When people win money on a game show?
The maximum in Federal taxes is 35%. Generally, that is the amount that is taken out for large dollar winnings. If you're slick enough, you can channel a bunch of the money into various tax free 'shelters' that will drop the amount you really do have to pay money on. For example, if you just got the money now, you could look into dumping into IRAs and making the rest into 'gifts' to family members. Most people never make use of all the available tax benefits with which to protect the winnings. If you aren't sure what any of this means, go talk to a tax accountant. For the cost of hiring the guy, you could probably save ten times the amount you would otherwise lose in taxes.
So, being an accountant is not permissible?
Asalam Alaikum, I am Accountant with 15years of experience, It is true that according to a well known Hadith those who invoke the curse of Allah with regard to a transaction of Riba (interest or usury) include a person 'who has written the interest'. However, this Hadith refers to the scribe of the transaction i.e. a person who has written an agreement or prepared the document to evidence the transaction. It does not include a person who was not involved in the transaction itself in any way, but while preparing the accounts of a person, has come across reference to the Riba transaction and has recorded it as an event that has already happened without his involvement. This is how the scholars have interpreted the Hadith: Al-Ubbi, the famous commentator of Sahih Muslim has explained the Hadith in the following manner: 'By the word 'writer of Riba' the Hadith intends the scribe of the document evidencing the transaction of Riba, and by the word 'witness' it means a person who attended the occasion to become a formal witness in support of the transaction. The Holy Prophet (Sallallaahu !layhi Wasallam) has held them all as equal in sin because the transaction took place only with their joint efforts.' It is evident from these references that it is the writing of the document of Riba which invokes the curse of Allah and not its subsequent recording in a statement of the facts that already happened. Therefore, the case of an Accountant of a firm or a company is different from the person who is directly responsible for the operation of interests. So far as the accountant is not involved in charging interest, claiming it from the debtor or pursuing him for that matter, merely making entries in the books of account will not make him liable to fall within the ambit of prohibition stipulated in the Hadith. Unless the major part (at least 51%) of the company isharam it is not prohibited to draw salary for permissible services rendered to that company.
I’m not going to name any particular tax preparation chain, for fear of getting sued, but it’s my opinion that in general, those chains aren’t much cheaper than most personal accountants (of course, there are some accountants that cater to high income clientele with complicated returns and accordingly charge much higher than average fees), are staffed largely by people who don’t do much more than enter your data, don’t really know a lot of tax rules particularly well and offer nothing in the way of tax planning for the next year. On top of that, some try to sell you a sort of “prepaid audit defense” meaning if you pay them this extra fee on top of their normal tax preparation fees, they will represent you in an audit. I believe this is generally a scam because most people, particularly those who visit these chains in the first place, will never need to be represented in an audit.TurboTax is perfectly fine if you are single, work a regular job, don’t have much in the way of investment income and don’t itemize deductions (which far fewer people will do in light of the new tax laws). It is also much cheaper than the tax preparation chains. I used it for many years myself when my situation was simple enough.As far as tax professionals/accountants go, it’s a matter of selecting someone that is a good fit, can get a good grasp of your situation and with whom you are comfortable sharing a decent amount of your financial information. Like any professional service, there are plenty of “bad apples” out there but I believe most tax professionals do everything to make sure their clients’ tax returns are done properly, minimize the tax liability and put their clients’ interests first. The fees they charge are generally worth it - unless of course, your situation is as simple as what I mentioned in the previous paragraph.
Can someone please explain taxes to me?
great that you are interested in what is going on and you might go to www.irs.gov and find publication 17, you can read it or down load it, but is good to help you understand as for people being glad when they have completed the return, most people don't keep track of what they make and what they spend during the year so they have to sort thru all the sfuff they have neglected 12 months to get it together in a matter of three months everyone who makes any kind of income files a tax return annually, they may have money coming back to them since they might not owe what was withheld from their paychecks or if they didn't they might owe money--a big fear for far too many
Do Semi Qualified Chartered Accountants have Earnings GREATER than qualified Chartered Accountants ??My one line answer “IT DEPENDS ON YOUR ATTITUDE AND KNOWLEDGE”,I have a real life story of a person whom I know. His name is Mr. Singh(Name Changed).Mr Singh, despite giving multiple attempts, was unable to clear a single group of CA finals left CA in 2001, and started doing accounting work by visiting client’s offices(he could not afford a office that time).Because of his dedication and hard work, his clients started giving him work of Tax and other Compliances work also. Within a period of 3 years, he could manage to buy a small office in Grade B town of Haryana.Seeing his growth he decided to do LLB(Just for Tag), because a professional degree was good for his accounting practice and his image.In accounting and Taxation work he was doing good, but not great. Mr Singh’s started bank finance work for his clients, from here his real success started.I came into his contact in 2012 as he wanted to share some professional work with me. Once, one of his staff member said to me “ Pravesh ji, hamare sir ke paas 1500 files hein clients ki (Our Sir, has 1500 client files)”.After hearing this I did not believe him first and I thought “His staff is trying to impress me and lying unnecessarily ” , but when Mr Singh started sending professional work to me, I got to realise the truth.A. Today Mr Singh is one of top Taxation Lawyers of his town.B. He made multiple representations to Haryana government for GST.C. According to my estimates, he must be earning 60- 65 lakhs(He started some businesses also) a year after deducting all expenditures.D. He owns a Skoda Octavia(New Model) and a Baleno.E. He owns a 4500 square feet house in NCR(National Capital Region) and has spent Rs. 1.5 Crores( He himself told me) for it’s construction.F. Since last three years he has been going abroad for vacation( Singapore, Dubai and Europe this year).G. He owns two offices, one in his home town and other one in NCR(National Capital Region).So this is the success story of Mr Singh, who did not bent in front of his failures, kept hustling in his life and today he is earning better than many (not all) qualified CAs.DISCLAIMER: My answer should not be reckoned as my support to the idea of leaving CA in middle. I always suggest CA students to complete their education and then think about earning.ThanksPravesh
Types of Accounting Jobs!!!?
I am in school and looking to be an Accountant. I have realized that there is much more to the norm of what I considered to be an Accountant. I have to write a paper on what I want to do in my future career and I am lost for I don't know all of the types of Accounting jobs there are. Can someone please tell me what types (all of them) of Accounting jobs there are and a brief description of what they do. I will be getting a Bachelors in Accounting. Thanks!!!
Under accounting I see CPA and PC. What are the the two titles? Which is better to use in a small bus?
If you're looking in the yellow pages I think what you're seeing is differences in the naming of CPA practices. Some might just call their business Smith & Jones, CPA. If they incorporated the professional practice as a professional corporation, they would list it as Smith & Jones, CPA, PC to meet the state's legal requirement that if you're operating as a corporation that fact must be disclosed as part of the name. Generally state law doesn't allow professionals to incorporate as a general business corporation and use the abbreviation Inc in their names as you might with, for example, Toms BBQ, Inc. As to who you should use for your business you should find a CPA that you are comfortable talking to and wouldn't mind having lunch with at your restaurant. You don't want one who is too busy to talk to you or who talks down to you or tries to impress you with buzz words and jargon.
Peter and Carl gave great answers, but let's break it down into basics. I took some accounting in my MBA program.You do not need math beyond basic arithmetic. People think accounting is about math but it's not. It's about the proper recording of a business' activities using accepted principles (either GAAP or IFRS).People also confuse finance and accounting. Finance starts with the time value of money and moves on from there. Finance is more about the efficient deployment of capital. You learn things like Black-Scholes to price options. Or, portfolio theory. In finance, I would say you need a much stronger foundation in math since finance equations use stats, calculus, differential equations, etc.In accounting, you learn about assets and liabilities. Credits and debits. Cost accounting and its effects on behavior and its tax effects.One last example: Let's talk about a simple retail example of buying a product in Q1 for $10 and selling it in Q2 for $20.An accountant would tell you that COGS was $10, revenue was $20, and profit is $10 in Q2. A finance person would see $10 as a cash outflow in Q1, calculate the inventory holding costs (cost of capital), and see a cash inflow in Q2 of $20. He would tell you profit is something less than $10 because of the opportunity cost of capital being locked up in inventory.I'm not sure that makes sense to you just yet, but the point is both the accountant AND the finance person are right. It's just how you want to see the world.