Author: tonynova
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Who is responsible when the payroll service screws up?
A new legal case might give some insight to responsibility for compliance with the maze of federal, state and local laws controlling electronic banking and payroll transactions Most small businesses that pay employees or contractors use a third-party payroll accounting service to handle the required record-keeping and tax payment transactions. These services are inexpensive, typically…
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The shrinking middle class
Pew Research Center published this graph that shows how the portion of people in the middle class has shrunk from 60% to 50% of all Americans over the past 25 years. The calculation defined middle class as someone with a total household income ranging from $41,900 to $125,600 for a three-person household in 2014. Source: http://money.cnn.com/2015/12/09/news/economy/middle-class/index.html
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Shocking number of depressed and alcoholic attorneys
A shocking research report in the February 2016 issue of Journal of Addictive Medicine reports that lawyers in the U.S. have a rate of alcoholism and depression three times higher than the overall population. 1 in 5 attorneys would meet the traditional definition of “alcoholic” and 28% self-report that they are suffering from depression. The report was…
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What the stock market did while you were out
In case anyone has not noticed, the stock market’s performance stalled a year ago after 6 years of almost straight line growth. We hit bottom in the ‘great recession’ in 2009 and and then values tripled over the next six years. Since last January we’ve lost value. The overall long term return on investment for…
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Preview of “The Road to Little Dribbling: Adventures of an American in Britain”
A friend asked if would recommend reading Bill Bryson’s new book The Road to Little Dribbling: Adventures of an American in Britain. Actually I’m just at the beginning of reading it so I answered the question from a different perspective. What is the book about? Getting old, travel in England and the devastating indirect effects of…
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Control the cost of divorce with peaceful resolution techniques
A checklist of financial planning issues to consider in collaborative divorce Divorce is expensive and almost always a losing proposition for both parties from a financial perspective. Financial stress during the marriage is increasingly cited as one of the reasons that married couples seek a divorce. An expensive divorce only makes this problem worse. During…
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Debunking the myths of peaceful divorce strategies
Many of the widely read articles in popular media or financial industry publications that discuss alternate divorce resolution strategies1 focus primarily on the limitations of each of these methods. The articles are often written by attorneys and so the focus on disparagement might be considered to be unbalanced or self-serving for the profession. Certainly it…
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Eight common financial mistakes in a divorce
The names in these examples are not real but are used to reinforce the point that the stories are taken from real life divorce. The examples were originally developed for use in study materials for an adult education program in financial planning at Delaware Valley University in the early 1990s. Over the years I have…
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Financial coaching during a divorce
Divorce is a significant financial event. The national average cost of divorce likely exceeds $20,000 but for couples who own a business or other substantial assets the cost can be many times larger. The real cost of divorce is not limited to the legal fees but spills over into otherwise avoidable tax liability and poor…
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Reviewing income tax returns for accuracy and opportunity
Reviewing income tax returns for accuracy is valuable because it can avoid processing delays, prevent errors that would cause audits and trigger penalties. There is a second potentially more valuable reason to review a tax return. and uncover opportunities for tax planning to reduce tax burdens in the future. Many accountants, including myself, offer a…