Caterpillar, the world’s largest maker of construction and mining equipment, allegedly avoided paying more than $2.4bn in US taxes over a decade by striking a deal with Swiss tax authorities to pay as little as 4% on the profits from its lucrative international spare parts business through a Geneva-based subsidiary.

Though the practice of basing such subsidiaries offshore is widespread among multinationals, and Senate investigators refused to say whether they believe the company broke US tax law, the elaborate accounting strategy appears to take so-called ‘transfer pricing’ practices to new extremes.

The report, which was produced by the Senate subcommittee on investigations under chairman Carl Levin, a Michigan Democrat, claims that 85% of Caterpillar’s international profits from selling parts – its most profitable activity – were routed through its Swiss subsidiary, even though the vast majority of associated manufacturing, research and employment remained in the US.

“Caterpillar is an American success story that produces phenomenal industrial machines, but it is also a member of the corporate profit-shifting club that has shifted billions of dollars in profits offshore to avoid paying US taxes,” Levin told reporters in a briefing on Capitol Hill.

Read more from this story HERE.

Tax Revenues Hit Record in First 5 Months of FY14; 5-Month Deficit Still $377B

/2 Comments/in , /by

Photo Credit: APInflation-adjusted federal tax revenues hit a record $1,104,947,000,000 in the first five months of fiscal 2014, but the federal government still ran a $377,379,000,000 deficit during that time, according to the Monthly Treasury Statement for February.

Each month, the Treasury publishes the government’s “total receipts,” including all revenue from individual income taxes, corporate income taxes, social insurance and retirement taxes (including Social Security and Medicare taxes), unemployment insurance taxes, excise taxes, estate and gift taxes, customs duties, and “miscellaneous receipts.”

In constant 2014 dollars, the $1,104,947,000,000 that the federal government collected from October through February in fiscal 2014 was $90,193,750,000 more than the $1,014,753,250,000 it collected in October through February in fiscal 2013.

After the current fiscal year, the second highest federal tax intake in the first five months of a fiscal year occurred in the first five months of fiscal 2007, when the government collected $1,076,721,860,000 in 2014 dollars—or $28,225,140,000 less than in the first five months of this fiscal year.

Read more from this story HERE.

Unlikely GOP Tax Plan the Result of Changing Politics

/2 Comments/in , /by

Photo Credit: AP/J. Scott ApplewhiteThe tax reform plan from Michigan Rep. Dave Camp was unimaginable as a Republican document just a few years ago, the result of a shifting political landscape that has seen the triumph of President Obama’s tax message and the influence of conservative populism.

The House Ways and Means Committee chairman sought a blueprint that was impervious to charges that it would benefit the wealthy and burden the middle class. That was a direct reaction to the beating Republicans took on the issue in the 2012 presidential contest, with Obama’s “fairness” pitch to increase taxes on the so-called wealthy resonating better than GOP nominee Mitt Romney’s traditional Republican proposal for across-the-board cuts to stimulate economic growth.

Breaking with GOP orthodoxy, Camp also wanted a plan that, while lowering tax rates for all income brackets, received a “revenue neutral” score from Congress’ nonpartisan accounting agencies. Camp wanted to avoid potent Democratic attacks that tax cuts increase the deficit and cost Washington money it needs for cherished programs. Republicans had long dismissed the concept of paying for tax cuts on the grounds that they create jobs and boost revenue, while asserting that the government’s money belongs to the people and reducing their tax load shouldn’t require offsets.

Camp’s draft has received perhaps the most attention for proposing to simplify the tax code by scaling back typically politically sacred exemptions, such as the mortgage interest deduction popular with voters and the housing industry. For years, Republicans — including Camp — promoted these carve-outs as crucial economic drivers. But in a nod to the Tea Party’s sway with House Republicans, Camp was liberated to target a host of breaks the conservative grassroots deride as “crony capitalism.”

“We have to recognize the [political] environment we’re in today, and the fiscal circumstances we’re facing, and take all that into account,” said Rep. Charles Boustany, R-La., a senior member of the Ways and Means Committee who had a hand in writing the Camp plan.

Read more this story HERE.

CBO Shows Top 40% Pay More than 100% of Taxes

/1 Comment/in , /by

Photo Credit: Human Events

Photo Credit: Human Events

This article originally appeared on heartland.org.

The Congressional Budget Office has published a study, The Distribution of Household Income and Federal Taxes, 2010, which shows that the top 40 percent of income earners paid 106.2 percent of total federal income taxes, while the bottom 40 percent paid -9.1 percent. This isn’t the study’s headline, so you have to dig a bit to get that information, but look at Table 3 on page 13 of the study to find that information.

The Table shows that the top 20 percent of income earners paid 92.9 percent of total income taxes in 2010 (the latest year available), and the next-highest 20 percent paid 13.3 percent of total income taxes, so the top 40 percent paid 106.2 percent.

Refundable Credits = Negative Tax Liability

Because of refundable tax credits like the earned income tax credit and the child tax credit, the bottom 20 percent got more money refunded to them than they paid in taxes, so they paid -6.2 percent of total taxes. The next-lowest 20 percent paid -2.9 percent, so the bottom 40 percent paid -9.1 percent of total income taxes. More than 9 percent of total income tax payments go toward paying out money directly to people who get more back than they paid in.

Read more from this story HERE.

Palin: Read My Lipstick- No New Taxes

/2 Comments/in , /by

Photo Credit: Breitbart

Photo Credit: Breitbart

No one can argue with the fact that Paul Ryan’s compromise budget bill raises taxes and increases spending. Show me one Republican who got elected on that platform. Spare America the Orwellian word games. If the government is taking money out of your pocket to fund its growing Big Brother operations, it’s a tax. Whether money is taken from you via your phone bill, your airline ticket, or your income, it’s a tax. If politicians can’t be honest about this, it’s time to go home.

The TEA Party’s very acronym stands for “Taxed Enough Already.” We sent these politicians to Congress in an historic landslide election in 2010 with a mandate to stop the runaway spending train bankrupting our nation, not to wave to it from the station or – heaven forbid – increase its speed. And yet, here we are still pretending that there are no real world consequences to running up near trillion dollar deficits year after year with no end in sight.

So, where does this leave us? We can sit back and accept the increased spending “Compromised Plan” with increases in taxes and spending, or we can charge ahead to at least preserve the very modest Sequester cuts American workers already fought for. If we go with the first option, we simply kick the can down the road yet again and wait for the inevitable real world consequences of bankruptcy (see Detroit for an example of what’s in store). Or we can go with the second option and probably get clobbered by the media (so what’s new?!).

Read more from this story HERE.

Large Employers Cite Obamacare ‘Cadillac’ Tax in Reducing Benefits (+video)

/1 Comment/in , /by

Photo Credit: ReutersFor 75 million Americans who get their insurance through large companies, the Affordable Care Act is a mixed bag. Experts tell NBC News the new healthcare law is only slightly increasing premiums next year, but causing some companies with the most generous plans to reduce their employees’ benefits.

Aaron Baker, 36, his wife Billie and their two young children are covered under a generous health insurance plan offered by the private Midwestern university where he’s worked for 10 years. When they opened their benefits notice this year, they were pleased to see their $385 premium is only up by four dollars next year. However, they were shocked to discover that instead of covering the first dollar they spend with no deductible, the Baker’s plan now includes a $1,000 deductible and a $2,500 out of pocket maximum. They also will still have small co-pays for services.

According to the enrollment notice, the changes are “to relieve future health plan trend pressure and to put the university in a position to avoid the excise tax that becomes effective in 2018.” The 40 percent excise tax—often called the “Cadillac tax”— is part of Obamacare and is levied on the most generous health plans. It’s designed to bring down overall health costs by making companies and workers more cost-conscious. The thinking is that if consumers have to pay more expenses themselves, through higher deductibles and out-of-pocket expenses, they’ll avoid unnecessary or overly costly procedures. And that is supposed to make care more affordable for everyone.

Billie Baker doesn’t think much of that concept. “I think that saying that your insurance is too good so we’re going to give you a penalty,” she said, “is sort of outrageous to me.”

Said Aaron, “You would think the government would want employers to offer good health care packages to their employees. It seems like that is not the case.”

Visit NBCNews.com for breaking news, world news, and news about the economy

Read more from this story HERE.

WH Predicts: Tax Revenues Will Cross $3T Mark For First Time in U.S. History in FY ’14– $29,673 Per Full-Time Worker

/1 Comment/in , /by

Photo Credit: AP Photo/Charles DharapakThe latest Monthly Treasury Statement, which was released on Wednesday afternoon, relies on the estimate made by the White House Office of Management and Budget to say that federal tax revenues will top $3 trillion for the first time in the nation’s history in fiscal 2014.

In fact, the record $3,023,004,000,000 in tax revenues that the White House is predicting the federal government will rake in during fiscal 2014 not only exceeds the inflation-adjusted revenue taken in by the government in any previous year, it also equals $29,673 in tax revenue for every full-time worker in the country.

It is also equals $9,534 for every man, woman and child currently living in the country.

Until now, the record-setting year for inflation-adjusted federal tax revenues was fiscal 2007. In that year, the federal government brought in $2,899,644,380,000 in constant 2013 dollars.

If the White House is correct that total federal tax receipts will hit $3,023,004,000,000 in fiscal 2014, that would represent an increase of $123,359,620,000 in constant 2013 dollars over fiscal 2007’s record tax haul of $2,899,644,380,000. Real tax revenues this year, according to the White House estimate, will be 4.25 percent higher than they have ever been.

Read more from this story HERE.