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Financial tips and hacks for small business owners

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Sequestration hits Friday: Will Your Business Take a Hit?

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Sequestration hits Friday, and your small business may not be spared from the effects. Big Budget Cuts Coming Friday: Will Your Business Take a Hit? At this stage in the negotiations, it appears almost certain that a deal to avert sequestration will not be reached in time to prevent $85 billion in budget cuts from going into effect on Friday. Congress and the Executive Branch are too far apart on how to ameliorate these cuts, and each party believes the other will suffer more politically from … [Read more...]

3 Dumb Mistakes That Can Lead to a Tax Audit

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Several Mistakes That Can Lead to a Tax Audit. Don't let one of these dumb mistakes be one of them. The fear of being audited keeps millions of small-business owners up at night, especially during tax season. While the number of tax returns audited each year is around 1 percent of total returns filed, that doesn’t do much to pacify the fears of tax filers. Small-business owners and self-employed people with higher incomes are at a greater risk of being audited in part because it is easier for … [Read more...]

Do Wealthy Business Owners Need Long-term Care Insurance?

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Even if your filthy rich, long-term care insurance may be the best way to make sure you have a good quality of life when you're old. A long-term care insurance (LTCI) policy is an important financial planning tool. It helps cover the costs incurred by policyholders who can no longer take care of themselves due to illness, injury or old age. The policies usually protect the insured for expense that traditional health insurance, including Medicare, may not cover as well for periods of time that … [Read more...]

How to Tell if You Need to Hire a CFO

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Know how to read the signs that tell you its time to hire a CFO. As small businesses grow, managing cash becomes far more complex. You have to: forecast cash needs and cash receipts, establish processes for tracking payments and dealing with late payers, produce financial statements, establish budgets, invest unused cash and much more. If you expect to keep growing your business, you can’t spend all of your time managing your money. Waiting too long to hire a full-time finance person can … [Read more...]

When is a Business Expense Not a Business Expense?

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The IRS is pretty strict when it comes to deducting expenses and some of their restrictions may surprise you at tax time. When is a Business Expense Not a Business Expense? Answer: When the IRS says it isn’t. This detail can cause many headaches for small-business owners, especially those who keep track of their own accounting.  When managing your company’s accounts, you should follow what are known as Generally Accepted Accounting Principles or GAAP. For many small businesses, GAAP is pretty … [Read more...]

Do Success Stories Like Facebook Do More Harm Than Good?

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Too many Mark Zuckerberg Wanna-bees are warping the meaning and process of entrepreneurship. Do Success Stories Like Facebook Do More Harm Than Good? I’ll admit it's a tempting fantasy. The notion of coming up with an idea on the spur of the moment, turning into a startup business and then raising hundreds of millions of investor dollars at a nine-figure valuation is intoxicating. What business owner wouldn’t want that? There is an elite club of startups that are either pre-revenue or have … [Read more...]

Don’t Be Afraid of the Big, Bad Financial Statement

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Financial statements can be a small-business owner's best friend. Don't avoid them. Many small-business owners have a natural aversion to finance and financial statements. Unlike sales or product development, which are considered core to success, finance is seen as a necessary evil that's best left to accountants and “numbers guys.” Part of this perception is the fault of the finance industry itself, which loves to use jargon. The income statement, for example, is also called the operations … [Read more...]

Minimum Wage Debate: Is $9 an Hour Not Enough or Too Much?

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The controversy over raising the minimum wage is raging once again. Does raising the minimum wage help or hurt workers? In political, business and economic circles, this is a debate that's still raging and is hardly anywhere near being settled. All sides point to studies that produce results supporting their particular point of view. The current minimum wage battle opened a new front when Alan Krueger, chairman of the President’s Council of Economic Advisers, proposed that the federal … [Read more...]

You Won’t Believe the USPS’ Latest Plan for Survival

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After losing $16 billion, the USPS thinks going from the route to the runway will help. The United States Postal Service recently announced that it's getting into the fashion business. According to corporate licensing manager Steven Mills, USPS is launching a men’s outerwear line called “Rain Heat & Snow.” But women aren't being left out of the fun; the USPS plans to launch a women’s line soon as well. In case you want to try the clothes on before buying them, they’ll be available in major … [Read more...]

President Neglects Small Business in Tax Plan

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President Obama's tax plan to lower business taxes doesn't help small business. As part of his plan to reform the tax code, President Obama has called for lowering marginal tax rates on corporate income. According to the President’s plan, announced in the State of the Union Address, the top corporate marginal tax rate would be lowered from 35 percent to 28 percent. While this is a welcomed proposal, the benefits to small businesses are negligible. The overwhelming majority of small … [Read more...]