* Professor James Maule has some interesting comments on depreciation in his post “Just Because It Didn’t Work the First 50 Times Doesn’t Mean It Will Work Next Time” at MAULED AGAIN.

”The depreciation provisions . . . have contributed to the current economic mess by allowing taxpayers to compute taxable income as though their economic position declined when in fact it remained the same or improved”.

Jim agrees with what I discussed at TWTP in my post “Here is Something to Think About”. He discusses the idea in more detail in “Instead of More Favorable Depreciation Deductions, Eliminate Them?”.

Goose the Tax Dog (I am assuming Goose is the name of the Dog) also adds his 2 cents on the topic in his post “Real Estate Depreciation” at THE TAX STUDENT.

I would be interested to hear your comments on what I propose in this post.

* TAXGIRL Kelly Phillips Erb points out that it seems that somewhere someone from the press is giving out bad information on BO’s stimulus package in her post “Ask the taxgirl: Don’t Look for a Second Rebate Check in the Mail!”.

Read my, and Kelly’s, lips – THERE WILL NOT BE ANOTHER “STIMULUS” REBATE CHECK! While he didn’t take my advice regarding refundable credits, at least BO listened to me about rebates.

* Right on Prof Daniel Shaviro of START MAKING SENSE – “Happiest word in the English language {is} ‘Ex”, when placed with a dash in front of the words ‘President George W. Bush’.”

* A great Q+A post from Gina Gwozdz at TAX TIPS BLOG on “1099 vs W2?” She makes the excellent point – “Your employer does not get to decide if they can pay you as a W-2 employee or a 1099 contractor. The law determines your classification.”

* Trish McIntyre of OUR TAXING TIMES provides the word on the economic “stimulus” rebate you did or didn’t receive last year in her post “Stimulus Rebate-Taxable This Year?”. The answer, of course, is NO – for both federal and state returns.

Trish points out that you could get an additional rebate added to the refund, or subtracted from the balance due, on your 2008 Form 1040 or 1040A – “For example, the full stimulus rebate a married couple with one child could receive was $1500. A child born in 2008 qualifies the couple for an extra $300.”

The 2008 “stimulus” rebate election year bribe caused tons and tons of confusion last year, completely overwhelming the IRS – and I expect the confusion to continue to apply to 2008 tax returns. As was the case with the last rebate check, there will be millions of errors on 2008 federal returns.

* I came across an interesting bit of information in my “wanderings” on Thursday – “The Association of Chartered Certified Accountants, the global body for professional accountants, views the U.S. tax regime as one of the world’s most complex, according to Chas Roy-Chowdhury, London-based head of taxation.”

* In item from Freep.com (Detroit Free Press) titled “Tax Rebate Impact on Economy is Weak” we learn “Two University of Michigan economics professors have some advice for President Barack Obama about how not to design his economic stimulus package. Their advice: Don’t make tax rebates a big part of it.”

The professors confirm what I have been saying all along – “Onetime payments from the government are a weak economic stimulus”.

Some statistics from the article – ”The U-M economists found that only 20% of U.S. households mostly spent their tax rebates, while about 48% used their rebate mostly to pay debt and roughly 32% mostly saved their rebate checks.”

* Always leave ‘em laughing – you will find some good parenting advice from BUSINESS PUNDIT in the post “Always Check Your Child’s Homework Before it Gets Turned In”.

TTFN