Amortization (tax law)

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In tax law, amortization refers to the cost recovery system for intangible property. Although the theory behind cost recovery deductions of amortization is to deduct from basis in a systematic manner over an asset's estimated useful economic life so as to reflect its consumption, expiration, obsolescence or other decline in value as a result of use or the passage of time, many times a perfect match of income and deductions does not occur for policy reasons.

Tax law area of law

Tax law or revenue law is an area of legal study which deals with the constitutional, common-law, statutory, tax treaty, and regulatory rules that constitute the law applicable to taxation.

Intangible property, also known as incorporeal property, describes something which a person or corporation can have ownership of and can transfer ownership to another person or corporation, but has no physical substance, for example brand identity or knowledge/intellectual property. It generally refers to statutory creations such as copyright, trademarks, or patents. It excludes tangible property like real property and personal property. In some jurisdictions intangible property are referred to as choses in action. Intangible property is used in distinction to tangible property. It is useful to note that there are two forms of intangible property: legal intangible property and competitive intangible property. Competitive intangible property disobeys the intellectual property test of voluntary extinguishment and therefore results in the sources that create intellectual property escaping quantification.

Basis, as used in United States tax law, is the original cost of property, adjusted for factors such as depreciation. When property is sold, the taxpayer pays/(saves) taxes on a capital gain/(loss) that equals the amount realized on the sale minus the sold property's basis.

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Depreciation

A corresponding concept for tangible assets is depreciation. Methodologies for allocating amortization to each tax period are generally the same as for depreciation. However, many intangible assets such as goodwill or certain brands may be deemed to have an indefinite useful life, or “self-created” and are therefore not subject to amortization. [1]

Depreciation Decrease in asset values, or the allocation of cost thereof

In accountancy, depreciation refers to two aspects of the same concept:

An intangible asset is an asset that lacks physical substance. It is defined in opposition to physical assets such as machinery and buildings. An intangible asset is usually very hard to evaluate. Patents, copyrights, franchises, goodwill, trademarks, and trade names. The general interpretation also includes software and other intangible computer based assets are all examples of intangible assets. Intangible assets generally—though not necessarily—suffer from typical market failures of non-rivalry and non-excludability.

In the United States of America

The United States Congress gives taxpayers larger deductions in the early years of an asset’s useful life.

United States Congress Legislature of the United States

The United States Congress is the bicameral legislature of the Federal Government of the United States. The legislature consists of two chambers: the House of Representatives and the Senate.

Intangible property

Intangible property which is subject to amortization is described in 26 U.S.C. §§ 197(c)(1) and 197(d) and must be property held either for use in a trade, business, or for the production of income. Before 1993, the United States Tax Code did not contain provisions for cost recovery of intangible assets; rather, the intangible assets were depreciated under the current provisions for depreciation of tangible assets, 26 U.S.C. §§ 167 and 168. However, the problem before 1993 was that many intangible assets did not meet the burdensome requirements of §§ 167 and 168 because intangible assets can not necessarily be subject to “wear and tear”. This led to taxpayers having the incentive to ignore any basis in the intangible asset until it was sold.

The Internal Revenue Code (IRC), formally the Internal Revenue Code of 1986, is the domestic portion of federal statutory tax law in the United States, published in various volumes of the United States Statutes at Large, and separately as Title 26 of the United States Code (USC). It is organized topically, into subtitles and sections, covering income tax, payroll taxes, estate taxes, gift taxes, and excise taxes; as well as procedure and administration. Its implementing agency is the Internal Revenue Service.

Under §197 most acquired intangible assets are to be amortized ratably over a fifteen-year period. [2] This is not the best treatment of an intangible whose actual life is much shorter than fifteen years. Furthermore, if an intangible is not eligible for amortization under § 197, the taxpayer can depreciate the asset if there is a showing of the assets useful life. [3]

Startup expenditure

Startup expenditures are defined as investigatory expenses incurred prior to commencing a trade or business activity which would have been deducted had they been paid or incurred when the taxpayer was already engaged in the trade or business activity.

Unlike other sections in the tax code which do not allow current deductions for most startup expenses, section 195 allows a taxpayer to amortize start-up expenditures over a 180-month period. [4] The policy behind this provision is to encourage taxpayers to explore new business ventures.

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Expenditure is an outflow of money to another person or group to pay for an item or service, or for a category of costs. For a tenant, rent is an expense. For students or parents, tuition is an expense. Buying food, clothing, furniture or an automobile is often referred to as an expense. An expense is a cost that is "paid" or "remitted", usually in exchange for something of value. Something that seems to cost a great deal is "expensive". Something that seems to cost little is "inexpensive". "Expenses of the table" are expenses of dining, refreshments, a feast, etc.

Tax deduction is a reduction of income that is able to be taxed and is commonly a result of expenses, particularly those incurred to produce additional income. Tax deductions are a form of tax incentives, along with exemptions and credits. The difference between deductions, exemptions and credits is that deductions and exemptions both reduce taxable income, while credits reduce tax.

Earnings before interest, taxes, depreciation, and amortization accounting measure: net earnings, before interest expenses, taxes, depreciation, and amortization are subtracted

A company's earnings before interest, taxes, depreciation, and amortization is an accounting measure calculated using a company's net earnings, before interest expenses, taxes, depreciation, and amortization are subtracted, as a proxy for a company's current operating profitability.

Capital expenditure

Capital expenditure or capital expense is the money a company spends to buy, maintain, or improve its fixed assets, such as buildings, vehicles, equipment, or land. It is considered a capital expenditure when the asset is newly purchased or when money is used towards extending the useful life of an existing asset, such as repairing the roof.

The schedular system of taxation is the system of how the charge to United Kingdom corporation tax is applied. It also applied to United Kingdom income tax before legislation was rewritten by the Tax Law Rewrite Project. Similar systems apply in other jurisdictions that are or were closely related to the United Kingdom, such as Ireland and Jersey.

The Modified Accelerated Cost Recovery System (MACRS) is the current tax depreciation system in the United States. Under this system, the capitalized cost (basis) of tangible property is recovered over a specified life by annual deductions for depreciation. The lives are specified broadly in the Internal Revenue Code. The Internal Revenue Service (IRS) publishes detailed tables of lives by classes of assets. The deduction for depreciation is computed under one of two methods at the election of the taxpayer, with limitations. See IRS Publication 946 for a 120-page guide to MACRS.

Section 179 of the United States Internal Revenue Code, allows a taxpayer to elect to deduct the cost of certain types of property on their income taxes as an expense, rather than requiring the cost of the property to be capitalized and depreciated. This property is generally limited to tangible, depreciable, personal property which is acquired by purchase for use in the active conduct of a trade or business. Buildings were not eligible for section 179 deductions prior to the passage of the Small Business Jobs Act of 2010; however, qualified real property may be deducted now.

Faux frais of production

Faux frais of production is a concept used by classical political economists and by Karl Marx in his critique of political economy. It refers to "incidental operating expenses" incurred in the productive investment of capital, which do not themselves add new value to output. In Marx's social accounting, the faux frais are a component of constant capital, or alternately are funded by a fraction of the new surplus value.

Accelerated depreciation refers to any one of several methods by which a company, for 'financial accounting' or tax purposes, depreciates a fixed asset in such a way that the amount of depreciation taken each year is higher during the earlier years of an asset’s life. For financial accounting purposes, accelerated depreciation is expected to be much more productive during its early years, so that depreciation expense will more accurately represent how much of an asset’s usefulness is being used up each year. For tax purposes, accelerated depreciation provides a way of deferring corporate income taxes by reducing taxable income in current years, in exchange for increased taxable income in future years. This is a valuable tax incentive that encourages businesses to purchase new assets.

Depreciation recapture is the USA Internal Revenue Service (IRS) procedure for collecting income tax on a gain realized by a taxpayer when the taxpayer disposes of an asset that had previously provided an offset to ordinary income for the taxpayer through depreciation. In other words, because the IRS allows a taxpayer to deduct the depreciation of an asset from the taxpayer’s ordinary income, the taxpayer has to report any gain from the disposal of the asset as ordinary income, not as a capital gain.

Under the U.S. tax code, businesses expenditures can be deducted from the total taxable income when filing income taxes if a taxpayer can show the funds were used for business-related activities, not personal or capital expenses. Capital expenditures either create cost basis or add to a preexisting cost basis and cannot be deducted in the year the taxpayer pays or incurs the expenditure.

Generally, expenses related to the carrying-on of a business or trade are deductible from a United States taxpayer's adjusted gross income. For many taxpayers, this means that expenses related to seeking new employment, including some relevant expenses incurred for the taxpayer's education, can be deducted, resulting in a tax break, as long as certain criteria are met.

Commissioner v. Idaho Power Co., 418 U.S. 1 (1974), was a United States Supreme Court case.

<i>Simon v. Commissioner</i>

Simon v. Commissioner, 68 F.3d 41, was a decision by the Second Circuit of the United States Court of Appeals relating to the deductibility of expensive items or tools that may increase in value as a collectible but decrease in value if used in the course of a business or trade.

The Repair Allowance Method, also known as the Repair Allowance Safe Harbor, is a proposed regulation to the Internal Revenue Service administrative regulations. This optional method of calculating deductions affects individuals and corporate taxpayers who own property subject to MACRS and repair or improve property used in a trade or business. This method permits taxpayers to treat both material and labor cost used to repair or improve property as a trade or business expense. Therefore, taxpayers who elect this method may deduct this cost as an above the line deduction under 26 CFR §. 162. This method is a proposed simplification, when compared to other deduction methods, because it does not distinguish between repair and improvement of property. Without the proposed regulation, improvements to property must be capitalized and not expensed because improvements are considered a capital expenditure. Arguably, this proposed regulation would not be used by a taxpayer who has a clearly defined business expense otherwise deductible under IRC §. 162. And even California adopts the PRA

<i>Selig v. United States</i>

Selig v. United States, 740 F.2d 572, is a case decided by the United States Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit related to the amortization of intangible property.

Section 280F was enacted to limit certain deductions on depreciable assets. Section 280F is a policy that makes the Internal Revenue Code more accurate by allowing a taxpayer to report their business use on an asset they may also need for some personal reasons.

The oil depletion allowance in American (US) tax law is an allowance claimable by anyone with an economic interest in a mineral deposit or standing timber. The principle is that the asset is a capital investment that is a wasting asset, and therefore depreciation can reasonably be offset against income.

References

  1. House Report No. 103-111, 103rd Congress, 25 May 1993.
  2. House Report No. 103-111.
  3. Treasury Regulation § 1.167(a)(3).
  4. 26 U.S.C. § 195.

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