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There Still May Be Time To Make An IRA Contribution For Last Year

If you’re getting ready to file your 2022 tax return, and your tax bill is higher than you’d like, there may still be an opportunity to lower it. If you’re eligible, you can make a deductible contribution to a traditional IRA right up until this year’s April 18 filing deadline and benefit from the tax savings on your 2022 return.

Rules for eligibility

You can make a deductible contribution to a traditional IRA if:

  • You (and your spouse) aren’t an active participant in an employer-sponsored retirement plan, or
  • You (or your spouse) are an active participant in an employer plan, but your modified adjusted gross income (MAGI) doesn’t exceed certain levels that vary from year-to-year by filing status.

For 2022, if you’re a married joint tax return filer and you are covered by an employer plan, your deductible IRA contribution phases out over $109,000 to $129,000 of MAGI. If you’re single or a head of household, the phaseout range is $68,000 to $78,000 for 2022. For married filing separately, the phaseout range is $0 to $10,000. For 2022, if you’re not an active participant in an employer-sponsored retirement plan, but your spouse is, your deductible […]

By |2023-02-21T15:53:28+00:00February 21st, 2023|contributions, ira|0 Comments

Should Your Business Address Retirement Plan Leakage?

Under just about any circumstances, the word “leakage” has negative connotations. And so it follows that this indeed holds true for retirement planning as well.

In this context, leakage refers to early, pre-retirement withdrawals from an account. Now, as a business owner who sponsors a qualified retirement plan, you might say, “Well, that’s my participants’ business, not mine.”

However, there are valid reasons to care about the issue and perhaps address it with employees who participate in your plan.

Why it matters

For starters, leakage can lead to higher plan expenses. Fees are often determined on a per-account or per-participant basis. When a plan loses funds to leakage, total assets and individual account sizes shrink, which tends to hurt administrative efficiency and raise costs.

More broadly, if your employees are taking pre-retirement withdrawals, it could indicate they’re facing unusual financial challenges. These usually have a negative impact on productivity […]

By |2022-02-23T23:45:14+00:00February 23rd, 2022|contributions, retirement|0 Comments

How The CARES Act Changes Deducting Charitable Contributions

Whether taxpayers are supporting natural disaster recovery, COVID-19 pandemic aid or another cause that’s personally meaningful to them, their charitable donations may be tax deductible. These deductions basically reduce the amount of their taxable income.

Here’s how the CARES Act changes deducting charitable contributions made in 2020:

Previously, charitable contributions could only be deducted if taxpayers itemized their deductions.

However, taxpayers who don’t itemize deductions may take a charitable deduction of up to $300 for cash contributions made in 2020 to qualifying organizations. For the purposes of this deduction, qualifying organizations are those that are religious, charitable, educational, scientific or literary in purpose. The law changed in this area due to the Coronavirus Aid, Relief, and Economic Security Act.

The CARES Act also suspends limits on charitable contributions and temporarily increases limits on contributions of food inventory. More information about these changes is available on IRS.gov.

Here are some resources for people making donations:

Tax Exempt Organization Search
Taxpayers must give to qualified organizations to deduct their donations on their tax return. They can use this tool to find out if a specific charity qualifies as a charitable organization for income tax purposes.

Publication 526, Charitable Contributions
This […]

By |2020-11-12T21:20:05+00:00November 12th, 2020|cares act, charity, New Tax Laws|0 Comments

New Business? It’s A Good Time To Start A Retirement Plan

If you recently launched a business, you may want to set up a tax-favored retirement plan for yourself and your employees. There are several types of qualified plans that are eligible for these tax advantages:

  • A current deduction from income to the employer for contributions to the plan,
  • Tax-free buildup of the value of plan investments, and
  • The deferral of income (augmented by investment earnings) to employees until funds are distributed.

There are two basic types of plans.

Defined benefit pension plans

A defined benefit plan provides for a fixed benefit in retirement, based generally upon years of service and compensation. While defined benefit plans generally pay benefits in the form of an annuity (for example, over the life of the participant, or joint lives of the participant and his or her spouse), some defined benefit plans provide for a lump sum payment of benefits. In certain “cash balance plans,” the benefit is typically paid and expressed as a cash lump sum.

Adoption of a defined benefit plan requires a commitment to fund it. These plans often provide the greatest current deduction from income and the greatest retirement benefit, if the business owners are nearing retirement. […]

By |2020-11-03T15:08:14+00:00November 3rd, 2020|business, retirement, small business|0 Comments

A Nonworking Spouse Can Still Have An IRA

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It’s often difficult for married couples to save as much as they need for retirement when one spouse doesn’t work outside the home — perhaps so that spouse can take care of children or elderly parents. In general, an IRA contribution is allowed only if a taxpayer has compensation. However, an exception involves a “spousal” IRA. It allows a contribution to be made for a nonworking spouse.

Under the spousal IRA rules, the amount that a married couple can contribute to an IRA for a nonworking spouse in 2020 is $6,000, which is the same limit that applies for the working spouse.

Two main benefits

As you may be aware, IRAs offer two types of benefits for taxpayers who make contributions to them.

  1. Contributions of up to $6,000 a year to an IRA may be tax deductible.
  2. The earnings on funds within the IRA are not taxed until withdrawn. (Alternatively, you may make contributions to a Roth IRA. There’s no deduction for Roth IRA contributions, but, if certain requirements are met, distributions are tax-free.)

As long as the couple together has at least $12,000 of earned income, $6,000 can be contributed to an IRA for each, for […]

By |2020-09-03T20:02:48+00:00June 2nd, 2020|contributions, ira, retirement|0 Comments
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