Tax Guru-Ker$tetter Letter

Wednesday, January 12, 2005

Expiring Tax Provisions

One of the many frustrations in dealing with the tax system in this country is the propensity for our rulers to continuously tinker with it. To say that it is a constantly moving target is quite the understatement.

To add to the already mind boggling level of complexity is the fact that so many of the minute details of the tax code have different expiration dates. These are meant to give our rulers an opportunity to revisit those issues on a perpetual basis and renew them for a few more years, or just allow them to die off.

Thanks to Tom Herman at the Wall Street Journal for the link to this recently published 18 page pdf list of the various tax provisions expiring for each year from 2004 through 2014. Most of them are esoteric items that few regular people ever encounter; but some are very important, such as an end to the reduced capital gain rates at the end of 2008.

Of course, this entire list is subject to change at the whim of our rulers, especially if the tax reform panel does anything.

- posted by Kerry M. Kerstetter, MBA~CPA~ATP~ATA @ 1/12/2005 06:13:00 PM Send this post: