Whether this marks the end of your tax season for 2010 or is just a pit stop on the way to October 15th, it’s certainly a day that gets marked on the calendar of many a tax sage.
In case you’re completely oblivious to the significance of this day, it marks the extended filing deadline for corporations, partnerships and trusts. That amounts to metric asston of returns and there’s probably more than a few people that suffer nervous breakdowns on the road to this annual deadline.
Whether or not you’ll be drinking your lunch today, it’s a nice reminder (or an excruciating one) that all things – including CFOs and Lindsay Lohan (what’s taking so long?) – eventually pass.
You can express joy or resentment about your successful completion of tax season 2010. It was your last, right? Sure. We’ve heard that before. Anyway, if this marks end, go enjoy yourself this evening.
But of course, we haven’t forgotten that there are plenty of you that have 30 days to go. Feel free to bitch and moan and then get back to work.
A daylong hostage standoff ended late Wednesday when an armed, disabled man wheeled himself out of a post office in Wytheville, Virginia, and was taken into custody, police said.
The alleged gunman, identified by police as Warren “Gator” Taylor, 53, of Sullivan County, Tennessee, surrendered in a wheelchair, said Wythe County Sherrif’s Office Chief Deputy Keith Dunagan. All three hostages walked out without injury.
…
He asked for a pizza but made no other demands, [the police] said. He seemed neither angry nor disgruntled but did utter complaints about government and taxes…When the supreme pizza that police ordered was more than half an hour late, Taylor joked that Pizza Hut promises delivery in less than half an hour or the food is free.
Apparently there’s been a bit of unnecessary confusion out there about the deductibility of marijuana for medical purposes. The Wall St. Journal article that we linked to this morning discusses the problems employers are encountering wi e.g. can’t use HSA funds; they don’t care if you’ve got a card, if you test positive you’re fired).
But the question of deducting the cost of your White Widow et al. that you legally purchase in states like California and Colorado has been making the rounds. After a little discussion, it’s pretty clear that the IRS is not going allow you deduct your pot for tax purposes simply because it’s still illegal at the Federal level. Doctor’s note be damned.
The confusion arose due to the following letter that was sent to New York Senator Chuck Schumer, who had sent a letter to the IRS inquiring about a constituent using a “herb” to treat migraine headaches:
As with many facets of how to treat medical marijuana for tax and other purposes, it appears that those in charge are merely tiptoeing around the question. In the letter, the term “marijuana” is never used explicitly – the term used is “herb”. While it’s my understanding that the specifics of the case involved medical marijuana used for the treatment of migraines, that isn’t specifically stated in the sanitized version of the letter. No use of “marijuana”, just the term “herb.” That could be St. Johns Wort or milk thistle as far as the IRS is concerned.
Fortunately TaxProf Paul Caron clears up for us in a couple of updates from his latest post on this issue:
Update #2:Rev. Rul. 97-9, 1997-1 CB 77, specifically precludes a medical expense deduction for medical marijuana:
An amount paid to obtain a controlled substance (such as marijuana) for medical purposes, in violation of federal law, is not a deductible expense for medical care under § 213. This holding applies even if the state law requires a prescription of a physician to obtain and use the controlled substance and the taxpayer obtains a prescription.
So the IRS in Info. 2010-0080 either was (1) signalling a retreat from its position in Rev. Rul. 97-9 by not mentioning the federal legality of the substance; (2) implicitly referring only to legal herbs (and hence not covering marijuana).
Update #3: I am told by an enterprising reporter that the herb in question in Info. 2010-0080 is Petadolex, so it appears that interpretation #2 above controls and the conclusion in Rev. Rul. 97-9 denying a medical expense deduction for medicial marijuana still obtains.
So there you have it. Regardless if you have glaucoma, cancer, HIV, chronic pain, high anxiety or any ailment that marijuana can effectively alleviate, don’t bother trying to include it on Schedule A. We’d ask the IRS to implore a little common sense here but legally, as long as marijuana remains illegal at the federal level that’s not going to happen. And from a more practical standpoint, we’re still talking about the IRS.
Forty-one percent per a Treasury Inspector General for Tax Administration report. Luckily, the TIGTA has suggestions:
TIGTA recommended that the IRS analyze the accuracy of returns prepared at individual volunteer sites to identify patterns and concerns on which to focus education, training and accountability. The report also suggested that the IRS improve the intake sheet that is used at the start of the tax prep process to include questions based on new tax laws and filing status, and improve the reviews of intake sheets and returns completed at volunteer sites.
The TIGTA anonymously sent auditors to volunteer testing sites which seems pretty unfair. If those sneaky bastards had reviewed the tax returns instead of Monday morning quarterbacking the volunteers maybe there would’ve been less mistakes. Just a thought.
Whether this marks the end of your tax season for 2010 or is just a pit stop on the way to October 15th, it’s certainly a day that gets marked on the calendar of many a tax sage.