Category: Blog

Former President Jimmy Carter once called our tax code “a disgrace to the human race,” and there’s really not a lot to like about it. There’s at least some consolation, though, in the fact that we’re all stuck with the same maddening rules. If you and your spouse file jointly, and your ordinary taxable income is $100,000, you’ll pay the same amount as any other joint filers reporting the same $100,000 in ordinary taxable income.

In today’s new Gilded Age, Americans are constantly vying to one-up each other. You show up at your high-school reunion in a new Mercedes E-Class; then your classmate pulls up in a Maserati Quattroporte. (Some would call it a $50,000 car with a $50,000 hood ornament, but still, it’s a Maserati.) You show off a picture of your 42-foot sloop; your neighbor whips out his phone to show off his 62-foot schooner. You show up in Davos in your new GII; your business rival flies in on a GIV....

Halloween is almost here, and if it seems like things have changed since you were a kid, you’re right! Halloween has become big business, with the National Retail Federation predicting Americans will spend $9.1 billion on the festivities. That includes $3.4 billion on costumes, with top choices being superheroes, animals, princesses, witches, vampires, and zombies. And, “pets will not be left behind, with 10 percent of consumers dressing their pet as a pumpkin.” (If you’ve...

Consumer surveys consistently show that CPAs are the most trusted financial advisors of all. But what happens in the rare instance when you can’t trust your CPA? Nothing good, that’s for sure!

We live in an unfortunate era of disunity. Cultural divides, racial divides, religious divides, and political divides are threatening to tear America apart. Every so often, though, someone comes along to unite us all in a great primal scream of rage. Remember “Pharma bro” Martin Shkreli, who bought the company that manufactures the prescription Daraprim, then jacked the price from $13.50 to $750 per pill? We really do need more people like him to unite us against a common enemy.

Most of us like to eat, even if we choose to deny ourselves this pleasure from time to time. And those of us with an entrepreneurial bent often dream of opening a restaurant. Sometimes it’s a bustling cafe fronting a busy urban sidewalk. Sometimes it’s comfort food served on a rural byway. And when the dream works, it really is a dream. Just ask celebrity restaurateurs like Vanity Fair editor Graydon Carter, proprietor of Greenwich Village’s Waverly Inn, or Hollywood legend Clint...

“You better cut the pizza in four pieces because I’m not hungry enough to eat six.” Yogi Berra The calendar is full of little-known commemorations that probably escape your attention, and this month is no exception. Some of them are just silly, like September 19’s International Talk Like a Pirate Day. (Although, really, if you don’t think pirates are cool, what’s wrong with you?) Some are obscure, like September 23’s Restless Leg Awareness Day. But some...