Tax planning

Since 2011, when Occupy Wall Street protesters rallied under the slogan “We are the 99%,” the income threshold for the top 1% is up an inflation-adjusted 33%.

The IRS estimates it sent about 113.4 million refund checks to taxpayers, down from 116 million sent a year earlier.

Clients should consider paying more deductible expenses before year-end if their total itemizable deductions will be close to their standard deduction amount.

Armed with some specific details, advisors can explain why the seductive option is both too good and too good to be true.

The tax basis can change when homeowners compute depreciation, loss or gain for sales purposes.

Blucora’s Avantax Wealth Management combines two firms that took competing approaches to serving tax professionals branching into wealth management.

Without the marital deduction, a certain category of married clients will have challenges inheriting property outright.

Clients should think of the years as empty buckets and keep the amount of income into each bucket level per year.

Despite raised thresholds, advisors can still find big itemization opportunities if they know where to look.

Nearly three in four defer medical treatment, get suboptimal care to avoid deductibles or skip appointments to sidestep a bill.

Chances are high that one or both parents who have left the workforce ahead of their full retirement age are still working out of necessity.

Age discrimination, unpredictable life shocks and involuntary retirement casts serious doubt on the “work longer” thesis.

Advisors may need to alert clients as to when these checks will be taxable.

With the net unrealized appreciation, workers can roll some employer stock into a taxable brokerage plan.

From surcharge brackets to prescription drug plans, advisors need to understand how Medicare works.

Advisors may be able to shift taxable income and potentially save on employment taxes, as well.

Unmarried siblings who cover more than half of their parents' expenses are advised to use the head of household filing status.

Some cryptocurrency investors are receiving a new round of letters from the IRS telling them that their federal tax returns don’t match the information received from virtual currency exchanges, a new front in the agency’s burgeoning scrutiny of the industry.

Clients are advised to consider delaying their Social Security benefits, as up to 85% will be subject to income taxes, an expert says.

Ten issues taxpayers and their advisors should be paying attention to right now.