News Stories
Senate Leaders Pull Bill, IRA Charitable Rollover
Extension Remains on Hold
On June 24, Senate Democratic leaders pulled the American Workers, State
and Business Relief Act of 2010 (H.R. 4213) a bill that includes a one-year
retroactive extension of the IRA charitable rollover, from floor consideration
after a second attempt to move to a final vote on the bill failed. The
Senate is now unlikely to act on an IRA charitable rollover extension
until the fall. Prior to its expiration on Dec. 31, 2009, the IRA charitable
rollover allowed taxpayers age 70 1/2 or older to direct up to $100,000
annually from their individual retirement accounts to eligible charities,
including colleges, universities and independent schools, without having
to count the distribution as income for tax purposes. If enacted, H.R.
4213 would retroactively extend the IRA charitable rollover for one
year-from Jan. 1 to Dec. 31, 2010. Despite efforts to scale back the
cost of H.R. 4213, Senate Democrats fell three votes short of the required
60 votes to proceed to a final vote on the bill. Senate Majority Leader
Harry Reid (D-Nev.) indicated that he does not expect the Senate to
return to the bill in the short term. With a packed agenda in July and
a recess period in August, it is unlikely the Senate will take up H.R.
4213 until September at the earliest.
Council for Advancement and Support of Education
6/24/2010
Using Life Insurance To Make Charitable
Donations
Donors who wish to leverage their cash donations to charity can use
life insurance as an excellent means of accomplishing their goal. By
either gifting a policy outright or naming a charity as beneficiary,
they can provide the charity of their choice with a large sum of money
that can provide a lasting legacy for a cause that they believe in.
For the full article, click
here.
Forbes.com 6/28/2010
The Average Investor Is His Own Worst Enemy
Terrance Odean, a finance professor at the University of California,
Berkeley's Haas School of Business, has spent his career studying a
very specific type of investor: the one who is overconfident, shortsighted
and far more likely to snap up a stock at the worst possible moment
than to make the kind of contrarian bet that pays off in the long run.
Odean's specialty, in other words, is the average investor. Click
here for the full article.
Forbes.com Investment Guide 6/28/2010
Coverdell Tax Break Expires
If you've been using a Coverdell savings account to pay for tuition
or other expenses for a student in kindergarten through 12th grade,
step up your spending. Beginning next year, any earnings you withdraw
will be taxable as ordinary income and subject to a 10% penalty unless
used for college expenses. The maximum allowable yearly contribution
to Coverdell account will also be lowered from $2,000 to $500.
Congress could step in to renew the expiring provisions, but that's
unlikely. If your child will go to college, you could roll the Coverdell
money into a 529 savings plan at any time, penalty-free, as long as
the accounts have the same beneficiary. But if that's not an attractive
option, this is the time to spend Coverdell funds creatively.
Beyond tuition and fees, you can use Coverdell money to pay for tutoring,
books and supplies, uniforms, and transportation. You can buy a computer
for the whole family to use and pay for Internet access, too. One provision
that might be addressed by Congress: Starting next year, anyone who
claims a higher-education tax credit cannot take a tax-free distribution
from a Coverdell account in the same year, even for college expenses.
Lawmakers may tweak that rule so that you can use both in the same year,
but not to pay for the same expenses.
Kiplinger's Personal Finance magazine, July
2010
3 Retirement Worst Case Scenarios To Avoid
Retirement won't be enjoyable if you are constantly worried about outliving
your money. Your first retirement planning goal should be eliminating
this money stress. You can do this by financially preparing for worst
case scenario retirement events that are reasonably foreseeable. These
are three
worst case scenarios that this baby boomer is planning for.
Yahoo Finance 6/1/2010
Retire South of the Border
When Sid and Barb Williams began searching for the perfect place to
retire, they never thought they'd wind up living outside the U.S. But
in the course of their research, they kept hearing about the benefits
of retiring to Panama. For more information, click
here.
Kiplinger's Personal
Finance magazine 6/3/2010
Seven Facts to Help You Understand the Alternative
Minimum Tax
More and more Americans are finding they qualify for the Alternative
Minimum Tax (AMT). The Alternative Minimum Tax attempts to ensure that
anyone who benefits from certain tax advantages pays at least a minimum
amount of tax. Here
are seven facts the Internal Revenue Service wants you to know about
the AMT and changes to this special tax.
10 Uncommon Sources of Income in Retirement
To live out their retirement years in relative bliss, people traditionally
count on multiple sources of income--investments, retirement funds,
pension plans, and Social Security. For many, however, the recession
sapped one or more of their income sources and derailed plans for post-work
life, which now calls for a little money-making creativity. From renting
out an empty bedroom to working a part-time job in retail, retirees
are handling the setback with aplomb. For some more ideas, such as return
temping and fellowships, click
here.
Identity Theft: How To Avoid It
Identity theft occurs so frequently that the Federal Bureau of Investigation
cites it as "America's fastest growing crime problem." Thieves steal
and fraudulently use the names, addresses, Social Security numbers (SSNs),
bank account information, credit card numbers and other personal information
of some 10 million Americans each year, according to the Federal Trade
Commission. Learning about how thieves get your personal information
is the first step toward protecting yourself from this devastating attack
on your financial well-being. This article from Forbes provides information
for protection as well as what to do once your identity is stolen. For
more, read
the entire article.
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