Guest Article

“Two men showed up saying they were from the IRS because I hadn’t paid my taxes. It scared me to death. Am I going to jail? Can they do that? I’m scared.” That is what the taxpayer blurted out as soon as I answered my business phone. Now before you say, “Timalyn, no way!” Yes, way! This was February 2020 when the world was still open, and the IRS was wide awake. Revenue officers were still on the phone making calls and showing up to businesses. Since the pandemic, many taxpayers, business owners included, have become lax in taking care of their tax obligations. This is due not only to many small and micro businesses still struggling financially, but also because the IRS has not been as aggressive the past few years. Business owners with employees are in a far more dangerous position if they have not kept up with their taxes. That’s why we’re going to look at one of the worst types of taxes to get behind on, payroll taxes. One of my mentors even refers to them as the “kiss of death” to business owners. The penalties for not paying payroll taxes can bury and put the nail in the coffin of most small businesses. Let me show you how these taxes can be the grim reaper. Let’s start from the top with what payroll taxes are and how the payroll tax penalties work.

Have you ever gone into a dealership to purchase a car? It’s been a while for me, but one of the things that keeps me from vehicle shopping is just how difficult it is to ascertain the actual price of the vehicle. The salesperson wants to run a credit check and then talk to you about how much payment you can afford. They want to factor rebates and trade-in value of your existing vehicle to the payment they quote you without ever telling you what you are paying for the car. The entire negotiation often becomes about the monthly payment (regardless of the term of the loan) rather than the car’s price. Indeed, personal finance websites almost always recommend negotiating the three aspects of your car purchase separately: the vehicle’s price, the trade-in amount for your vehicle, and the financing. Otherwise, you run the risk of both buying more car than you can afford and being upside down in the loan (owing more on the vehicle than the vehicle is worth) shortly after you make the purchase. What does this have to do with the expansion of the Residential Clean Energy Credit, you ask? More than you might think. My husband, after talking to a neighbor, recently decided to start shopping for solar panel systems with the idea of saving money on (or largely eliminating) our monthly power bills. What followed was a crash course in residential solar energy sales and the associated economics.

Section 183, which limits or entirely eliminates deductions attributable to activities not entered into for profit, may be coming in for more attention from an invigorated IRS. Section 183 is commonly referred to, not without reason, as the hobby loss rule. Based on my extensive study of the case law, I believe that practitioners widely misunderstand 183. I have noted cases where taxpayers had not gotten a heads up from their adviser. More commonly there is a misunderstanding of 183(d), a presumption in favor of taxpayers that is rarely relevant at all, but which the agency can never use against them. Most important is the failure to appreciate that it is the objective of making a profit not the expectation that is necessary. With that in mind here are the most recent developments...

“I’m going to get a pedicure later,” my wife said to me one Saturday morning. I quickly replied, “You should start an OnlyFans so you can deduct it.” (Everything has a tax angle when you’re married to a tax person.) “Is that really a thing?” she inquired. “Well…” I said, “It depends...” (Nothing is certain when you’re married to a tax person.) “...ordinarily I would say no, but in this case, it might be necessary.” (Everything is a tax pun when you’re married to a tax person.) In the “post” covid era, many taxpayers have turned to the gig economy. (Aside from the number of companies paying workers as contractors when they should actually be employees, but that’s a different topic for a different time.) Many of these gig workers are new to being self- employed and wonder what exactly they can “write off.”

Sometimes my mind is not the safest place to be. I mean face it, a few issues ago I wrote on best practices for doing Al Capone’s tax returns. But how did I even get started thinking about the taxability of a business dealing in black market organs? Well, it started when someone on social media (perhaps looking to supplement the income from their tax practice) asked if the gain on selling a kidney was taxable and, if so, what would be the seller’s basis in the organ? Then there was that time I was having dinner and adult beverages with some tax colleagues in Las Vegas, and we started talking about that old urban legend about waking up in a bathtub full of ice missing a kidney. It was a fun night, and we all woke up with all of our kidneys and other organs in place. Nevertheless, I found myself wondering (and continuing to wonder) about the tax consequences of transacting in human body parts—one’s own or those illegally harvested from others. Turns out, there have been some court cases on the topic which means that the discussion is more than merely theoretical.

"I knew he was a crook when I married him." Come again? And you still married him? That's what I said in my head as it took every muscle in my face to keep my forehead from scowling. But instead, I said, "What do you mean?" "We always had good money and nice things, but we never paid taxes. I always owed when I was single. But when we got married, I stopped working and we never owed." Let me take a moment to rewind and get you up to speed. This taxpayer, let's call her Mrs. Bonnie for the purposes of this story, reached out because she needed to file last year's tax return. She was recently widowed, and her husband typically handled the tax filing. So, she was already feeling overwhelmed and lost when it happened. She went to the mailbox and pulled out mail from the IRS. It was a CP3219A , notifying her that credits claimed on a previous tax return were being disallowed by the IRS. Not only did she owe taxes, but she also owed accuracy related penalties. She only had 90 days to respond if she disagreed and didn't know what to do. When she reached out to me, she inquired about whether I could review previous year returns. Mrs. Bonnie wanted to make sure that they were "done right". This isn't a strange request. I told her that I would review the prior year to have a baseline and if I saw anything fishy, I'd bring it to her attention and perhaps look at another year. I didn't even make it to the signatures before the fishiness leaped off the page. I set up a meeting with her via Zoom to review my findings. As I begin to ask about some of the credits claimed and her husband's business her answers did not match what was on the return. That's when she let me know that she knew her husband, Mr. Clyde, was a crook when she married him. Mrs. Bonnie didn't know much about taxes, but she did a bit of research. She read about something called Innocent Spouse Relief and thought she may be eligible. Let's look at what Innocent Spouse Relief is and why Mrs. Bonnie was not eligible, but your client may be.

A recently filed lawsuit against CohnReznick opens a window into a niche form of tax practice – compliance and planning around the Low-Income Housing Tax Credit . The case highlights a current controversy between investors seeking returns and not-for-profits seeking to insure continued affordability and their own interests to be just a bit cynical. We get to discuss some obscure tax issues and reflect on the question of who it is that is actually your client.

The story of Scott M. Hoensheid’s charitable planning gone awry as related by Judge Joseph W. Nega of the United States Tax Court is an interesting one. Click here to continue reading…