Look, Mom – I’m A Gay Republican Now
By Larry M. Elkin, CPA, CFP®
December 30, 2009
If being a Democrat can run in families, it runs in mine. My parents were one generation removed from Ellis Island and the Lower East Side. Tammany Hall’s ward heelers helped my grandparents become Americans by telling them how to vote. My father enlisted in the Navy at 16, got married at 20, and joined a [...]
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564 view(s)
December 30, 2009
If being a Democrat can run in families, it runs in mine. My parents were one generation removed from Ellis Island and the Lower East Side. Tammany Hall’s ward heelers helped my grandparents become Americans by telling them how to vote. My father enlisted in the Navy at 16, got married at 20, and joined a [...]
To read the complete post, click here.
1 response
564 view(s)
Liberation On The Tarmac
By Larry M. Elkin, CPA, CFP®
December 29, 2009
Airlines can continue to herd their customers like cattle, pack us like sardines and nickel-and-dime us like the suckers we must be, since we keep coming back for more. But they can no longer hold us hostage. With pro-passenger legislation bottled up on Capitol Hill, Transportation Secretary Ray LaHood has issued a Department of Transportation rule addressing [...]
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173 view(s)
December 29, 2009
Airlines can continue to herd their customers like cattle, pack us like sardines and nickel-and-dime us like the suckers we must be, since we keep coming back for more. But they can no longer hold us hostage. With pro-passenger legislation bottled up on Capitol Hill, Transportation Secretary Ray LaHood has issued a Department of Transportation rule addressing [...]
To read the complete post, click here.
173 view(s)
Privacy In The Workplace
By Larry M. Elkin, CPA, CFP®
December 28, 2009
Most white-collar employees have telephones on their desks, and most employers, myself included, do not mind if an employee uses the phone occasionally for personal purposes. It would never occur to me to eavesdrop or surreptitiously record those conversations. On the other hand, I, and many other employers, warn employees that they should not expect privacy [...]
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167 view(s)
December 28, 2009
Most white-collar employees have telephones on their desks, and most employers, myself included, do not mind if an employee uses the phone occasionally for personal purposes. It would never occur to me to eavesdrop or surreptitiously record those conversations. On the other hand, I, and many other employers, warn employees that they should not expect privacy [...]
To read the complete post, click here.
167 view(s)
No Pontoons For Santa Claus
By Larry M. Elkin, CPA, CFP®
December 24, 2009
The ice is nice and thick at the North Pole this Christmas Eve. Santa and his team will be able to use the sled without adding pontoons. Neither global warming nor El Niño will stop The Jolly One from making his appointed rounds. Al Gore startled many observers at the recent United Nations climate conference in [...]
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204 view(s)
December 24, 2009
The ice is nice and thick at the North Pole this Christmas Eve. Santa and his team will be able to use the sled without adding pontoons. Neither global warming nor El Niño will stop The Jolly One from making his appointed rounds. Al Gore startled many observers at the recent United Nations climate conference in [...]
To read the complete post, click here.
204 view(s)
Finance Oracles See Trouble Ahead For Greece
By Jonathan Bergman, CFP®, EA
December 23, 2009
(Photo ©iStockphoto.com/mbbirdy) When most people think of Greece, they imagine warm ocean breezes and tranquil seaside fishing towns. But these days, when European leaders talk about Greece, the mood is anything but calm. After years of imbalanced budgets, government corruption and widespread tax evasion, Greece is now on the brink of a full-on financial crisis. The country’s debt [...]
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261 view(s)
December 23, 2009
(Photo ©iStockphoto.com/mbbirdy) When most people think of Greece, they imagine warm ocean breezes and tranquil seaside fishing towns. But these days, when European leaders talk about Greece, the mood is anything but calm. After years of imbalanced budgets, government corruption and widespread tax evasion, Greece is now on the brink of a full-on financial crisis. The country’s debt [...]
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261 view(s)
Universal Coverage: A Bus Ticket To Omaha
By Larry M. Elkin, CPA, CFP®
December 22, 2009
Is the health care overhaul staggering through the Senate this week the most important social welfare legislation in a generation, as Democratic leaders claim? Or is it so compromised that the final product is not worth the agony, and the political risk, required to produce it? The bill that cleared its first crucial test vote in [...]
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158 view(s)
December 22, 2009
Is the health care overhaul staggering through the Senate this week the most important social welfare legislation in a generation, as Democratic leaders claim? Or is it so compromised that the final product is not worth the agony, and the political risk, required to produce it? The bill that cleared its first crucial test vote in [...]
To read the complete post, click here.
158 view(s)
Seeking The Trophy CEO
By Larry M. Elkin, CPA, CFP®
December 21, 2009
Men of a certain age (mine) have an unfortunate tendency to toss aside faithful partners in favor of someone new and exciting. You’re not truly a big shot until you have that trophy wife hanging on your arm. I suppose you must be an even bigger shot if you can bag a trophy CEO. It is not [...]
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183 view(s)
December 21, 2009
Men of a certain age (mine) have an unfortunate tendency to toss aside faithful partners in favor of someone new and exciting. You’re not truly a big shot until you have that trophy wife hanging on your arm. I suppose you must be an even bigger shot if you can bag a trophy CEO. It is not [...]
To read the complete post, click here.
183 view(s)
Britain Beats Up Its Bankers, Too
By Larry M. Elkin, CPA, CFP®
December 18, 2009
No one likes bankers these days. Last week, the British government said it will levy a 50 percent tax on bonuses paid to bankers in excess of £25,000, or about $40,700. The one-time tax is being touted as a band-aid for Britain’s budget woes. Moody’s recently warned that, if the British government doesn’t deal with its deficit [...]
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172 view(s)
December 18, 2009
No one likes bankers these days. Last week, the British government said it will levy a 50 percent tax on bonuses paid to bankers in excess of £25,000, or about $40,700. The one-time tax is being touted as a band-aid for Britain’s budget woes. Moody’s recently warned that, if the British government doesn’t deal with its deficit [...]
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172 view(s)
The Estate Tax Disappears, For Now
By Larry M. Elkin, CPA, CFP®
December 17, 2009
A lot of tax professionals are going to be surprised to learn, when they read this morning’s newspaper, that the estate tax really is going on hiatus effective New Year’s Day. I am not. Events have played out pretty much as I anticipated in the commentary that appeared in this space on Aug. 20. Last night, Senate [...]
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195 view(s)
December 17, 2009
A lot of tax professionals are going to be surprised to learn, when they read this morning’s newspaper, that the estate tax really is going on hiatus effective New Year’s Day. I am not. Events have played out pretty much as I anticipated in the commentary that appeared in this space on Aug. 20. Last night, Senate [...]
To read the complete post, click here.
195 view(s)
The Longest Year
December 31, 2009
The year that ends tonight has been the longest of my life. For me – and for a lot of other people – it began on Sept. 15, 2008. That was the day Lehman Brothers collapsed, Merrill Lynch and American International Group teetered, and the world looked into an economic abyss. Everything we thought we knew [...]
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199 view(s)