Obama and the Self Employed - More Tax On Business = Less Jobs Created

Posted Today at 12:31 AM by corporatefactors.net Category: Business General

If you want jobs you have to create business. Creating more business means creating more jobs.

There can be no new jobs without the creation of business. Once again more tax is imposed on business owners under the new Obama plan.

With one company going bankrupt after next and more people getting laid off from their jobs in record numbers, how then do we find jobs if they can't be created ?

Test Question?

How will business owners deal with this new tax?

Answer?

By laying off people not hiring new people.

What is the incentive to start up a new business and create new jobs?

Correct me if I am wrong, but if you add up city, state, fed tax, health tax, and all other tax you could expect to pay in a business, are we not well past over 50% of every dollar earned by a business paid out in one form of tax or another.

It's the whole tax picture we have to keep an eye on.

Corporate Research - How much can you afford to lose?

From the http://www.corporatefactors.net/ Business & Venture Capital Forums !!

Corporate Research – Background checks by Karen Blau

You are a venture capitalist considering investing in a company. Or –You have found a business you want to buy.

Or –You are ready to start a new business, and you are considering a partner.

You know the industry, the business plan makes sense.

Now –How much can you afford to lose? Everything you have invested – and more?

Gather round, children, for a scary bedtime story.

Our client, one of the biggest casino owners in Las Vegas, wanted to build a casino in a certain Pacific Rim country. They know lots about the gaming industry, but nothing about the rules and regulations of that country, or its culture. Furthermore, they want to associate the casino with an online poker website.

They have been approached by Michael W., who has told them that he is the “only” person who can put this project together, and it will be successful beyond all expectations. He has all the connections and the know-how.

They client has checked him on the Internet, and has seen that he is of Asian descent and has been the President of two Internet gaming companies.Realizing that not just money, but the reputation of their existing casino at stake, they request a background check.Findings? Michael had been forced to resign from the first company.

Although it was a public company, there was nothing in the annual report about the reason, although he left without notice. We tracked down the former CFO of the company in the Caribbean, who described Michael’s flagrant abuse of the company’s resources, and noted that “he is the least scrupulous guy I ever worked for”. Did I mention the police raid on the corporate offices a year after he took the helm? Something about pornography, illegal gambling, money laundering…

The head office eventually relocated to Antigua. The second gaming company refused to discuss Michael with us.We also found two criminal actions against Michael, one for impaired driving; one for driving without a licence. There were five civil court cases involving Michael as a defendant.

The issue in four of the cases was his failure to pay for work for which he had contracted personally. A Writ of Seizure and Sale had issued against Michael for unpaid income. There was a similar action against him in another state according to federal court records.Needless to say, the client decided against a partnership with Michael.

And what is Michael doing today? He is an investment-banking consultant.Remember, knowledge = power.

Karen Blau can be reached for Due Diligence at intelligence@karenblau.com or check out the website: Intelligence - KarenBlau.com - Reduce your risk, make informed decisions

Fallout from Madoff & Asset Protection

By Jeff Lipton

The last thing anybody needed was further distrust in this current environment.

As if fear of the unknown was not bad enough the fact that someone could hide such a Ponzi scheme for so very long and under the eyes of regulators only further emphasizes the fact that there is no free lunch and no wizards who are so incredibly bright that they can out-pace the market.

When the market was falling and those Madoff investors were still seeing gains on essentially a covered call strategy what did they believe was happening?

I will tell you, it’s another case of the fact that some people see hedge funds and their managers as these mystical brilliant masters of intellect who can defy all laws of probability with their cunning and guile.

The answer is that hedge funds operate in an unregulated market place, and as masters such as Warren Buffet have proven for decades, you cannot out-think the market place consistently for any length of time.

As Buffett has pointed out; buy the best in the industry, one that does not rely on the government or subsidy to earn its market share and hold. Yet there are many who felt that Madoff was smarter, the fact that he was unaccountable and mysterious added to the mythical proportions of this wizard from hell.This is the similar in the world of asset protection, and there are some parallel axioms. Don’t move your assets into any structure (offshore trust, foundation ect.) that is not regulated and the partners (your banker, broker, trustee and custodian) are not regulated and transparent.

Don’t trust some company in an offshore locale with your assets unless the aforementioned is true. It’s an old story, but hundreds are ripped off each year in offshore trust, foundation, or corporate schemes. Many are too embarrassed or its non declared money that gets ripped off or they are charged fees and can’t complain because of the non transparent or non declared nature of the assets.

This was some of thinking behind asset protection insurance™, there was a need for a transparent way to insure assets against creditors and that all parties to the equation were regulated, licensed, and accountable.

This is not the case with the majority of offshore trust or foundation providers, nor do you have the benefit of choice of their bank, broker or custodian (or even how and if they are regulated).

Follow the lead of your smaller domestic life interests, if you don’t know or don’t understand, don’t do it. Especially in regard to asset protection strategies, go with regulated, licensed, accountable and transparent partners and products and declare the process or you may never be able to avail yourself of the ability to use the law to protect your assets when you need to.

Madoff Cont ...

I am always amazed at the hypocritical regulatory finger pointing when a fraud is not found as in Madoff but even angrier by the usual knee jerk reactions and the closing of the barn door after the horses are out.In this case people have been saying for years before and after the Long Term Capital that hedge funds must be regulated a lot closer.

In fact having worked offshore for many years I can tell you that its harder to open up a bank account in Barbados than New York, Paris or London, or set up a trust or purchase asset protection insurance.

You would need a passport, two utility bills three letters of reference (one from a bank) all notarized. But yet billions go unnoticed in the surreal institutional world.

Even more amazing is the fact that there not only several intuitions but competitors who actually complained of the fact that Madoff was involved in a Ponzi scheme early on, but yet nothing.

All of the fund business adheres to the regulatory world except hedge funds that are offshore funds and “not as closely regulated”?This is not true all of the offshore funds, our clients buy a lot offshore funds but they are regulated very closely.

Hedge funds are essentially private funds and are not regulated and the issue of the audit and supporting documentation must be scrutinized, what kind of lax double standards these institutions that look down their noses at everyone have.

Truth is all of Madoff’s clients are guilty of the greater fool theory and maybe now we will get disclosure in an industry (hedge funds) that has proven once again that it must be more closely regulated and monitored.

Lastly, let’s all stop with that foolish belief that anyone is that much smarter than the market (and thus not scrutinized because we apparently cannot understand what they do so why bother?). Or that they can get consistent double digit returns over years and without risk, for its this foolishness that makes Ponzi schemers flourish, lets regulate this industry so that it plays on the same filed as all other funds and institutions.

Axioms of Asset Protection

By Jeff Lipton

I am always asked and I am tired of repeating myself, additionally I am tired of all of the hucksters, fraud artists and usual hangers-on that make anything to do with asset protection or off shore planning sleazy and untoward.

I am angry that I try and convince people that you can no longer hide assets from economic predators (governments, partners, litigants, creditors, ex-spouses, family ect.) , and that it’s no longer difficult to find you or your money.

Thus, please find as my gift, to keep out of trouble and enjoy the protection afforded by real asset protection working effectively to disenfranchise economic predators, the following axioms of asset protection.

I will expound on each in days to come;Axioms of Asset Protection;

a) Do not go offshore unless it’s for asset protection,

b) Asset protection requires a fully disclosed irrevocable disposition of assets in order to work effectively and legally, this means that the structure will be visible and thus defendable at law and yes taxable (remember you are doing this for asset protection not hide from the tax-man!).

All structures (trusts, foundations, asset protection insurance) require the aforementioned to be effective for legal asset protection to work.

Protecting Your Inheritance

Jeff Lipton


This is a recent question I received which I thought I would post to the blog and forum:

Dear Jeff:

Q;

I have an inheritance of $400,000 coming to me and I also have some stocks, I am planning to marry soon and want to insure that this money is outside of the marital assets and that I can safely pass these assets to any future generations.
Samuel

A;

In regard to the $400,000 note that you should not try to hide the existence of the asset as that will involve an immediate element of distrust and in reality you would only be potentially perjuring yourself should you be discovered (in the legal sense of the word) in a subsequent litigious matter.

The use of either a declared asset protection trust or simple asset protection insurance, will allow for those assets (the inheritance and the stocks) to be placed into an asset protection structure. They would be in normal cases outside of the ability of a court of Family Law courts to attach if the they were irrevocably transferred (which would include taxes being paid) and declared and the structure resides in another jurisdiction.

Asset protection insurance is a superior vehicle to protect them as those assets would have had to have been irrevocably transferred into the policy for the benefit of beneficiaries and domestic courts could not attach these assets. The trust subjects itself to the risk of being what is termed a sham trust, and is not as flexible of a vehicle.

Lastly, family courts would in fact try to do an even up of existing assets that exist within your domestic jurisdiction. Meaning that if there were $400,000 plus asset value in a house or a business the split would not be 50-50 on these assets and the judge may attempt to compensate the other spouse from those assets. That said, the goal is protect the $400,000 plus for the benefit of beneficiaries and in this regard no extraterritorial decree from a judge can affect the disposition or use of the $400,000 plus assets.

Many a spouse in this position will name the other spouse a beneficiary of the policy, thus difficult to say that the spouse has been disenfranchised, and yet the critical rational for protecting these assets is to insure that the original beneficiaries which may the couple’s children and the spouse, receive these assets and that they are not tampered with or their course of use altered if the spouse remarries.

In many cases it’s more important to insure that those assets benefit the children and a subsequent marital event cannot alter their future use. If the other spouse is named as a beneficiary then it’s hard to argue that they have been disentitled-just the freedom for that spouse to choose has been limited and there may be some minimal even up on existing other assets.

This works, we have deployed asset protection insurance and like scenarios to protect family assets.

Asset Protection Insurance - A Great Idea !!

By Jeff Lipton

We have a unique insurance product that fulfils many long-term needs such as: Creditor Proofing; Intergenerational Rollover of Assets; An Alternative to Liability Insurance; and Protection of Intellectual Property (including royalty, license and any payment streams).

Creditor Proof Your Assets Against Future Liabilities This product will creditor proof your assets and insures their replacement should a successful attack on your assets ever occur. It is effective against any creditor or claimant; be they clients, business associates, partners, or personal contacts (your current family or future members of your estate).

Virtually any asset can be protected in a policy including cash and securities, but real estate, private equity, gems, art and intellectual property.
Intergenerational Rollover of Assets The product will dovetail with any estate plan, freeze and existing insurance planning proposal.

In fact, it will not only protect assets for future generations from the standpoint of all litigation and/or regulatory, family, or economic incident, but do so for as much as 100 years in the future. Families can rest assured that all assets will transfer unencumbered and as planned regardless of intervening future events. This is a superior alternative to prenuptial agreements. Alternative to Liability Insurance this product is designed to replace costly initiatives such as medical malpractice insurance but is equally applicable to any liability coverage. It protects all of the estate assets inside the policy and rates will not increase as a result of prior claims history or subsequent findings of negligence. If you are a consumer of liability coverage that has seen rates skyrocket for any claim history, this is an excellent alternative solution.

Protection of Intellectual Property and Royalty Streams:This insurance will protect and preserve the sanctity of intellectual property from creditors and others that might seek to control or influence its use.

The policy can be administrated to allow for licensing to other parties and cash flow payments can be made directly to the policy, protecting both the asset and the resultant payment flow as well.

The insurance policy is transferrable making it an excellent vehicle for transacting the sale of intellectual property. As with all of the applications mentioned, the product is ideal for corporations, partnerships, foundations, trusts and individuals alike.

For further information on the application and usage of asset protection insurance products in detail visit our web site; www.aseassurance.com

Why Your Child Support Will Never Be Paid

By Kevin Bousquet -
Corpa Investigation www.corpa.com


Child support orders are rapidly becoming worthless (no different than judgments). It’s not a collection problem, it is an ability to have some power to get access to information like bank accounts, employment, the vehicles owned so you can collect on your order. For example, how in the world is anyone expected to find the bank account of their ex-spouse and determine if there is any money in the account?

Due to the fact that there is so much attention in the media about the Family Responsibility Office (FRO), right now, about collecting child support, I am going to help people understand the real reason why their child support will never be paid or collected.There is no point in blaming the FRO – they run into the same problems as any starving recipient trying to collect support. They send letters, they make phone calls and they manage a payment systems for those payers (lets call them debtors) who actually pay.

The failure to collect these order is not about collection at all. It’s about trying to find the assets, the employment, the bank account, the property or the vehicle of the debtor so you can collect.Your on your own and it’s and “investigative task” not a “collection task”. This is the main reason why assigning support orders to collection agencies will never work.

Collection agencies make phone calls, write letters, and report the debt into the debtor’s personal credit bureau file. They have no access to bank account information nor do they have any power to obtain the actual information you need to collect on your order. This is an investigate mission on all fronts and someone has to play detective and it won’t be any government agency doing if for you.
Here are your responsibilities:

Find a bank account.
Find property (land or a house).
Find employment.
Suspend the debtor’s driver’s licence.

Finding A Bank Account

You are expected on your own to find a bank account with money in it. You need to identify the bank (i.e. the institution) and the actual bank branch where you believe the debtor might have a bank account. You do not have to have an actual account number.How on earth is someone expected to lawfully find a bank account on a person but most importantly if there is actual money in the account? The banks certainly won’t give out this information, as they will protect their customers, and even more so now, with the new privacy legislation and fraud and identity theft on the rise.There is no system, nor any powers of a support order, which will allow recipients of support orders to properly and lawfully get bank account information in order to proceed with a garnishment. What about if the debtor works at a job for cash? or perhaps the account is joint? or is in some other name? or even a company name as with a self employed person?

Finding Property (land or a house).

It is possible in most states and provinces to take a debtor’s name and run the name through a computerized database to see if they own land or a house. But very few child support debtors put property in their name. Some may be found to own property jointly however depending on where you live you may be able to register an execution on the property. This would merely allow you collect monies only when the debtor sells the property. You would collect what is left over after all the mortgages and expenses have been paid on the sale.

Finding Employment

While you may find employment on the debtor through word of mouth, friends, relatives etc… Trying to garnish employment wages can be very difficult if not impossible if your debtor falls under one of the categories:

(Working For Cash)

(Working Under Contract)

(Self Employed)

(Low Waged Employee)

(Working For Cash)

One of the biggest reasons your child support will never be paid is the underground economy which is nothing more then a term for people who go to work everyday and are paid in cash.

Millions of people go to work every day and work for cash. They are paid in cash and never deposit their cash wages into any bank account or report their income to the IRS or Revenue Canada. If they are paid by check from a cash employeer they simply cash their check at a local cash stop store and pocket their wages in cash. People who live like this do not fear collection agencies nor are they concerned about their credit rating. They don’t need credit cards or credit as they pay cash for their expenses.

Finding out if a person is working for cash can be impossible on your own. There is no other way to show a person is working for cash then to have them followed. How do you show cash from hand to hand?

The normal course of investigation would be to have the debtor followed into work. Obtaining video or pictures of a debtor spending every business day at the same job site for eight hours yet never reporting a nickel of income.

But many who are starving for child support can not afford to hire private investigators at $50.00 to $75.00 per hour plus kilometers and expenses. Doing surveillance on your own could be illegal and dangerous from a driving stand point. When you have a debtor working for cash not paying child support or filing tax returns who then is responsible for this mess?? Is it the Family Responsibility Office or the IRS and Revenue Canada who is responsible for cleaning up the underground economy?

It is logical to expect the FRO, the IRS or Revenue Canada to follow a cash paid dead-beat dad into work at 6:00 amto a construction job-site? With all the controversy surrounding privacy concerns can we expect that anyone can solve this problem?

(Working Under Contract)

One of the biggest scams going to avoid child support (and judgments) is employers who hire a person (a debtor) under contract and call it ”contract”. This is most commonly used by employeers to avoid paying payroll taxes. When we use the word “contract” we are not talking about about a contract position or an agreement. We are talking about a situation where an employer pays an employee (the debtor) by check and makes it look on the books like the employee/debtor is a business who invoiced the company.

The debtor merely gives an invoice to the employer every second friday for his wages. No tax is deducted and no income is ever reported.Many employers create actual written agreements where the employee has to promise in writing to file taxes at the end of the year. But what many don’t realise is that this contractual relationship can be very very illegal.

If in the tax year the debtor has worked for only one employer that whole year and he has not invoiced any other company, the IRS and Revenue Canada could consider the relationship illegal.

Both the employee and the employer could face fines, penalties, and be compelled to pay all appropriate payroll taxes and deductions.

Many starving recipients of child support often wonder how the debtor they are chasing is able to go to work everyday for the same employeer yet not one nickel from the garnishment served on the company has ever been paid.

THE OTHER SIDE OF THE COIN

But what about the other side of the coin? Much of the reason why child support is not being paid is that many payers of child support cannot easily and cheaply apply to the court to have their support orders reduced if there is a change in their employment of financial situation.The result is that these payers fall drastically into arrears, being unable to afford to get their orders to reflect their true income.The ultimate result is that the payer will become so far in arrears their only alternative is the underground economy (working for cash under the table) to avoid a large garnishment of wages that may, in fact, be unfairly registered against them.Lets do the math!! The average retainer to a lawyer to have a support order reduced (or the legal term “varied”) can be anywhere from $2000.00 to $6000.00.

Days will be spent preparing court papers and attending at court hearings. For example: a seasonal worker in like a landscaper, may earn very high wages in the warm, summer months, but in the winter the wages drop or he/she may earn nothing at all.

The seasonal worker may be paying $700 per month in support, based on a job he/she had two years ago at the time of the divorce.Now, years later, the income has dropped. At $2000.00 to $6000.00 in legal fees to get an order varied who can afford to keep up every single time there is a change in employment circumstances.

Some courts will allow you to file the paper work and attend on your own (without a lawyer) yet some judges will insist you be represented by a lawyer. It’s a crap shoot if you think you can do it on your own and find a judge who will listen to you.

The Law Society of Upper Canada has just recently licensed Paralegals in Ontario. In the past a payor of child support could perhaps hire a Paralegal to cheaply assist in completing the forms to have a support order reduced.

It is now illegal for Paralegals to advertise this service and to do may aspects of family law or divorce law. This now makes it more expensive to get your support order reduced. Learn the word “no standing” real quick. There will be nothing more humiliating if you file your papers and attend at court when you are drastically in arrears depite the reasons you may have. Chances are you won’t have any standing at all before the judge despite the legitimate reasons you may have for being unable to pay and being so far into arrears.

As long as their is no system in place to reduce a child support order inexpensively and less time consuming the family court system will continue to manufacture no payers into the underground economy. You can roll your eyes all you want but no-one in their right mind will spend the time and money to have their order changed every time there is a change in financial circumstances.As would be payers fall into the underground economy, they will not only continue to not only avoid paying child support, but also personal income taxes.

To recap:1.

Until the court is willing to give more judicial powers to support orders and judgments information be impossible to find to allow people to collect on their Orders and Judgments Things like the order having authority or power to force a payer’s employer to give circumstances regarding employment. A bank being served with a support order to be compelled to report on all bank accounts registered in the payer’s name. The department of transportation upon being served with a support order being compelled to provide a vehicle and address information so a vehicle could be seized or a license suspended.

Assets have to be identified before there can be collection and/or enforcement.

2. Until a simple paper system is in place to allow parties to go to court (with or without a lawyer) to get their orders changed, simply and cheaply, there is a change in their financial circumstances, payers will continue to outsmart the system, go underground and not pay support or income taxes. It is possible to represent oneself in small claims court and landlord tenant Court but not in the family court.

These hearings could be conducted with a simple set of forms and be heard by a referee, arbitrator or registrar, instead of busy judges with overloaded family court dockets. The system right now is too complicated, time consuming and expensive.

3. The only way to catch a person working for cash is to follow them in to work – plain and simple. No search method on earth will reveal how a person is truly spending their working day if he or she is not reporting his income.Government Insurance companies like the Workmens Compensation Board (now the WSIB) spend millions of dollars to hire independent private investigation firms to use private investigators to follow (via surveillance) on would-be cheaters of the insurance system to see if they are continuing to work or faking their injuries during the business day. It’s the only way to fight this kind of fraud. Revenue Canada (or the IRS in the United States) should be teaming with the FRO to help fund Private Investigation agencies to conduct surveillance and inquiries on cheaters not only of child support but working underground for cash.

A person working for cash trying avoid child support is not only cheating the family court system but is in fact committing tax evasion. This makes the problem a joint responsibility of Revenue Canada and the IRS who continue to unsuccessfully battle the underground economy. The underground economy is partly manufactured by the failing family court and FRO system.Privatization of the FRO, or forwarding child support orders to collection agencies, will accomplish nothing in the way of actual collection.

Collection agencies make phone calls, send letters, and report to credit bureaus. It will be a waste of your tax money on a system that is already failing both sides of the coin. You can’t collect on what you don’t find. Finding assets is an investigative mission. Dead-beat parents need to be followed into work – plain and simple – there is no other way.