Along with the holidays comes a lot of extra work for many family-run businesses, which may require putting the kids to work and having a spouse help out over the busy time. There are special tax rules when hiring your children and also for your spouse, depending on whether he or she is a business partner or an employee.
There is a little-known disaster provision of the tax code that, where if an employer has adopted a leave-based donation program, the employees can forgo paid vacation, sick, or personal leave in exchange for their employer making equivalent cash payments to qualified charitable organizations. This does not necessarily mean the employee also forfeits the time off; it will not be paid time off to the extent it is converted to leave-based donation payments.
If you claimed the employee retention credit (ERC) in the fourth quarter of 2021, you better read this about a retroactive change affecting the credit for the fourth quarter of 2021.
Background: The ERC was created by the Coronavirus Aid, Relief, and Economic Security Act (CARES Act), and the American Rescue Plan Act (ARP Act) extended the ERC for wages paid through December 31, 2021.
Now the recently passed Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act (IIJ Act) has retroactively repealed the ERC for the fourth quarter of 2021 for all taxpayers except recovery start-up businesses. A recovery start-up business is an employer that began carrying on any trade or business after February 15, 2020, and has gross receipts under $1,000,000 for the three-tax-year period ending with the tax year that precedes the calendar quarter for which the ERC is determined.
Many businesses already claimed the ERC for wages paid the fourth quarter of 2021 before the IIJ Act was passed in mid-November. Thus, other than recovery start-up businesses, employers that have claimed a fourth quarter 2021 ERC will be required to repay advance payments but will not be subject to any penalties. IRS Notice 2021-65 provides guidance on how to repay any advance credit payments and how to avoid penalties.
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If you are a business owner, and are hiring new workers, you may be able to claim a Work Opportunity Tax Credit (WOTC) if you hire someone who has been unemployed for 27 consecutive weeks or more or if the individual is from one of several other categories of eligible employees, as explained below. This credit is an income tax credit, unlike some of the pandemic-related credits that are applied to employment taxes of the business.
Like many small business owners, you probably find yourself very busy in the wake of the COVID slowdown and are getting back up to speed. But don’t forget about your future.
There are a number of retirement plans available, including Keogh plans and 401(k)s. However, a simplified employee pension plan (SEP) may be your best option.
The reason a SEP is “simplified” is that its retirement contributions are deposited into a traditional IRA account under the control of the SEP participant, thus eliminating most of the employer’s administrative duties. That is why these plans are sometimes referred to as SEP-IRAs. SEPs function much like Keogh retirement plans, and they allow tax-deductible contributions for both employees and self-employed individuals. For an employee, the maximum contribution for 2021 is the lesser of 25% of that employee’s compensation or $58,000. These contributions are excluded from the employees’ wages and are not subject to withholding for income tax or FICA. A self-employed person can contribute 25% of his or her compensation after deducting the employer’s contribution, which boils down to the smaller of 20% of the business’ net profit or $58,000. Each year, the employer can specify a compensation amount between zero and 25% (not exceeding the maximums for the year).
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Many companies, as an incentive to employees to help grow the companies’ market value, will offer stock options to key employees. The options give the employee the right to buy up to a specified number of shares of the company’s stock at a future date at a specific price. Generally, options are not immediately vested and must be held for a period of time before they can be exercised. Then, at some later date, and assuming the stock price has appreciated to a value higher than the option price of the stock, the employee can excise the options (buy the shares), paying the lower option price for the stock rather than the current market price. This gives the employee the opportunity to participate in the growth of the company through gains from the sale of the stock without the risk of ownership.
President Trump issued a Presidential Memorandum on August 8, 2020, that directs the Treasury Secretary to use his authority to defer the withholding, deposit and payment of employees’ portions of Social Security taxes from September 1 through December 31, 2020. The goal is to put more money in the pockets of workers during the COVID-19 pandemic emergency. The deferral applies to the 6.2% tax on wages or compensation paid for a bi-weekly pay period of less than $4,000 or the equivalent threshold amount for other pay periods. In other words, employees with annual wages up to $104,000 are generally eligible for the deferral.
Just a few days before the start of the deferral period, the IRS has issued guidance explaining that the due date for withholding and paying Social Security taxes has been postponed; they are now due between January 1, 2021 and April 30, 2021. This means that Social Security taxes not withheld in the last 4 months of 2020 are to be ratably withheld from employees’ wages during the first 4 months of 2021, along with the required withholding on the 2021 wages.
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If you hire a domestic worker to provide services in or around your home, you probably have a tax liability that you don’t know about – or one that you do know about but are ignoring. Either situation can come back to bite you. When the worker is your employee, your liability includes both withholding and paying payroll taxes as well as issuing a W-2 after the close of the year.
Sure, it is a lot easier simply to pay your worker in cash so as to avoid federal and state payroll taxes – and all the paperwork that goes with them. Your domestic worker will likely be fully cooperative with a cash deal because he or she can also avoid paying taxes. However, if the IRS or your state employment department finds out about these payments, the result could be very unpleasant for you.
Not everyone who performs services in or around your home is classified as an employee. For instance, a plumber or electrician who makes repairs in your home will generally be a licensed contractor; the government does not classify contractors as employees.
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With jobs at a premium during the COVID-19 pandemic, you might consider hiring your children to help out in your business. Financially, it makes more sense to keep the family employed rather than hiring strangers, provided, of course, that the family member is suitable for the job. Note, however, that wages paid to children and other relatives aren’t eligible for the Employee Retention Credit created by Congress in 2020 as part of the COVID-19 emergency relief measures for employers.
Rather than helping to support your children with your after-tax dollars, you can instead hire them in your business and pay them with tax-deductible dollars. Of course, the employment must be legitimate and the pay commensurate with the hours and the job worked. The following are typical situations encountered when hiring family members.
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