Archive for May 25th, 2010

Prying eyes: gov’t hones in on your financial transactions …

May 25, 2010

The was (and is) broadscale opposition to the Patriot Act provisions that let Feds listen in to phone chats.  But, not much whining about the Feds getting their  hands on all of our health and financial records. 

ObamaCare gives the Feds access to individual health records (though they promise they won’t do anything ontoward with them) ,,,  and the new Financial Reform ductates more detailed accounting of financial transactions.

And, oh yeah, there’ll be 15,000 more IRS agents …

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Excerpted from cnnMoney.com: Stealth IRS changes mean millions of new tax forms, May 21, 2010

The 1099 is a catch-all series of IRS documents used to report non-wage income from a variety of sources like contract work, dividends, earned interest and pension distributions.

There’s  massive expansion of requirements for businesses to file 1099 tax forms that was hidden in the 2,409-page health reform bill, but it’s just one piece of a years-long legislative stealth campaign to create ways for the federal government to track down unreported income and close the so-called “tax gap”.

The federal government loses an estimated $300 billion each year from the “tax gap” between what individuals and businesses owe and what they actually pay.

A new 1099-K aims to shine a light on a currently hard-to-track payment stream: credit cards.

Starting in 2011, financial firms that process credit or debit card payments will be required to send their clients, and the IRS, an annual form documenting the year’s transactions. It applies to all payment processors, including Paypal, Amazon.com, and others that service very small businesses.

The 1099 changes attached to the health care reform bill massively expand the requirements for filing the “1099-Misc” form, which companies use for recording payments to freelance workers and other individual service providers.

Until now, payments to corporations have been exempt from 1099 rules, as have payments for the purchase of goods.

Starting in 2012, all business payments or purchases that exceed $600 in a calendar year will need to be accompanied by a 1099 filing.

In essence, the 1099-Misc is having its role changed from a form for tracking off-payroll employment to one that must accompany virtually any sizeable business transaction.

Full article:
http://money.cnn.com/2010/05/21/smallbusiness/1099_deluge/index.htm

Senior moments: Senators say “Let’s regulate ATMs” … now, somebody tell them what they are.

May 25, 2010

Congress seems willing to regulate a lot of stuff that they don’t understand.

Hard to imagine somebody flummoxed  (<= one of my favorite words)  by ATMs has got a grasp on Credit Default Swaps … go figure.

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Excerpted from Washington Post: Aging Congress flummoxed by ATMs,  May 21, 2010

Sen. Tom Harkin (D-Iowa) has long pushed an amendment to limit those pesky and expensive transaction fees at automated teller machines, but his fellow senators didn’t go along with the idea this week.

One possible explanation: Quite a few of Harkin’s aging colleagues appear to have little or no contact with the decades-old technology of cash machines.

  • Sen. Ben Nelson (D), for example, told the Omaha World-Herald this week that he has never once used an ATM, relying on bank tellers instead.
  • Sen. Mike Johanns (R), has used his ATM card fewer than five times.
  • Sen. Charles E. Grassley (Iowa), the ranking Republican on the Finance Committee has a bank card but doesn’t use it for cash.

The remarks also appear to provide further evidence of cloistered politicians and a generation gap in the halls of an aging Congress.

The average age of members is among the highest of any Congress in the past century

  • The average age of senators is 63.1 years, which is three years higher than it was four years ago;
  • The average for the House was 57.2 years, which is up by two years.
  • The Senate’s longest-serving member, Robert C. Byrd (D-W.Va.), is 92.

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Factoids

The first ATMs appeared in the United States in 1969 … there are more than 1.7 million machines worldwide.

Over 90%  percent of consumers use an ATM … about 60 percent of consumers use their bank’s ATM up to five time a month … ,12 percent use it at least 10 times a month.

Most banks barely break even on ATM fees — free customer withdrawals are typically paid for with charges to noncustomers …  but about half the ATMs in the country are operated by independent, for profit ATM operators.

Full article:
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2010/05/20/AR2010052003613.html?wpisrc=nl_tech

CBS goes retro … and I’m a happy man.

May 25, 2010

My 3 favorite TV shows of all time are 24, Mannix, and Hawaii Five-0.

So, my pulse elevated when I read that next year’s program line-up at CBS includes  a reinvention of Hawaii Five-O,”the tropical police series that was a top-ten CBS program in the early 1970s”.”

Below is a pic of the cast.  Guy on the left must be Danny (originally played by James MacArthur), guy in the middle must be Chin-Ho Kelly (originally played by Kam Fong) and the guy on the right must be Kono (originally played by a dude named Zulu).

image 
Left to right: Scott Caan, Daniel Dae Kim, Alex O’Loughlin and Grace Park in the new ‘Hawaii-Five-O’ series.

But, the cast picture begs two questions:

(1) Where’s McGarrett ?

(2) What’s with the girl ?

All I can say is “Book him, Danno !”

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WSJ: Playing It Safe: New CBS Lineup Includes Crime Dramas, Remake, May 19, 2010 http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052748704912004575252683905115498.html?mod=djemMM_t