brave new world

[jainen]

There are a couple of nasty new penalties in the Small Business and Work Opportunity Tax Act of 2007 that Congress passed this morning. (The president is expected to sign it.)

Preparers will now risk a much larger hit for taking an unreasonable position, even if they didn't actually know (but "should have known") about the position. The standard for unreasonable is not the 1-out-of-3 that Circular 230 prescribes, but "more likely than not." And the new penalty applies to any tax return, not just income tax.

The substantial underpayment penalty also has a major upgrade. No longer is it only based on whether there is an actual tax deficiency. If the IRS doesn't like it, just filing the return itself can trigger a 20%/$5000 penalty even when you overpaid and get a refund! "Reasonable cause" is not an acceptable excuse anymore either.

Welcome to the brave new world.

[Gretel]

Isn't there anything our professional organizations can do about this. This kind of puts a final stamp on tax return preparers: Underground agents for the IRS. It's outrageous.

I can see that they need to weed out bad preparers, but if you did your best there needs to be some reason. I would fight this through the courts.

[OldJack]

Preparers will now risk a much larger hit for taking an unreasonable position, even if they didn't actually know (but "should have known") about the position.

What about the unreasonable position of the IRS? Did the politicians include something for the outrageous IRS tax positions especially at the auditor level?

[jainen]

Au contraire

>>Underground agents for the IRS<<

Au contraire, mon cherie. The clients need us now more than ever. Only someone with a strong command of the code and rulings can protect them from this arbitrary power.

[George Boutwell]

Preparers will now risk a much larger hit for taking an unreasonable position, even if they didn't actually know (but "should have known") about the position.

The key word here is not UNREASONABLE, but UNDISCLOSED. Any penalties can be avoided simply by pointing it out on the return. If this is really such a big problem, the surge in disclosures would either keep the IRS auditors from doing anything else; or turn out to be just another stack of forms that no one reads.

I'm more interested in the part of the law that extends the Kiddie Tax to students up to age 24 who qualify as dependents.

[jainen]

the Big Whoop

>>Did the politicians include something for the outrageous IRS tax positions<<

That's the Big Whoop, isn't it? Over the last several years the government has done big and little things to steal our freedoms, impose its arbitrary power, and prevent us from appealing.

This is the only reason I tolerate gun lobby arguments, remembering that the original reason for the second amendment was not to protect ourselves from criminals, but from the government.

[George Boutwell]

remembering that the original reason for the second amendment was not to protect ourselves from criminals, but from the government.

The original reason for the well-regulated militia was to kill the Native Americans who had the audacity to protest the dispossession of their lands. Still, in Virginia only about 25% of the militia members (all males, who were drafted at 16) owned firearms. Then the Continental army would requisition them because they didn't have many, either. That's what the Second Amendment meant to prohibit. The tradition continues today, when local police departments have better equipment than many of the troops serving overseas.

[OldJack]

>>The tradition continues today, when local police departments have better equipment than many of the troops serving overseas.<<

The reason local police have such good equipment is that they grab property from citizens without valid cause or court authority. Don't get me wrong, I have never used drugs and don't know anyone that does, but the drug seizer program seems unconstitutional to me.

Just because a known drug user has money in his pocket doesn't give the police the right to take his vehicle for the chief of police to drive to and from work. But that is how it works.

[newbie]

>>The tradition continues today, when local police departments have better equipment than many of the troops serving overseas.<<

The reason local police have such good equipment is that they grab property from citizens without valid cause or court authority. Don't get me wrong, I have never used drugs and don't know anyone that does, but the drug seizer program seems unconstitutional to me.

Just because a known drug user has money in his pocket doesn't give the police the right to take his vehicle for the chief of police to drive to and from work. But that is how it works.

You're not serious are you?

[dsi]

As it has already been pointed out, OUR FREEDOMS HAVE SLOWLY BEEN DISAPPEARING over the years. One day they will all be gone.

[George Boutwell]

Just because a known drug user has money in his pocket doesn't give the police the right to take his vehicle for the chief of police to drive to and from work. But that is how it works.

Back in the days before IRS figured out that District Directors were expendable, we had one who liked to drive around in expensive cars seized in "immediate assessment" cases (usually drug dealers who, if found with $1,000 in contraband, were assumed to make $365,000 a year).

[TaxBird]

As it has already been pointed out, OUR FREEDOMS HAVE SLOWLY BEEN DISAPPEARING over the years. One day they will all be gone.

After the elimination of habeas corpus, what of any consequence do we have left?

[jainen]

habeas corpus

>>the elimination of habeas corpus<<

[deleted] Deep in your heart you know that our government only loves freedom and would NEVER seize an American citizen in a public place in America, without charging him with any crime, hold him for years in isolation, no witnessses or evidence, not even a lawyer or a friend, and torture him into insanity because he won't confess to things we already know he had no involvement in.

[veritas]

The original reason for the well-regulated militia was to kill the Native Americans who had the audacity to protest the dispossession of their lands. Still, in Virginia only about 25% of the militia members (all males, who were drafted at 16) owned firearms. Then the Continental army would requisition them because they didn't have many, either. That's what the Second Amendment meant to prohibit. The tradition continues today, when local police departments have better equipment than many of the troops serving overseas.

Really?

Who said this?

"Certainly one of the chief guarantees of freedom under any government, no matter how popular and respected, is the right of citizens to keep and bear arms ... The right of citizens to bear arms is just one guarantee against arbitrary government, one more safeguard, against the tyranny which now appears remote in America but which historically has proven to be always possible."

[George Boutwell]

After the elimination of habeas corpus, what of any consequence do we have left?

Well, since Lincoln did that more than 150 years ago, what's new?