Sunday

Rainy days and Sunday's.  My apologies to The Carpenters.


This is so typical of the crappy weather that you can run into for Spring sports events, particularly track, where you get chilled to the bone and can almost never get warm.  The Drake Relays were held in Des Moines Friday and Saturday, and I'm betting that the folks in the stands were wishing for those March days when it was almost hot.  The runners, of course, would take the cool versus the heat. 

I'm giving some props here to an Iowa girl, Ashley Miller of Tipton, who runs distance events for Nebraska.  She won numerous events at Drake as a high schooler, and got back to the top step of the podium yesterday with a win in the University 1500, in meet-record time.  I think she has run quick enough for an invite to the Olympic Trials later this Summer.  Always good to see a somewhat-local girl do well on the big stage.

As I have stated here previously, I don't watch the NBA, but I did note the extremely bad news delivered to the Bulls yesterday when their star player went down with a torn ACL near the end of the game.  The replay that I saw just showed him landing awkwardly after dumping the ball off.  With his departure, Chicago goes to a long-shot of getting past any of the teams with star-power in the play-offs.  

The second-guessers are lining up in droves.  Critics say that the coach shouldn't have had him still in the game with the outcome not in much doubt.  Some pundits are saying that the league and the players union are to blame for the injuries among numerous players now done for the year, what with the compacted season and limited training camps after the work-stoppage.  And the most outrageous award goes to the designer of Lebron James' Nike shoe who tweeted, and retweeted amid criticism, that Rose wouldn't have been injured if he were wearing Nike shoes.  Armchair coaches. Columnist's.  Shoe salesmen.  What an august group.

I have my professional dander up on some of the push-back coming from the Left on the House-passed bill to limit the student loan interest rate increase.  The House bill taps into one of the Obamacare accounts to fund the cost of the student loan adjustment.  The Senate has yet to approve a similar bill, but it is expected to do so, with funding coming from other means.  The White House has already indicated that the President would veto the House bill, even it somehow squeaked through the Senate.

The White House wants the funding to come from fully taxing as Social Security income the pass-through income of small businesses that have elected S-Corporation status under the Internal Revenue Code. For all of my professional career, S-Corporation has been the preferred form of entity for small businesses (although the Limited Liability Company gets most of the new action these days).  Our accounting firm has been an S-Corp since 1982.  Owners take a salary and pay normal income, Social Security and Medicare taxes on these earnings.  Net income beyond the salary, the "dividends" of the business, are not subject to Social Security or Medicare taxes.

The IRS and these business owners have always had differences of opinion on the right amount of salary.  The issue has been beat to death on audit and in the courts.  The S-Corp rules were most certainly originally adopted to promote business development in the small business sector.  The Administration's choice to Social Security tax all of the business's income is further testimony of their "fair share" philosophy to tax success.

Actually, my biggest gripe is their characterization of S-Corp status as a "tax shelter".  This sells well in their talking points to their supporters, but to suggest that an S-Corp is a tax shelter in the same vein as oil and gas drilling, wind energy or other decidedly risky endeavors is nothing but political obfuscation. When you read stories this week about the S-Corp tax shelters, remember that they are likely talking about your dentist, your car mechanic, your plumber and most of the other locally-owned business people whom you meet during the course of your normal day.

There has already been a provision floated around to tax dividends and interest and other "unearned" income for Social Security purposes .  The S-Corp move described above would be consistent with that concept.  If we're going there, let's do real reform: lower the rates, eliminate the deductions, and bring on to the tax rolls in some manner that half of the public that pays no income taxes.  Get rid of the tax accountants, the lawyers and 90% of the Internal Revenue Code.  I could live with that.  Too bad the politicians can't get passed their reelection strategies to actually do something meaningful.  Oh, I know.  Let's tax the rich!!

Sorry about that.  The topic is a bit dry, I know, but since I have more than a little experience with it on a professional level, I judged my two cents to be relevant and worth the space.

On to other things....

I also want to send props out to Aunt Martha for already responding with some material on my proposed literary effort on Grandpa/Daddy.  I'm still working on concept things.  The timeline is awfully short, but I've got a history of working best under a deadline, so the ball is sitting on the tee waiting for me to take a cut.

The Winniferous is here for the evening.  And the rain remains.  Hmmm.  How do I get her energy bled off?

Good luck to all in the Peanut Gallery for the oncoming week.  May Day on Tuesday!

BCOT