Tax News

Withholding from employees’ paychecks—income taxes and FICA—is referred to as trust fund taxes because the employer is holding them in trust for employees until deposited with the U.S. Treasury....

Estates of decedents that have not used up their exemption amount ($12.06 million for decedents dying in 2022) may make a portability election, called the deceased spousal unused exclusion (DSUE). To ...

The National Taxpayer Advocate Erin M. Collins released to Congress a mid-year report noting the good things and the bad things about IRS activities as well as to make recommendations for improvement ...

The IRS has been using various technologies to improve customer service, one of which is voice bots. To date, voice bots have answered over 3 million taxpayer calls. Now taxpayers can use voice bots t...

If you have an outstanding demand loan with an interest rate that’s below the applicable federal rate (AFR), you have interest income if you’re the lender or interest expense if you’re the borro...

Due to the spike in the price of gasoline used by vehicles, the IRS increased its standard mileage rate to 62.5 cents per mile for business driving from July 1 through December 31, 2022 (up from 58.5 ...

A spouse who was subject to abuse and physical intimidation by her former husband was entitled to equitable innocent spouse relief (Jan Pocock, TC Memo 2022-55). She met the conditions for a streamlin...

The IRS released data on 2020 individual income tax returns (Spring 2022 Statistics of Income Bulletin). There were 164.2 million Forms 1040 and 1040-SR filed for 2020, up from 159.7 million in the pr...

Each year, the IRS releases a list of tax scams as a warning to taxpayers to beware. This year’s list has many of the same scams reported in previous years. There are some new additions (IR-2022-113...

Between 1981 and 2002, an individual took out a series of federal student loans to finance his education. As of December 5, 2018, they were in default in an amount exceeding $170,000. He was informed ...

You can check the status of a tax refund on the IRS website using the tool called Where’s My Refund? It shows when your return has been received, when the refund has been approved, and when it has b...

The IRS interest rates on overpayments and underpayments for the third quarter of 2022 are one percentage point higher than in the second quarter (Rev. Rul. 2022-11). This is the second interest rate ...

Employers may have leave-based donation programs in which employees can choose to donate their unused leave time—vacation, sick, and personal days—for the use of other employees who’ve run out o...

Those with divorces or legal separation agreements finalized before 2019 are subject to old alimony rules. These rules allow payors to deduct payments, while recipients must report the payments as inc...

An offer in compromise (OIC) is an agreement between a taxpayer and the IRS that settles a taxpayer’s tax liabilities for less than the full amount owed. Taxpayers who can fully pay the liabilities ...

The IRS announced next year’s contribution limits for health savings accounts (HSAs), as well as requirements for high-deductible health plans (HDHPs) to which HSAs must be linked (Rev. Proc. 2022-2...

New York, Connecticut, Maryland, and New Jersey had challenged the constitutionality of the $10,000 cap on the itemized deduction for state and local income or sales taxes and property taxes. The stat...

An IRA owner named himself as beneficiary of his account. When he died, the account went into his estate of which his surviving spouse was the sole heir and sole administrator. She wanted to roll over...

A couple who bought a home in 2005 moved from it in 2009 due to one spouse’s medical condition. They rented out the home until it was sold in 2015, but the couple didn’t reside in the home at any ...

The IRS indicated in an informal ruling that costs incurred for health and wellness coaching under a health savings account, flexible spending account, or other tax-preferred account could be a qualif...