William Byrnes' Tax, Wealth, and Risk Intelligence

William Byrnes (Texas A&M) tax & compliance articles

Posts Tagged ‘IRS statistics’

Using IRS income stats for where to locate your financial planning firm

Posted by William Byrnes on August 7, 2014


IRS logoCombing through the IRS’ income tax data by county and by zipcode can provide valuable insight for, by example, where to locate a business that depends on foot traffic, where to live (for a well funded local public school) and where to direct marketing efforts for financial planning and wealth management.

Take for instance California.  Some counties have substantially more tax filers in the category above $200,000 income, than others.  The entire state has 802,100 tax filers reporting $200,000 and greater income, 83% being married couples (665,110).   That’s almost twice New York State’s with just 413,720 (of course, to understand New York City, I would need to add in the metropolitan stats from the tri-state Connecticut and New Jersey suburbs of the City).  However, Texas beat out New York at 433,150 high earner returns, whereas Florida only had 278,560.

Read my analysis by country and metropolitan area in my International Finance Professor Blog article.

Posted in Tax Policy, Wealth Management | Tagged: , , | Leave a Comment »

$135 billion of reported gifts for 2012 nearly tripling 2011 levels

Posted by William Byrnes on January 28, 2014


Yesterday, the IRS Tax Stats Dispatch (#2014-2) included the link for the summation of data from all 2012 Gift Tax Returns.   (see http://www.irs.gov/uac/SOI-Tax-Stats—Total-Gifts-of-Donor,-Total-Gifts,-Deductions,-Credits,-and-Net-Gift-Tax)

Interestingly, the total reported gifts of 2012 of approximately $135 billion was substantially more than double the 2011 year of approximately $51 billion, and previous years before that.  The significant pickup in reported gift giving over the last several years compared to 2012 is in the category $1 million and larger gifts.

Will be interested to read your comments as to why this may be ?  By example, is this the result of the now settled Estate and Gift tax rates ?  Is it a result of the timing of retiring baby boomers wealth transfer to the next generation of their progeny?  Is it charitably driven ?

Were financial planners prepared for the planning of this more than doubling of gifts to future generations and for charitable / legacy purposes?

Use Comments below.

Tax status and size of taxable gifts, current period [1]
 Total gifts [2] Total annual exclusions Total included amount of gifts Total deductions [3] Taxable gifts, current period [4]
Number Amount Number Amount Number Amount Number Amount Number Amount
(1) (2) (3) (4) (5) (6) (7) (8) (9) (10)
All returns, taxable and nontaxable 258,393 $134,846,285,766 244443 11794733033 191816 123051555062 5606 8120138820 190401 114968624890
$0 67992 5822167968 67680 4054653753 1415 1767514212 1415 1767514212 0 0
Less than $2,500 7612 362423498 6528 233021040 7612 129402627 24 119914708 7612 9487920
$2,500 under $5,000 7433 412615201 7075 262415929 7433 150200871 407 123,960,592 7433 26240997
$5,000 under $10,000 9294 563330627 8934 321839948 9294 241490859 264 172533814 9294 68957045
$10,000 under $25,000 26161 1366229180 25611 924979071 26161 441250106 217 17,630,195 26161 423619911
$25,000 under $50,000 23829 1731665895 22746 796632342 23829 935033551 397 84434152 23829 850599399
$50,000 under $75,000 13048 1239385141 12504 400229648 13048 839155682 17 38,557,818 13048 800621940
$75,000 under $100,000 8306 996198369 7583 183011743 8306 813186628 6 91,801,097 8306 721385532
$100,000 under $250,000 29570 6071771849 26863 961754449 29570 5110017617 311 338746401 29570 4771297431
$250,000 under $500,000 17,470 $7,519,686,206 16193 709363682 17470 6810322321 662 439160459 17470 6371161683
$500,000 under $1 million 16,149 $12,885,834,594 14609 773330454 16149 12112504390 390 346832003 16149 11765882467
$1 million or more 31,529 $95,874,977,236 28117 2173500974 31529 93701476195 1497 4579053368 31529 89159370564

Posted in Retirement Planning, Tax Exempt Orgs, Wealth Management | Tagged: , , , , , , | Leave a Comment »