The one-year lapse of the federal estate tax this year came with the unwelcome requirement that heirs assume their benefactors’ bases for some assets they inherit in 2010, as Howard Gleckman explained in a recent TaxVox post. For some mid-sized estates, that meant higher taxes. But Howard touched only briefly on the burden the new [...]

Okay, this one’s personal. For years I’ve filed my state tax return using iFile, Virginia’s free on-line tax filing service. I do that partly because I’m cheap—I don’t want to pay Intuit $15 to send my return electronically—and partly because it reduces errors and saves the state money.
But this year the General Assembly, with the concurrence of new governor Robert McDonnell, voted to end the iFile program. So next year I’ll go back to mailing in a paper return. A 44-cent stamp costs just 3 percent of Intuit’s bill. I did say I’m cheap, didn’t I?

The early returns are coming in on the First-Time Homebuyer Tax Credit. And it appears to be a bigger boondoggle than even I thought it would be.
At a House Ways & Means Oversight subcommittee hearing today, the Internal Revenue Service inspector general reported that the IRS is auditing more than 100,000 of the roughly 1.4 million returns that included a claim for the credit. This is a staggering audit rate for an agency that usually reviews only about 1 percent of returns.

Many people who have failed to pay taxes on funds stashed in overseas bank accounts will likely toss and turn during coming nights, worried that the tax man will soon come knocking at the door. Will they be among the nearly 4,500 account holders whose names Swiss bank UBS has agreed to give to the IRS? And even if their names aren’t on the list, will the IRS learn about them from others seeking amnesty? Should they apply for amnesty themselves, paying large tax bills but at least staying out of jail? Or lie low for fear the IRS will find other problems if they draw attention to their returns?