The news about saving money and light by replacing old bulbs is old (unless you’ve been living under a rock). But the issue of light saving is not overdone yet. Let’s assume that all US households would switch to high-efficiency light bulbs (such as compact fluorescent bulbs). This would reduce the nation’s energy consumption by 10% in the residential sector. The residential sector, by the way, accounts for about 20% of all energy use in the US. That’s a lot of oil.

Still not sure about switching to high-efficiency light bulbs? Don’t believe the hype about saving light? Do not believe in the positive impacts on the pocket or the environment? Do you want to calculate and test your energy savings yourself? Okay, let’s tackle cost savings and simple recovery next. (Simple payback refers to the amount of time it takes you to recoup the cost of new bulbs from savings.)

To calculate the final result, here is the necessary information:

• The power rating (watts) of the existing bulb
• The power rating (watts) of the new bulb
• The number of hours we use the bulb every day.
• The rate we pay for electricity in kilowatt-hours or kWh. You can find your electric rate by looking at the electric portion of your utility bill.
• One kilowatt is 1,000 watts, so we must remember to divide our answer by 1,000 to convert to kilowatt-hours.
• The cost of the original bulb.
• The cost of the new bulb.

As an example, let’s change a well-used light bulb into a fixture in a living room that is on continuously for 5 hours a day. The fixture has a 100-watt incandescent bulb that costs $050. It will be replaced with a 25-watt compact fluorescent or CFL (provides incandescent-equivalent brightness), costing $2.50. Let’s assume $0.15 per kilowatt hour (kWh) for the electricity rate, the US national average.

To calculate cost savings, first calculate the energy use of the existing bulb, then the replacement bulb. Hopefully, the replacement bulb’s energy use will be less than the existing bulb. The difference between the existing and the new is the savings. Here is the formula to calculate the cost of energy used per year:

Annual energy cost ($) = number of bulbs X watts per bulb/1,000 watts X hours of use per day X 365 days X electric rate

So, for our example:

Energy cost per existing bulb ($) = 1 bulb X 100 watts X 5 hours per day X 365 days X $0.15 per kWh/1,000 watts = $27.38 per year

Energy cost per replacement bulb ($) = 1 bulb X 25 watts X 5 hours per day X 365 days X $0.15 per kWh/1000 watts = $6.84 per year

Savings per year ($) = $27.38 – $6.84 = $20.54

Here is how to calculate the simple repayment in years:

Simple Payback (Years): (New Bulb Cost ($) – Old Bulb Cost ($)) / Annual Savings ($)

For our example, the simple refund is:

One-time repayment (years) = ($2.50 – $0.5) / $20.54 = 0.1 years or 1.2 months

That’s not a bad ROI for light savings. An average house has around 15 to 20 light bulbs. If they were all the same as the example above, that would result in a savings of about $411 per year. You can use the same method to calculate the savings for each room in your home and add up all the room savings to get a total of your annual savings.

You can verify your savings by monitoring your utility bills from month to month, as long as your rates stay the same and you don’t change the bulb’s operating hours. Even with proven savings, there still seem to be objections to replacing incandescent bulbs with compact fluorescent lights (or CFLs) or light-emitting diodes (or LEDs), otherwise this would be a “done deal.”

Delivering even greater savings (90% light savings) and longer life (25,000-50,000 hours) LEDs will be the dominant technology of the mid-future. They are also more environmentally friendly to produce and are less susceptible to breakage or moisture. But at this point, its main drawbacks are its high price and lower light output (or lumens) compared to incandescent bulbs. However, technology advances very quickly and once prices drop to reasonable levels, these problems will be a passing memory.

Compact fluorescent lamps, on the other hand, are much more accessible and affordable, and have come a long way in closely matching the light output and usefulness of incandescent bulbs. A repeated complaint about them is that CFLs need to warm up to reach full brightness, but that’s usually on the order of seconds to a minute for specialty bulbs. They are also affected by moisture and humidity.

While the cost of CFLs is still higher than a $0.50 incandescent bulb, prices have dropped to affordable levels for replacements, typically on the order of $1.50 to $4.50. per bulb, depending on the type. The average life of CFLs is 8,000 hours (or approximately five years with four hours per day of use), while incandescent bulbs are rated for 800 to 1,200 hours. One thing is worth noting for daylight savings calculations. The useful life of compact fluorescent lamps decreases if they are turned on and off frequently. If you plan to install them in areas where they will be changed frequently, reduce their useful life by 20% to 6400 hours.

What about the mercury in compact fluorescent lamps? The amount of mercury in a CFL is 5 mg or about 1/100 the amount of mercury in a dental filling (500 mg in a dental filling). More specifically, the mercury used by a power plant to make an incandescent light bulb is 10 mg, while for a compact fluorescent it is approximately 2.5 mg. However, broken bulbs should be handled with care, and burnt-out bulbs should be disposed of at home centers like Home Depot and Ikea.

No matter how we look at it, saving light by replacing incandescent bulbs is one of the easiest and most affordable methods to incorporate energy efficiency and gain energy savings in the home. Many countries have begun to systematically phase out the production of incandescent light bulbs. The economics are there, and the environmental benefits will only improve as technology advances.

Recent advances in technology have made it very easy for would-be scammers to create fake driver’s licenses to impersonate other people. The reason for this is that it can take a long time for a country or state to roll out new IDs with up-to-date security features and keep up with technology. However, no fake license will be foolproof. There will always be a way to tell that the ID is in fact a fake and not the genuine article. Here are 3 different tips you can use to help you spot a fake driver’s license:

* Look for imperfections. The most common way to spot a fake ID is to look for blemishes in the ID itself. Remember, any organization that issues driver’s licenses will have the process streamlined and will rarely, if ever, issue IDs that do not meet standards. Look for an image that is off-center or lettering on the license that is blurry or hard to read. No driver’s license will have red eyes in the image, and this is a common mistake many hobbyist ID makers make.

* Make sure the license is not expired. Often, people with fake IDs have borrowed a license from someone whose license has expired.

* Consult the security elements found in the guide. Any legitimate ID will have any number of security features. It’s always best to find the guide for the particular license you’re looking into and make sure all the security features are present. These features can come in the form of a hologram and black light, among many others.

Don’t forget to check the person who is passing the fake license. Often they will provide various physical clues including nervousness and restlessness that can point you to the fact that they have a fake driver’s license.

It’s getting back to that time of year where associations are thinking about end-of-year procedures, one of which is to hold the annual election under Revenue Rule 70-604.

I have been asked several times what those numbers mean. “70” means the year the judgment was entered (1970), and “604” simply represents the numerical sequence of the judgment for that year. This was sentence number 604 issued in 1970.

As a CPA, I receive more questions about the application of Revenue Resolution 70-604 than about all other tax matters combined. Several of my articles on the subject of Revenue Resolution 70-604 are posted in various places on the web, so I am regularly “found” and questions are sent my way. One question I get time and time again is “when do we do the election?”

While Revenue Resolution 70-604 is one of our most powerful tax planning tools for partnerships filing Form 1120, it is also the most subject to interpretation. One of the reasons for this is that the ruling itself is very short: only two paragraphs. The absence of internal definitions within the Ruling means that readers have to interpret it and come up with their own definitions for almost all critical issues within the Ruling’s scope, including the timing of the election.

Because so many areas of this Resolution are subject to interpretation, many years ago I contacted Mr. Ransom (who drafted Revenue Resolution 70-604) at the IRS National Office to discuss this and other issues. When I pointed out the ambiguity in the Judgment regarding the timing of the election, Mr. Ransom said that he felt there was no ambiguity, as the matter was worded on purpose to make the Judgment flexible. I specifically asked Mr. Ransom if an association could make its election after its fiscal year ended, and he said yes. He agreed that the only limitation on election time is that the election must be held before the tax return is filed and must be on a timely filed return.

I also asked Mr. Ransom if it was possible for an association to hold an election before the end of the fiscal year. He agreed that it would be possible to make the choice in this way, as the Resolution was purposely drafted to be flexible in stating that “any” excess could be carried over from one year to the next. That means you don’t have to indicate a specific amount that will carry over from one year to the next, you don’t even have to know if there will be any excess.

There is no risk of disadvantage in making an election under Revenue Resolution 70-604. If an association does not have an excess of membership income over membership expenses, the election will simply not apply to that year. It would be the same as if no choice had been made. If an association files Form 1120-H instead of Form 1120, then no election is needed, so again, the election simply will not apply to that year.

Penny Stocks: There are some great success stories about penny stocks, and there are some stories that, despite the word “pennies,” also refer to great losses. Young investors, or those with limited resources, often enter the stock market testing the waters with penny stocks. It sounds easy, and people wonder who can lose money by investing just a few cents.

One problem is that these actions can be contagious and attractive. The more someone owns, the more they want. And the more he or she is in the market, the more shares of different companies the investor discovers. Investment experts always talk about spreading purchases, dollar cost averaging, buying (and selling) over a period of time, and other investment rules that have been repeated for decades. But, a small or first-time investor can get caught up in many traps. Maybe he bought a couple hundred dollars of a penny stock and the price goes down a few cents (which can easily translate to 10 or 20 percent). There is a temptation to buy more. It lowers the average cost, of course; but it also makes the investor more involved. Conversely, if it goes up, the investor may be afraid of missing out and buy more to make sure it goes up, assuming that’s where the stock is going. On the other hand, an investor can get lucky with a penny stock, just like stocks that sell for higher prices.

Whether a stock is 30 cents or $30, the investor should do their homework on the company, keep an eye on it, look at its competitors and the industries in which it is involved, listen to the experts, and then use common sense. If every kid in the second grade at your school bought a new type of shoe, and the company’s stock is priced low, it might be worth an investment. But, if a cheap stock is now low in price after a long slide, or if it’s very volatile, keep looking for something else.

“Getting stuck is not a problem. Staying stuck is”-Alistair Smith

There is nothing more daunting than staring at a blank computer screen or a blank page to write your Pulitzer Prize best-selling book with blank pages. However, business executives, like everyone else, occasionally experience getting stuck on ideas to help you complete a task, grow your business, and experience stress, frustration, and overwhelm.

“Life’s challenges shouldn’t paralyze you, they should help you discover who you are.” -Bernice Johnson Reagon

If you knew where it came from, you could avoid it, but it can appear suddenly and you don’t know why, at least at first. Some say that the experience of being stuck is the perception of limited options. Nobody likes to feel stuck. To get unstuck, you need to take a step back and look at what happened before, during, and after you got to where you are now.

“Right now I’m stuck somewhere between what ifs, what coulds, what could haves, and what nevers will and all I want to know is what it really is.” -Christina Hart

Being stuck in a rut doing the same daily routines and not getting out of it can prevent you from accepting opportunities because you don’t know which way to go. Focusing on your stress, frustration, and overwhelmed feelings can paralyze you. The problem isn’t just being stuck, it’s how you stay in a stuck position.

“If you’re faced with a new challenge or asked to do something you’ve never done before, don’t be afraid to step up. You have more capacity than you think, but you’ll never see it unless you demand it of yourself.” yourself for more.” -Joyce Meyer

Being stuck has a component of fear

Being stuck has the same experience as fear. This is a response to the stress, frustration, and overwhelm you are experiencing that is perceived as threatening or harmful to you. As a result, you feel anxious and nervous because you don’t think about the things that matter most to you.

Usually, when people are trapped, you don’t realize that fear is playing a part. You need to understand how fear allows you to get stuck without realizing it. When you struggle with fear, it’s because of a decision you made or are about to make or because you don’t like being criticized or judged for something you said or did. Most people don’t like the latter at all.

The fear of not doing things within a set deadline is still in force. You may be worried that you won’t be able to get things done on time. Although fear is completely normal, it prevents you from creating or producing something new. Solving this problem helps you handle it better. Sometimes the act of doing something outside of your comfort zone is terrifying. When you do it a couple of times you get used to it being part of your routine.

What got you here won’t get you there

“Fear is often our immediate response to uncertainty. There is nothing wrong with experiencing fear. The key is not to get caught up in it.” -Gabrielle Bernstein

With most people using traditional ways to get unstuck, you are still focused on your stressed, frustrated, and overwhelmed thoughts. By doing so, you remain in a stagnant position. This is being reactive. You panic and go into crisis mode. This does not help you advance.

Too many leaders expect to stay the course and continue to conduct business with a traditional approach. You expect to work in the same way as before and get different results.

For many young executives, you were promoted because of your skills, talent, and ability to solve problems. You thought it was cool to sit in a prominent place and delegate the work to others. What you didn’t expect was that being an executive you also had projects to accomplish. This leads him to not work 9 to 5, but 50 hours or more each week. This may be too overwhelming for many, especially if you thought things would be very different.

“Insanity is doing the same thing over and over again but expecting different results.” A fresh approach is probably all you need to get unstuck. (Albert Einstein)

With this comes self confidence.

“Nothing builds self-esteem and self-confidence like achievement.”-Thomas Carlyle

The most important step in developing self-confidence is simply taking action. Take a few minutes and think about what you’re stuck with. The way you get unstuck has a lot to do with your resilience to overcome your stuck situation with patience.

Be curious and think about the fact that when you are caught up in fear, it is close. Essentially, ask questions. Don’t let anything or anyone stop you from being curious about why you got stuck. You may even find out that you caused it or that it had nothing to do with you.

“The way to build self-confidence is to do what you fear.” -William Jennings Bryan

Work on your self esteem as you need to increase your self confidence and believe in yourself more.

change your perspective

“A challenge only becomes an obstacle when you bow down to it.” -Ray Davis

Adapting a fresh idea from fear of the unknown keeps you stuck. The more decisions and actions you take, the more you will believe in your ability to overcome your fears. Identify what actions you can take to move forward.

By changing your perspective, I mean not reacting to your stagnation and going into a crisis or panic mode. This only keeps you more stressed, frustrated, and overwhelmed. Instead, think more proactively. In doing so, you need to take a step back and see what happened. This allows you to start taking steps to avoid further feelings of stagnation and to stay creative. Then it will be much easier to get out of your stuck feelings and move on. (This article does not specifically say how this experience goes beyond what is reported here.)

Know when to multitask and when to single-task

“I like the challenge of trying different things and wondering if it’s going to work or if I’m going to fall flat on my face.” -Actor Johnny Depp

It’s important to recognize when you’re taking on more than you can handle. Too many people agree to work on more than one task at a time. You may think that you can be more productive by working on multiple projects, but you need to know what you really can and cannot do. Time constraints also play a role in deciding what and how much to take on. By comparing multitaskers to non-multitaskrs, Stanford professor Clifford Nass concluded that multitaskers perform poorly on a variety of tasks, are easily distracted, and have difficulty concentrating.

Conclusion: There are many different ways to unstick. Use the ones that work for you. A great way to get unstuck and find innovative ideas is to ask questions about assumptions and beliefs, rephrase the rules of your business. Are they adapted to the current workplace? Shift your mindset from traditional ways of doing business and get rid of unconventional activities. Remember, give yourself permission to fail and make mistakes. This is expected in the current way of doing business.

“You are not stuck where you are unless you choose to be.” -Wayne Dyer

According to the IRS, there are three categories of income: assets, liabilities, and portfolio.

Active is what it seems. You do income-generating activities from which you earn income.

Portfolio is also what it seems. You invest money in things like stocks, real estate funds, or other investment vehicles, and at best, your investment produces a profit or income.

Then there is passive income.

The holy cow of network marketing companies and continuity/membership site experts.

The goal of every type of overworked, low-income, self-employed person praying for a miracle.

Passive intimacy without work. You, on the beach, cocktail in hand, checking your PayPal account for sales every few hours. Or, even better, you, on your sofa, in your pajamas, watching GOT or House. Again.

I’ve googled a ton of content on passive income, and while there are some solid possibilities out there (for example, lending money for interest), many take a solid idea and execute on it immediately, like this one that admits you have to get the job done for get to passive: “first you need to get off your ass and do something crazy, say write a quality 20,000 word ebook (crazy not passive lol)” but this is where it gets crazy: “but then you can sit and enjoy watching PayPal sale messages pop up on your iPhone every morning as one sale after another is made… continuously and without any extra work. That’s passive piña colada flavored goodness!”

There are some seriously delusional thoughts.

Let’s look at digital products. You write or create it once, set it up on a landing page, connect the cart, drive traffic, and head to the beach to pick up your moolah.

A well-made e-book or virtual program requires hours of research, writing, production, formatting, etc. Those hours cost your time, and during those hours you are not making money. But okay, we can all agree, there has to be work on the front end, right?

Right, but it doesn’t end there.

Now we have marketing. If your landing page is optimized, your copy is great, and your ads are perfect (something that requires daily monitoring, by the way), and your ebook, product, or program is targeted to the right audience, you could see recurring revenue from this. evergreen product.

Phew. We’ve done quite a bit of work so far and there are a lot of “if’s” from a marketing perspective. (If your landing page converts because you have converting copy and the page is SEO optimized, and you are targeting an audience that wants what you have, and so on.)

And marketing doesn’t end if you want sales to continue.

What about affiliate partner management, returns, customer service? Even outsourced, there is still active participation.

This type of income, as you can see, is far from being passive but rather leveraged.

Leveraged is good. This is how businesses grow and, in our case, entrepreneurs, how we get out of the trap of limiting revenue in the fee-for-service model only.

I don’t want to bring Debbie down, but part of my commitment to my clients and to you, my readers, is to bring the truth; illuminate the traps, the false gods and the naked emperors.

Am I suggesting not to do an ebook, virtual show, or continuity show? NO! (Well, I might in the case of the membership/continuity program, and I’m rounding up some experts to break down the good and the bad and who should and shouldn’t and when. I’ll have details next week here.)

I suggest you examine your attraction to a marketing idea before you jump in. No idea will “save” a shaky business – sales is the exception here – and an idea that promises to “change everything” in your business is likely not to deliver on its promise. What you really require is only going to be found in the type of mouse: that fine print at the bottom of web pages and print ads that give you the disclaimer.

Always read the type of mice.

And start researching leveraged income streams. Find out what it really takes to set one up and get started. It may not be passive, but it is income that requires less of you one-to-one or one-to-many. And that means more time to work on your bag or pina coladas.

Have you ever considered where your phone or computer came from? Each individual part of the device requires work in production and assembly. There are many products that are manufactured in the country, but the large number of companies that move their products to be produced in other countries is growing every day due to the expected increases in profits. This is an example of globalization. Specifically, companies like Apple can produce their phones, computers, and tablets in foreign countries for much less money than it takes to produce them domestically in the United States. New technology at companies like Apple has allowed globalization to have a negative effect on global business through factors such as location, consumers, and competing organizations. Yes, international factories can produce parts cheaply, but at what cost to global companies?

The consumer is the main reason why companies are successful. Without the consumer, companies would be wasting valuable resources and capital to produce products or services that are not purchased. People all over the world have become so fascinated with Apple products that they spend outrageous amounts of money on them. The cost of these products does not change regardless of the country in which they are sold. However, if the consumer cannot afford the product, he cannot buy it. This is especially true for those who live in the United States if companies like Apple, among many others, move their jobs abroad. Similarly, in foreign countries, companies that produce the technology are paid pennies on the dollar. This results in low wages for workers and, in turn, the inability to purchase products. Thus, the expansion of technology internationally through globalization has a negative effect on the company through the volume of consumer purchases.

Many companies initially manufactured their products in the country. The desire for a higher return on investment has attracted more companies to consider or commit to expanding these tasks internationally through globalization. Potential startups in the United States are not considering manufacturing or creating new products domestically because they fear they will not be able to compete with international rivals or companies that use outsourcing. As a result, this may be too much expansion happening too fast for a new business, and it could be counterproductive to your bottom line. The lack of opportunities to produce in the country has also reduced the number of jobs and has taken funds out of the economy in many ways. By not creating the physical product, but continuing to consume it in the United States, the economy still essentially receives the taxes from the creation or sale of the good. Yet the economy is missing out on income taxes collected from factory employees, as well as money those same workers would be spending to stimulate our economy if their work were not outsourced. This means that consumers will spend less money on products that are produced by companies like Apple.

On the other hand, the globalization of technology also has negative effects at the international level. This continues to affect business on a global scale. As noted above, companies are paid pennies on the dollar for the products they produce, which translates into poor working conditions and wages for the people employed in these jobs. Low wages for workers are directly related to the inability to buy non-essential items like iPads, MacBooks or iPhones. So by using globalization, Apple is technically limiting the number of products it will sell. Continuing with this thought, it is well known that an alarming number of Apple factory workers have committed suicide through exhaustion in their situations. A negative stigma and reputation could be attached to Apple for the reasons behind this, resulting in additional units not being purchased. This would all be thanks to the initial effects of globalization and illustrates just how complicated the problems caused by globalization can be.

Competing companies are also affected by the globalization of technology. For example, when Company One sends manufacturing of its products abroad, there are many negative impacts on similar businesses. There are lost sales opportunities for other companies because Company One can sell its product for much less due to market dominance in the interest of the consumer. The consumer looks for cheaper items with an available sale. Supply tends to be higher because larger manufacturers are able to offer more products for less, further increasing demand. You cannot compete with Company One because their cost to bring the product to market is significantly lower.

The effects of globalization on business are so severe that more emphasis should be placed on discussing the pros and cons when making the decision to outsource a business. Although it may generate more profit for a company, they should consider how far they are willing to go to achieve this goal. They must deliberate on the effects of globalization in their country of origin, as well as in international countries. While outsourcing can be a positive for them, low wages, poor working conditions, and deteriorating mental health have dire repercussions for overseas workers. Likewise, the negative effects on the economy itself and that of competitors must be considered. The money that should be stimulating and circulating through one’s own economy is now in another country. Also, competitors in the same industry will have trouble keeping up and could be forced to go out of business. None of these factors is positive for one’s country. Finally, the most important point about globalization would be the long-term effects on global business. You may initially see higher gains, but overall, globalization affects the consumer and all countries involved so much that sales volume is likely to decline as time goes on. This blatantly defeats the main goal of globalization for a business in the first place.

Introduction

There is no such thing as a free lunch. There is a vein of gold in that old saying. And yet, that doesn’t stop many from trying to get something for nothing. Entire generations have now grown up trained to depend on government support, whether through food stamps, skewed tax credit laws, or welfare. Many of them hardly realize the price they pay in dignity, respect and freedom. And yet, even with those who really need it or really deserve the help, there are many more looking for ways to scam the government for funds.

Each of them is convinced that they have found the foolproof way to fool Uncle Sam and, in many cases, get away with it temporarily. Although there are many variations on the general themes, each will generally fall into one of five categories.

1. EIC Fraud

2. Payroll “under the table”

3. Falsification of W-2 or 1099 information

4. Clustered nest

5. Multilevel Marketing Tax Evasion Methods

EIC FRAUD

The Earned Income Credit is a refundable tax credit designed to help working single parents. Typically, the way a (non-refundable) tax credit works is that if a person has paid $5,000 in tax during the year and qualifies for the $10,000 tax credit, they can only receive the $5,000 they paid in tax. If the individual paid $0 in taxes, the tax credit could be $50,000 or more and they would receive $0. With the refundable tax credit, the person is not required to have paid taxes for the earned income credit to be added to the person’s refund amount.

It works on a sliding scale where the EIC goes up to its maximum (usually around $15,000 in earned income) and when income goes above $15,000, the EIC slides down. The maximum EIC is usually around $5,500. Finally, at around $28,000, the EIC has decreased to $0. As someone who spent several years preparing taxes in low-income neighborhoods, let me tell you, there are those who plan their entire year around getting this huge tax check that is taken from those who pay and given to those who don’t. . The EIC is granted only for your first two children from birth to age 17.

The ‘married or single’ couple with four children will go to a tax preparation office, separate those with experience in this. And even though they each live in the same home, they each claim head of household status, which increases the amount they can deduct from their taxable income and with each of them claiming EIC they can receive a check totaling up to $10,000 by the end of the year. tax filing season. Householder is supposed to be for those who don’t get any other support from anywhere else. The head of the family must provide for that household, so if there is a boyfriend, girlfriend, spouse, parent, etc. living there, they cannot claim that designation.

These cheaters will do this for years before they are caught, but once caught, they are not allowed to claim EIC for ten years after a fraud investigation. They will then have to return the incorrectly paid EIC and pay penalties for fraudulent returns plus up to 75% of the amount that was defrauded to the IRS.

how they are caught

Every time a person opens a bank account, buys a car, rents or buys a house, a little note is made that identifies their Social Security number with that transaction. Obviously, someone whose earned income is less than $15,500 is not going to buy a $35,000 car or a $200,000 house. These cheaters don’t realize they’re putting a big target on their back that screams, “Audit me!” to trained IRS auditors. He cannot have it both ways and claim that he earned enough income to pay for his purchase on credit and then, on another form, claim that he did not earn enough money to pay taxes.

There is a repository for this information, and the IRS takes note of logical errors. Example; A man came into my office and proudly told us that he was the father of nine children by seven different women and that his total income for the year was less than $3000 and that he wanted to claim half of his children before their mothers so that he could get the refund first. There is no way in this world that a man can only pay for food, rent and gas with a yearly income of $3000. And he wanted to claim that he also supported these children? He went to prison a year and a half later, but I hear his kids are doing just fine without him.

payroll under the table

Whether it’s because the worker lives here in this country illegally or the employer doesn’t want to worry about payroll taxes, a growing number of small businesses are paying cash. And since his employer doesn’t report it, the individual employee sees an opportunity to fool the government. (In some of these cases, these people are involved in illegal activities through which they get all their money. Drug trafficking, prostitution, etc.)

The first caveat here is that this arrangement is illegal. The second is that it is dangerous. Illegal because there are certain state requirements for employment that cannot be met or measured without records. And dangerous because that’s how most employers manage to pay for workers’ compensation insurance. An injury in a workplace where everything is done ‘under the table’ will often receive poor care for fear of reporting the injury to a hospital or qualified physician.

how they are caught

In the same way that those who are cheating EIC, every legal transaction they make puts one more flag in a case that would not otherwise have one. If they are making money that they are not reporting, they will have a hard time explaining how they are making $900 a month in mortgage payments when they only claim to make $500 and are the only support provider for that household. As the Zen master would say, “all things are connected, and yet not all are the same.”

Falsification of W2 or 1099 information

It’s relatively easy to buy a pack of blank W-2s or 1099s and “create” your own income. Scammers typically use a legitimate EIN number from a legitimate business they have temporarily worked at or a friend or relative has worked at and create a W-2 that provides them with enough income to get the EIC credit. By the time the ruse is discovered, the cheaters have cashed their rebate checks super fast and left town. Filing electronically prevents some fraud, but facilitates others.

The rightful owner of the business must explain why they did not pay the payroll tax for these people who falsified these forms. The IRS seems to move a lot slower when you’re the loser. It could mean paying penalties for payroll taxes that were never supposed to be filed anyway.

Many of the people who use this particular scam are illegal immigrants and don’t have a legitimate social security number anyway, those who are legal citizens and yet the cheaters anyway eventually move on and forget about the crime they they have comitted.

how they are caught

Once this particular scam is forgotten, one day they will have to use their social security number for a job, a loan, or a college application. At that point, they nail it even if it’s five or more years later. Offenses of this type earn prison time.

If it’s an illegal that’s cashing this check, it makes it more of a challenge. An illegal usually does not have a checking account to use to cash this check, so they must go to a check cashing store. It is there where they must present identification, addresses of references and some employment information. What many people don’t realize is that every check you receive and cash has clearly identifiable stamps showing where and when the check was cashed, deposited, and processed. If the illegal is still in the same area when the IRS gets up and starts investigating, it doesn’t take much to find them.

the clustered nest

Using the same principle in the first EIC fraud of a couple living together in the same place and each claiming Head of Household and EIC for each of their four children, the bundled nest describes what happens when that is taken to the extreme. . Where there are four or more families within the same residence, each claiming HOH and EIC for their group of children. This is common in predominantly Hispanic areas where families can get along with each other in close quarters. Children are often exchanged between relatives to get the maximum benefit from the tax refund.

how they are caught

When doing background checks, there are areas and addresses that are automatic “red flags” for fraud. They are called ‘high risk’ areas, high turnover, transient population, hotels, apartment complexes, etc. When an address has ever been used as a ‘cluster nest’ where more than one family claims residence at the same time, that location is flagged. Eventually, the addresses are combined with the dates and times that individuals claim residence and sole ownership of the head of household title. As long as the whole family moves every three years, they could go on like this for many years. But once an area has been ‘flagged’, so are the social security numbers that use that address.

Multilevel Marketing Tax Evasion Scam

Lately there has been a group that promotes an old idea that everyone considers “new”. This group comes from an MLM that sells legal insurance plans and a large part of its business is recruiting other representatives. As the engine has petered out over the past seven years, it’s getting harder and harder to recruit smart people to these pyramid schemes. Therefore, their focus has shifted to de-emphasize the MLM aspect and sell them the benefits of being able to deduct the expenses they already have by starting their own business.

Most W-2 earners, as they are called, don’t have the time to work 40-60 hours a week and spend another 10-20 on an MLM. So the focus is this, let me show you how to deduct those expenses that you have now anyway and save money on your taxes. When you own your own business, you can deduct losses, home office expenses, and a percentage of your utility bills based on the size of the home office.

So now they have smart people joining this pyramid MLM group, not to advance within the MLM, but to deduct all the losses they will have pushing these prepaid legal insurance plans to their friends and family. There are several things wrong with this; First, your business must be running for the purpose of making a profit, NOT to pay for daily personal expenses. Second, there are rules and regulations for home office and vacation deductions that these ‘phony tax experts’ don’t bother to explain to their new hire, easily leading to deductions being disallowed and penalties and fees begin to accumulate. And third, these so-called tax experts are as far from experts as possible. One weekend training class does not make a tax expert.

how they are caught

The main inspiration behind this devious scheme cleverly avoids investigations and prosecutions. The legal prepaid insurance company, however, seems to constantly attract investigations. Corporate fraud experts have cited several red flags that a company is ready to commit fraud at the corporate level, and this particular company is at that point. Since it is difficult to hold the corporation accountable for the outlandish claims of its sales force, there will continue to be people caught up in this ‘join in’ scheme that has been around for over 30 years. The good news is that the eyes of corporate fraud experts are on them and there will be a slip up soon. Boy, I hope you guys meet a good lawyer.