Hiring Independent Contractors Carries Hidden Risks
While the number of workers choosing to become independent contractors is growing, companies who hire them may face a hidden downside to this trend ' lengthy IRS or state audits, heavy fines, and discrimination lawsuits ' all due to employer misclassification of "1099 workers."
Litigation
Recent rulings of importance to you and your practice.
Who Gets the Tax Refund?
Income tax refunds can involve substantial sums, and are a frequent source of disputes between divorcing spouses. Before advising a client regarding distribution of a joint tax refund, the matrimonial practitioner should review the applicable law. Federal tax law often dictates a different result from that of state equitable distribution or community property law, and the lawyer must know the difference. Liability for taxes does not necessarily confer a property interest. For example, although the parties to a joint federal income tax return are jointly and severally liable for the taxes payable for the year in question, and although the refund check is drawn to the order of the parties jointly, they do not necessarily have joint ownership rights to the tax refund.
The Changing and Conflicting State of Same-Sex Marriage
The May 17, 2004 legalization of same-sex marriage in Massachusetts cleared a symbolic and practical barrier to marriage between persons of the same sex within the United States, as the state became the first in the U.S. to give legal sanction to marriage between persons without regard to gender. The formal legal acceptance of same-sex marriage by a single jurisdiction within the United States, however, merely exacerbated a problem that has been developing and evolving for some time: the growing legal uncertainty brought by the legalization of same-sex marriage and unions by certain jurisdictions on the one hand, and increasing efforts to prohibit them from being granted or recognized, in others.
Heterosexual Discrimination By California Courts?
A Los Angeles District Court of Appeal threw out a suit by a man claiming that unmarried couples of the opposite sex should have the same right as same-sex couples to file wrongful-death suits. Jack Holguin said the law's exclusion of unmarried heterosexual couples violates his equal protection rights. <i>Holguin v. Flores</i>, B168774, Los Angeles' 2nd District Court of Appeal, Sept. 15, 2004. Holguin's girlfriend, Tamara Booth, was killed in a car accident. They had lived together for 3 years, but never married.
Best Software Technologies For Boosting Realization
<i>A&FP</i>'s July edition included an article describing how one large firm methodically improved collections with due regard for the delicacy of client relationships. To that same end, this new article by Jim Hammond explores software technologies that help focus and streamline a firm's collections efforts.
Origination Tracking: Findings From The A-W Survey
As a counterpoint to the September edition's commentary by Joel A. Rose on tracking of partner contributions, here's a statistics-based line of thought from Jim Cotterman; this article expands on his introduction to Altman-Weil's 2003 Survey of Compensation Systems in Private Law Firms.
Improved Revenue Forecasting
Paramount among the many analytic challenges facing Law firm CFOs and their financial staff is accurately forecasting cash. Relying on the law of large numbers, most firms assume that prior averages will hold, so they use history-based, firm-wide performance ratios to obtain cash flow projections.<br>In a growing firm, this simplistic approach has an inherent weakness: over-budgeting revenue. The problem is that not all of this year's growing production will be collected this year.
Corporate Tax Law Ends 'Double Taxation' Of Contingent Fees
Last year's November issue of <i>A&FP</i> editorialized against the IRS practice that is corrected, at least prospectively, by this legislation. As noted in that editorial, even the IRS's own Taxpayer Advocate supported such a correction. Passage of the new Act supports the argument that double taxation of contingency fees in such cases had never been the intent of Congress. Employment law and civil rights plaintiffs who previously held back from pursuing modest claims to avoid catastrophic income tax consequences are now free to proceed with such actions.
