Fido Deduction

Yes, you read it right. The US Congress is currently considering a Pet Car Expense Deduction to be added to the 2010 tax return.

The deduction would be for up to $3,500 of pet care expenses including veterinary care. The bill was introduced back in July of 2009 and has apparently stalled there with the great Health Care debate, but the bill's sponsors believe it has a good chance of passing.

While I am all for getting more of our tax dollars back, I fear the regulatory requirements that the IRS would impose to make this a possibility. Not to mention the massive amount of fraud that will surely come with it.

Health Care reality check

Now that it has passed, the facts of the Senate Health Care Bill, are available for all to read at the Library of Congress at http://thomas.loc.gov/, all 2,000 plus pages. You can also go to our website newsletter at http://www.harringtontax.biz/news and read our synopses of the relevant tax issues in the bill.

First of all, I'm disgusted with the facts of this legislation. The payoffs, earmarks, and closed-door deals that were made to get this thing through with a straight party line vote of 60-39. The Democrats who have argued for the justification of the earmarks and deals give "well the Republicans have done it too" as their logic. This is the reason that the Republicans were voted out of office and lost control of the Senate and House. Hopefully voters will remind the Democrats of this in the upcoming elections.

These same politicians said, "we want everyone to have health insurance". Really? Then why would they put legislation in this bill that penalizes wealthy people for buying good insurance and penalizes businesses for providing good insurance to their employees. But if a business doesn't provide insurance they get a smaller penalty, which is cheaper than providing the insurance. In addition, this bill imposes new penalties on non-profit hospitals who are already trying to help those in need, and creates 150,000 new government jobs in 132 new government agencies.

I fail to see how any of this will be good for the US?

While I personally believe there will be "Death Panels" deciding our health care needs, and that our quality of health care will go down the drain because there is no tort reform or any measures to encourage doctors either to continue or begin their practice, I have to give the politicians credit for one thing...they're actually working. Even if it is, in my opinion, "Bad Medicine".

Federal Withholding Repeal a Great Idea!

As a self employed person for the last 20+ years I have said that everyone should have to pay their income tax by check at the end of the year and NOT have it withheld from their paycheck.

The problem is, no-one really pays attention to what's being taken out. Yeah, it stinks when you get your paycheck and you see all that money going to the Federal Government, but you don't really feel the pain until you end up short when you file your taxes and have to write a check. Then everyone screams, cusses and calls the government and sometimes me, names.

Business owners write that check every quarter. We don't have someone withholding it for us. We actually have to sit down, calculate the dollar amount, and after we kick a few dogs, beat our fists against a wall and scream for half an hour, we write the lousy check! It stinks, and that is the nicest way I can put it.

In reality, businesses have to do this for employees monthly and for themselves every quarter. The time and expense is tremendous! The amount of hours wasted by employers calculating income tax withholding, workman's compensation and sales tax is staggering. If I or other business owners could have that time back to produce income, I believe that the US economy would serge, as we would have the time to produce more goods and services, income and employ more people.

House Bill, HR-1919 was introduced back in April of this year, repealing the Federal Withholding requirement. This proposed bill gives the taxpayer the option to have or not have their income tax withheld by their employer.

This bill, in my opinion is genius!

I believe it would do a number of things.

1) It would put more money in each taxpayers pocket every paycheck.

2) Limits the Federal Governments "overspending", as they wouldn't get the money until April.

3) Drastically reduces the amount of money and time wasted by business owners to report these earnings.

4) Finally cause so many people to pay attention to what they're paying in taxes as to cause a national outcry to reduce spending and thus the actual income tax.

The link to the Library of Congress website is http://thomas.loc.gov/, if you would like to check out the text of the bill for yourself.

The reality is that this bill will probably never pass. Unfortunately, the things I listed above are the exact reasons why most politicians would hate this bill. It's bad for their pet projects as they would have less of our money to play with. Which is why I support it.

Bryon Harrington

Is there really a Gun Tax?

I have received several emails regarding a supposed Gun Tax being introduced or that was secretly passed by Congress or the Senate. Based on the research I have done, this is partly true and mostly false.

Here are the facts:

The supposed Senate bill SB-2099, imposing an Income Tax on Guns, does not exist. There is a bill S-2099, which refers to installing windshield heater in electric government vehicles.

I have been informed by multiple conspiracy theorists that there is a Senate bill that imposed a "Gun Tax" on the 2009 income tax return. THIS IS FALSE. I have researched the bills and legislation and there is NO provision that I can find for claiming your guns on the 2009 tax return. This in essence, as claimed by some would constitute a national gun registration and listing. This would indeed be a bad thing, in my opinion.

There is in fact a House Bill HR-45 which is a National Gun Registry and Sales Tax bill. According to most Congressmen I have talked to, this bill is "Dead on Arrival", but you never know. This is an evil bill and I strongly oppose it as it creates a national database of gun owners, the first step to taking them away.

This bill, in my opinion, imposes several violations of rights, first the registration of store and privately purchased firearms, then a child safety requirement which results in jail time for offenders, and then a undue search of businesses who possess, sell or use firearms and finally a national sales tax on firearms.

The tax proposed is a national sales tax on firearms, which is possibly the only good thing about the bill. I know, I know, you're all screaming "WHAT!!" Think about this, when the tobacco taxes were imposed many of us screamed and I still do with my cigar habit, but I have no fear of them ever outlawing tobacco. Why, you ask? Because politicians now rely on that money to achieve all their little pet projects. Thus, a national gun sales tax would simply insure gun sales.

Lastly, in my research I have discovered a little known House Bill HR-2202, which would be a credit for gun owners to purchase Gun Safes and Cabinets. I see this bill as a trick to get gun owners to register their guns. Yes, I know everyone who buys a gun today is registered, but there is a vast population of "Private Purchase Gun Owners", who could be suckered into this law.

The link the the Library of Congress website to read the text of this legislation is http://thomas.loc.gov/.

My conclusion to all this, I oppose the House Bills HR-45 and HR-2202.

Bryon Harrington

The Beginning!

This is our first post to this blog where we intend to voice our opinion based on the facts of tax and accounting laws as they change daily and are proposed to be changed by lawmakers.

Every day something happens concerning tax laws, either federal or state that will affect the citizens of this country. People need to know the truth. We intend to state the facts here and give you the links to look it up and verify those facts.

While we are admittedly conservative in our views, we will tell you the facts no matter who it hurts politically, conservative or liberal. We believe in less government control and involvement in our businesses and daily lives, but we also believe there are some necessary taxes and those taxes should be equal and fair.

We hope you will continue to follow along with our blog and we will strive to be fair and current.