2011 Lane Reports
Thursday, December 1, 2011
On Monday, November 21, the Deficit Reduction Joint Committee of Congress officially threw in the towel and announced that it was unable to reach an agreement on the $1.2 trillion in cuts in the federal budget mandated by the Budget Control Act of 2011. What does this failure mean to you and the typical American family as we move forward into 2012? If the...
Tuesday, November 1, 2011
With the rise in electronic filing of tax returns –- nowadays, almost 80% of individual tax returns are filed electronically – it can be easy to forget that millions of tax returns, ranging from individual to corporate, are still prepared on paper and need to be mailed to the Internal Revenue Service for filing. And having to mail returns to the...
Monday, October 3, 2011
Mayor Rahm Emanuel seems undeterred by naysayers as he invests his vast political capital in an agenda of fiscal responsibility, school reform and safe streets. No question the urgent issues Mr. Emanuel has targeted must be on the front burner if Chicago is to remain livable, let alone become the world-class city it could be. But without real economic...
Thursday, September 1, 2011
The Low-profit Limited Liability Company, or "L3C," is a new, for-profit business form available to social entrepreneurs who seek the legal and tax flexibility of a traditional LLC, the social benefits of a non-profit organization, and the branding and market positioning advantages of a social enterprise. Moreover, the L3C presents a unique opportunity to...
Monday, August 1, 2011
The Law Office of Marc J. Lane is now on Facebook! To follow the firm, please click here. At the Law Offices of Marc J. Lane, P.C., we strive to keep you informed of helpful planning topics each month. Tax reform and budget reform are currently hot topics in Washington D.C., but as of the time of this writing, no clear consensus appears to be in...
Friday, July 1, 2011
In the waning days of the Daley administration, the former mayor incurred the wrath of union leaders when he floated the possibility of outsourcing the city's curbside recycling initiative without first consulting labor. It was Richard M. Daley, everyone remembers, who struck the deal to sell Midway Airport that ultimately collapsed for lack of financing...
Wednesday, June 1, 2011
The final chapter of my new book, Social Enterprise: Empowering Mission-Driven Entrepreneurs, (American Bar Association, 2011) raises the provocative question: "To What End?" The demand for metrics to evaluate social impact has never been stronger, and that demand comes from all quarters. Donors and investors want to ensure that their gifts, grants and...
Monday, May 2, 2011
AT&T's recently proposed acquisition of T-Mobile has awakened not so distant memories of when, prior to its breakup 1984, AT&T enjoyed a virtual monopoly in the telecommunications industry. The combination of these companies presents a host of issues that range from antitrust implications to the questionable benefits and relative costs to consumers...
Friday, April 1, 2011
Three years ago, the Chicago Urban League, a civil rights organization that encourages economic empowerment for African-Americans, sued the state of Illinois and the Illinois State Board of Education, alleging that the state's funding formula for education punishes minorities because it is based on property values. The Urban League, which hopes its case...
Tuesday, March 1, 2011
The Law Office of Marc J. Lane is now on Facebook! To follow the firm, please click here. Yummy Dough, a fairly new product out of Germany, creates a compound that kids can mold into various shapes, bake, and eat. The company behind Yummy Dough, 123 Nahrmittel GmbH, received numerous awards for the product and has been expanding distribution to other...
Tuesday, February 1, 2011
An unheralded provision of last spring's budget legislation adds Illinois to the growing roster of states committed to performance-driven budgeting. “Budgeting for outcomes” was introduced by former Washington Gov. Gary Locke in 2002, when he faced a $2.5-billion budget shortfall. Mr. Locke reformed the way state officials prioritized and spent...
Monday, January 3, 2011
This past December, as the weather outside became increasingly colder, the debate in Washington over taxes and spending was heating up to a fever pitch. Politicians, pundits, and concerned citizens from the right to the left and everywhere in between expressed opinions about our nation's economic policy and tax structure. One thing remained clear during...
