Farm Leadership
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ObamaCare Here To Stay (At least 4 more years)
I spent three of the last four days giving a seminar on the economic and tax effects of ObamaCare in Yakima, Kennewick and Boise and it was interesting to hear the feedback from farmers and other business owners. The first two days, the audience wanted to know my opinion on what would happen if Romney […]
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Fiscal Cliff Example # 2
We had several readers respond to our post yesterday asking for a couple more examples for a more “typical” situation. The seminar included other examples. One example was a married couple with three children and “normal” itemized deductions with the husband earning $100,000. In this example, the gross income tax owed for 2011 was $7,779. […]
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What the Fiscal Cliff Means To You?
As part of our normal tax planning updates at our firm, we had a two hour presentation on how the Fiscal Cliff may affect some of our taxpayers. As many of you know by now, on January 1, 2013 the Bush and Obama related lower tax rates are scheduled to expire along with many other […]
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Where Will Harvest Price End Up For Crop Insurance?
The USDA report that came out this morning appeared to have a bullish bias to it. Corn and Beans were up at least 20 cents and wheat was not too far behind. As of today prices, it appears the average corn price for the month of October for the harvest crop pricing is about $7.50 […]
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Is the True US Deficit $76 Trillion Instead of $16 Trillion
Bill Gross is the lead investment manager for PIMCO which is probably the largest Bond Fund company is the US or the world. Every month, he writes an Investment Outlook letter to their investors and this month’s letter was entitled “Damages“. In the letter, he recaps the countries whose deficit is large as a percentage […]
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Will Farmers Have More “Repairs” This Year?
Until about two years ago, farmers could have been in a battle with the IRS concerning whether a repair was really a repair or an asset that needed to be depreciated. Beginning in late 2010 and through 2011, 100% bonus depreciation applied for any new purchase including what might have been classified as a repair […]
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Maintain Flexibility with Deferred Payment Contracts
One of the best tools in our farm tax toolbox is the ability to use deferred payment contracts to achieve our desired level of taxable farm income. These contracts call for the sale of grain in 2012, with payment being received in 2013. Normally, the sale of the grain is taxed when cash is received, however, […]
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Involve Your Kids With Year-End Tax Planning
Many multi-generation farms have the parents totally immersed in the finances of the operation while the children may be more focused on the actual farm production activities. Since this is a time of year (right after harvest) to do your year-end tax planning, try to get the kids more involved this year in the actual […]
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Section 179 for 2013
We have gotten a few emails in the last few weeks asking what the Section 179 deduction will be in 2013. The current law is a limit of $25,000 for 2013. However, both the President and Congress have discussed increasing the deduction up to $500,000 with a phase-out starting at $2 million. It appears at […]
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Expectations For Farm Income Dropping Rapidly
For those states comprising the Kansas City Fed District (Nebraska, Mountain States, Kansas, Missouri and Oklahoma), the expectations for farm income have dropped dramatically due to the drought. In a just released report on the second quarter agricultural credit conditions, several financial nuggets can be found. Due to timely rains, the wheat crop in Oklahoma […]