This will hopefully become a series of posts. I am currently doing some consulting work for several small businesses near my home and there seems to be an interest in office productivity. Productivity is an accountant’s best friend. We love to count and measure, and the result is usually a clearer pathway to increase productivity. Increasing productivity is something that everyone should be focused on or at least aware of. Generally we think of productivity in the manufacturing world as an hourly or direct labor statistic. This is very important. [...]
Foreign Earned Income Exclusion
Ok, so I wrote a post about my friend and the International tax exemption here [link], but I totally forgot about the Foreign Earned Income Exclusion which may be the best option. This exclusion will allow you to exclude a certain amount of your foreign earned income to not be taxed in the US. This is of course only for U.S. citizens or resident aliens living abroad. Currently the limit is $95,100. You must pass several requirements to qualify: You must be earning income in a foreign country (pretty obvious) [...]
Text to Columns
My last year at university one of my professors gave us a side lecture about some useful excel tips we will use once we start working. I don’t remember all of the tips that he gave us but I do remember that he taught us about ‘text to columns.’ He said that we would use this function many times for sure. I was somewhat familiar with that function but I could not think of any practical uses for it. It wasn’t even two months in to my first job that [...]
Depreciation Expense Accounting
Depreciation seems to be very confusing to a lot of first year accountants. This doesn’t need to be a hard subject. Basically, depreciation is separating cost over time. It does not affect cash flow. For example if you buy a pencil and you use it for 2 years. First you would record the price you paid for the pencil let’s say that is 5 dollars (premium pencil). So your cash goes down 5 dollars the moment you purchase the pencil. But the useful life of the pencil you know will [...]
International Tax Exemption
A friend of mine moved to Korea recently. His company provided him with some tax support to help with the year that he would have income from two different countries. I thought it might be beneficial (and educational) to tell you his story. He worked from January to March in the United States and then from March 5th through the remainder of the year he worked in Korea. Now, I am not a tax expert but I have heard that the double taxation for a U.S. citizen living and working [...]