Tips from March 10, 2010Are you collecting the maximum tax breaks from the stimulus law passed last year? Here are the 5 best business tax breaks. Bonus depreciation. Allows a business to deduct 50% of the cost of a new asset in the year it is placed in service. Section 179 expensing. A small business can elect to expense up to $250k of the cost of qualified assets. Net operating losses. Under the new law, most businesses can elect to carry back losses for up to 5 years, instead of the usual 2 years. Discharge of business debt. The stimulus law allows businesses to recognize discharge of indebtedness income over 5 years, rather than all in 2009. Exclusion of gain on the sale of qualified small business stock. Increased to 75% for any gain from a sale between Feb 09 and Jan 11. Daily Overview: Keep the 2009 stimulus law in mind when you are calculating your taxes this year.  Big thanks to... [Read Full Article]

Management and Operations Ten Worst Communication Blunders of 2009 From a steady review of major news events, here are the ten worst communication blunders of 2009. BusinessKnowHow.com Management and OperationsProductivity Coach's Corner: Clear the Clutter, Create OpportunityThe following is a specific key to success in lightening the load on your body and mind. This is a practical activity, one you can do to reduce the unnecessary physical and psychological stress you may be carrying around right now. Wouldn't it be worth it to invest less than one half of an hour to regain some confidence and control? M... [Read Full Article]

Tips from June 25, 2009 The Small Business tips today will be discussing the Fair Credit Reporting Act (FCRA). Employers generally ask a credit reporting company for credit, employment history, motor vehicle records, criminal background, and references which must comply with the FCRA requirements. Under the FCRA, a credit reporting company will not provide an employee’s credit report to an employer without proper written consent. As an employer, if you decide to not hire or promote an employee based on their credit report, you must provide a copy of the report and let the employee know the right to challenge the report. FCRA also requires businesses to report accurate information regarding debts owed to a credit reporting company by a debtor to avoid costly fines. Daily Overview: The FCRA protects credit reports of employees.  For more information, go to the [Read Full Article]

Government and Economy New SBA Chief Could Deliver Real Change Karen Mills, President Obama's choice to run the Small Business Administration, could transform the agency's approach to funding. Greenwashing in Washington With Democrats emphasizing the environment in their economic recovery plan, environmental groups are saying that greenwashing—the marketing of products as green even if they really aren’t—has moved from being an advertising ploy to a lobbying tool. [Read Full Article]

In financial lingo, zombies are debtors that have little hope of recovery but manage to avoid being wiped out thanks to support from their lenders or the government. Zombies suck life out of an economy by consuming tax money, capital, and labor that would be better deployed in growing companies and sectors. Meanwhile, by slashing prices to generate sales, zombie companies can drag healthier rivals into insolvency. —BusinessWeek You would think that once was enough, that the failure of the first round was obvious, but no, Congress has done it again. They have released the second half of Paulson’s $700 billion and that shuffling sound you are hearing is the sound of zombies, coming at the smell of freshly-spilled money. According to Peter Coy, writing for BusinessWeek: “The Bush Administration has already ladled out billions o... [Read Full Article]