A few steps to take to manage your property tax bill.
With advances in technology, filing and paying your taxes has become as easy as checking email.
You should be diligent when making charitable contributions.
Given how scattered our digital lives have become, it’s important to have a good system for storing and managing your important papers.
You almost have to admire Carl Levin's timing. Amid a furor over politicized IRS tax enforcement, the Michigan Democrat on Tuesday tried to change the subject to a hardy Washington perennial—corporate tax loopholes. Too bad his designated ...
Apple Inc. paid no corporate income tax to any national government on tens of billions of dollars in overseas income over the past four years, Senate investigators found, a revelation that fuels the debate over whether the U.S. tax code ...
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President Obama named one of his budget functionaries, Danny Werfel, as the new acting Internal Revenue Service commissioner Thursday. Given that Mr. Werfel has spent the last year planning the sequester across the executive branch, he's ...
The District of Columbia’s Office of Revenue Analysis reviewed the estimated property, sales, auto and income taxes a family paid in 2011 in the largest city in each state. One of the biggest factors in how much a family can expect to pay ...
Rep. Kevin Brady makes a valiant effort in "Tax Reform Needs Accurate Tax Tables" (op-ed, May 6) to put pro-growth tax rationalization alongside or ahead of tax-progressivity maintenance in the current tax reform debate.
J.J. Zhang is a chemical engineer and amateur financial adviser who was the winner in MarketWatch’s second annual World’s Next Great Investing Columnist contest. He runs the blog MarketTech Reports. You can follow him on Twitter ...
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President Obama's budget, introduced in April, includes proposals to attract private investment in partnership with government for upgrading the nation's infrastructure. As he said in his State of the Union address, "what our businesses ...
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Republican lawmakers in several states are blunting plans by GOP governors to reduce or eliminate income taxes, putting the legislators at odds with figures many in the party see as leading voices on reshaping government.
WASHINGTON (MarketWatch) — Senate Finance Committee Chairman Max Baucus has announced his retirement, and he wants to see Congress pass major tax legislation before he leaves in 2014. Here’s one piece of advice: stay away from a carbon tax.
President Barack Obama and first lady Michelle Obama paid $112,214 in federal income taxes for 2012 on adjusted gross income of $608,611, an effective rate of 18.4%, the White House said.
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The White House took small but important steps toward lawmakers of both parties who favor rewriting the U.S.'s often-criticized tax code.Notably, the budget proposal released Wednesday endorses the idea of revamping both the individual and ...
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For a lot of taxpayers, tax season doesn't end on April 15.Soon after sending off their returns and other documents to the Internal Revenue Service, many people start right back again planning for the next tax season.
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Louisiana Gov. Bobby Jindal said Monday he is shelving a proposal to scrap the state's income tax by 2014 in the face of widespread opposition to the plan.
By now, your tax return for last year has probably been filed, and it’s time to focus on cutting taxes for the rest of this year. So here’s an idea for those running a small business as a sole proprietorship or husband-wife partnership. ...
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The federal budget proposed by President Obama last week differs in details from the budget approved by Senate Democrats in March. But they both assume significantly higher effective tax rates on the wealthiest Americans.
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Finding a cab in Paris is often an ordeal. For years, French taxi unions have bullied the government into maintaining what they consider their most valuable privilege: a strictly limited number of taxi medallions and for-hire vehicle ...
Although 2012 is in your rear-view mirror, it’s not too late to make some moves that will save taxes on Form 1040 and maybe on your state income tax return as well. Here are three possibilities.
If your spouse died last year, it of course affects your 2012 federal income tax return. But there are other tax implications as well. Here are four of the most important things to know.
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The Indian rupee nosedived against the dollar Thursday, dragged down by disappointment surrounding the new government budget for the next fiscal year.
State finances are on the mend, presenting a new wrinkle for holders of tax-free municipal bonds: A handful of states are pushing to cut income-tax rates. That could cause their bonds to underperform in coming years by reducing local demand ...
French actor Gerard Depardieu’s decision to renounce his citizenship in order to avoid paying taxes might be tempting to those moving into ever high brackets. But experts warn that making such an exit is often a complex and costly process.
Early in the morning of January 1, Congress finally got around to dealing with the tax part of the fiscal cliff drama by passing what is inaccurately named the American Taxpayer Relief Act of 2012. Thanks to the demise of the so-called ...
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Honeywell International Inc. chief executive David Cote gives the orders at the $48 billion industrial giant, but lately he has been taking directives from President Barack Obama and congressional Republicans, in hopes of finding a ...
It was a New Year's party to remember. Facing the fiscal cliff, Congress did all the easy stuff. It made most of the existing tax rates permanent, instead of letting them rise. For nearly everything that might have been painful, especially ...
Remember back when you were young and poor and nothing made you madder than tales of rich people who paid nothing in income taxes? Well, you weren't alone, and that anger led to the creation of something called the alternative minimum tax, ...
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NEW DELHI--Royal Dutch Shell PLC's India unit said Monday it would challenge a tax department notice that claims it underpriced a sale of shares to an overseas group company by $2.7 billion.
To read the current fiscal-cliff coverage, President Obama holds the upper hand and is poised for the "victory" of winning an increase in the top two tax rates.
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What ails the U.K. economy? This, rather than the politically sensitive issue of whether to abandon his debt target, was the real judgment call that George Osborne had to make in his "Autumn Statement."
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The spat over jobs between Republican Gov. Rick Perry of Texas and Democratic Gov. Jerry Brown of California keeps smoldering.Earlier this month Mr. Perry went to California on a recruiting trip and told businesses that Texas is where they ...
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In the midst of a dismal recovery where every job counts, one fact stands out: States that tax less achieve better economic performance. Conventional thinking (at least within government) says that low state taxes are dependent upon having ...
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Financial advisers facing so much uncertainty over taxes are counting on one thing to be consistent in 2013: the alternative-minimum tax.Advisers widely believe the White House and Congress will enact legislation that would keep millions ...
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Few states outside the South and Mountain West have recovered faster from the financial crisis than Ohio, and now Governor John Kasich is betting on tax reform to keep it going. He's another GOP statehouse executive creating a sharp policy ...
A century ago, on Feb. 3, 1913, the 16th Amendment to the Constitution authorizing a federal income tax was ratified. But the amendment's adoption was more an accident than an act of political will, and tinkering with the Constitution was ...
Chances are you'll have to roll over a retirement account at least once in your lifetime. Most likely, it will be when you leave your current employer and take your 401(k) with you. Or, you may be eligible to roll over your current IRA into ...
WASHINGTON—Senate Republican and Democratic leaders worked Saturday to bridge differences over how to avoid year-end tax increases and possibly spending cuts, and found themselves grappling not only over income tax rates, but also over a ...
LOS ANGELES (MarketWatch) — With 2012 winding down, we’re rushing into the new year amid utter insecurity about our tax lives. Talking heads expound on the “fiscal cliff” ad nauseum. But without the passage of any legislation, the chatter ...
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Senate Democrats and Republicans squared off Tuesday over whether to try to block across-the-board spending cuts set to begin March 1.Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D., Nev.) said his party would seek to avert the cuts, known in ...
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The tax changes included in the bill hashed out between the White House and congressional Republicans Monday includes the first increases in top income-tax rates in nearly two decades. They also set new thresholds for determining who is ...
One post-election budget surprise has been President Obama's resistance to John Boehner's proposal to get $800 billion in new revenue by closing tax loopholes. Here's one likely reason: the high tax rates of his blue-state Democratic ...
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Lawmakers are working to keep the country from going over the "fiscal cliff," but already they have caused two snafus that will soon hit millions of pocketbooks��and maybe even the economy.
Democratic Party leaders, President Obama in particular, are forever telling the country that wealthy Americans are taxed at too low a rate and pay too little in taxes. The need to correct this seeming injustice is framed not simply in ...
You may have heard it can get cold in Minnesota in January, or for that matter in April. Last week the temperature dropped to seven below zero in the Twin Cities, which is one reason many Midwesterners head to Florida or Arizona for the ...
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The annual scramble to make smart tax moves before Dec. 31 is proving especially vexing this year.Congress still hasn't settled 2013 tax rates on income, investments, large gifts and estates. Deductions and other breaks are also in doubt, ...
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LONDON—The U.K.'s opposition Labour Party said Thursday it would introduce a levy on homes worth more than £2 million ($3.1 million) and use the money raised to cut income tax for low earners if it was in power now, backing a tax on ...
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A funny thing often happens on the way to soaking the rich: They don't stick around for the bath. Take Britain, where Her Majesty's Revenue and Customs service reports that the number of taxpayers declaring £1 million a year in income fell ...
LONDON—Four years after the financial crisis, banks operating in the U.K. are finding out that the annual bonuses they pay to employees are still everybody's business.
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TOPEKA, Kan.—Even if he doesn't enter the race himself, this state's Republican governor, Sam Brownback, is determined to play a starring role in the next presidential election.
America's top-grossing golfer Phil Mickelson drove himself into a bunker on Jan. 20 when he said that federal and California state tax hikes had made him contemplate making "drastic changes" in his life—including, it was widely assumed, ...
WASHINGTON (MarketWatch) — President Barack Obama has abandoned his Hawaii vacation, returning to Washington to try to prevent the economy from going off the so-called fiscal cliff — the combination of tax increases and spending cuts that ...
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On Tuesday night, President Obama used his State of the Union address to call for a 24% increase in the federal minimum wage, to $9 an hour from its current $7.25. He left out an important detail: For many low-wage employees, single parents ...
Were the Hollywood academy to hand out Oscars for roles in this fiscal cliff drama, the winner of the Best Charlatan award would not be in much doubt. Corporate America, take your bow.
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According to new Census data, New York, Illinois, New Jersey, Connecticut and Rhode Island led the country last year in out-migration (measured as a share of their population). Not incidentally, the Tax Foundation ranks New York, New Jersey ...
When a loved one dies, somebody must step up to the plate to handle all the resulting tax issues. This person may be identified in the decedent's will as executor of the estate. If there isn't a will, however, the probate court will appoint ...
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President Barack Obama and congressional leaders, seeking to raise revenue as part of their high-stakes budget talks, have an extensive menu of options for increasing tax bills.
After weeks of wrangling and brinkmanship, Congress has finally passed a deal to avoid the dreaded fiscal cliff, striking compromises on a slew of outstanding tax questions, from what rates the wealthy will pay on income to who will face ...

There's no better time to start than today.
A few steps to take to manage your property tax bill.