August 2014 - The Tax Adviser

Sec. 67(e) reached the end of a long and tortured journey recently, when the IRS issued final regulations defining, once and for all, which expenses of an estate or trust are classified as miscellaneous itemized deductions subject to the 2% floor and the alternative minimum tax.

The definition of wages for purposes of income tax withholding and for the Federal Insurance Contributions Act has often been a point of contention. The Supreme Court recently reversed an appellate decision and held that severance payments to employees who were involuntarily terminated were taxable wages for FICA purposes.

In our annual survey, thousands of tax practitioners assessed the software they used to prepare 2013 returns.