-
Rural Mainstreet Index Continues to Weaken
Creighton University prepares a Rural Mainstreet Index that measures the economic outlook for the agricultural/rural sector of the economy. An index reading of 50 indicates growth neutral. The index for June 2013 was at 60.5 and for June of this year, it has dropped to 53.6, almost growth neutral. The index is composed of a […]
-
Section 179 and Bonus Depreciation Update
I seem to get more emails, phone calls and conversations regarding Section 179 and bonus depreciation compared to any other question. Both the Senate and House have either discussed or proposed several bills to extend bonus depreciation and Section 179 or make them permanent. In my opinion none of these bills will ultimately be passed […]
-
Communicate, Communicate, Communicate!
I was in Omaha yesterday with Dick Wittman and a local attorney doing a seminar for the Legacy Project on succession planning. One member of the audience mentioned that he felt like we had poured 100,000 bushels of corn into a 20,000 bushel grain bin. I know we covered a lot of material, but the […]
-
Help on Updating Your Payment Yield
Farmdoc Daily released information on Friday on updating your farm payment yields. These payment yields will be used in calculating any PLC payments and will not affect ARC calculations. However, if the option to update yields will result in higher yields, it will usually pay to update the yield since future farm bills may refer […]
-
Watch Out for Spousal Inherited IRAs
Spouses who inherited IRAs have a couple of elections available to them that non-spouses do not have. However, care must be taken to make sure that the 10% early withdrawal penalty does not apply when distributions are finally taken. When a spouse passes away owning an IRA whose beneficiary is the surviving spouse, that spouse […]
-
The 12 Day Business Trip
Today starts my (its seems annual) 12 day business trip to the Midwest. I start in the Minneapolis office for a couple of days of meetings with CLA staff and then head over to the Sioux Falls area for meetings with clients and prospects. I then head down to Omaha for a Monday seminar I […]
-
ARC-IC Allows for Maximizing Flexibility (Perhaps)
Under the new farm bill, Agricultural Risk Coverage (ARC) has two elective components. You can either elect county coverage on a covered crop by crop basis (ARC-CO) or elect to have ARC apply to all crops grown on your farm (ARC-IC). If you elect county coverage, you will be paid on each covered crop’s base […]
-
IRS Modifies Offshore Voluntary Disclosure Program (OVDP)
On June 18, 2014, the IRS announced new updated procedures for the voluntary disclosure program and new streamline filing procedures which in many cases substantially reduces the penalty exposure for non compliant taxpayers to 5% of the highest balance in foreign accounts and non-declared assets. I have personally worked with clients that were involved in […]
-
The Continued Attack on Section 1031 exchanges
In the FY2015 budget proposal released by President Obama back in March of this year was certain provisions of importance to farmers. One provision is the permanent extension of Section 179 at the $500,000 level. This would be a welcome change, however, as previously discussed in several posts, this will not happen until after the […]
-
Trends in Irrigated Ground
I have seen numerous farmers with farm ground in normally non-irrigated areas of the corn belt put in irrigation over the last couple of years. Based on this, I thought I would recap the trends shown in irrigated ground from the 2012 AG census In 1997, there were 15 states that had more than a […]
