Posted by Wendell Brock on Thu, Nov 10, 2022

Time For an Income Tax Review

Wendell Brock
Nov 10, 2022
3 min read

Unbelievably, it’s almost the end of the year. Before you know it it’ll be Thanksgiving then Christmas, and in a blink it’ll be the new year and the end of the 2022 tax year. That makes now the perfect time to start going over and reviewing your tax information.

It’s always good to review your previous year’s tax return. Take note of any changes that have occurred since the last time you filed. Did you move, retire, switch jobs, or get married? Has your filing status or tax bracket changed? Each filing status comes with different tax bracket income thresholds, standard deductions, and eligibility of certain tax credits.

Tax deductions help to reduce your taxable income, which means you will have a lower tax bill, so you don’t want to miss out on any! However, you need to make sure you have proper paperwork. Having all your required documentation is necessary to claim your deductions and will help protect you if you get audited.

Take some time to find all the deductions you are eligible for, things like retirement contributions, educational expenses, medical bills, property taxes and mortgage interest, or charitable donations. Likewise, you want to be able to utilize any tax credits available to you. As with deductions, you will need to your documents in order to claim them. Planning ahead for the following year, if you don’t already, have a separate file for any paperwork or documentation relating to your taxes, this way you won’t miss any when it comes time to file.

Look back over your medical expenses for the year, they will only be eligible for deductions for the amount that exceeds 7.5% of your adjusted gross income. For example if your AGI is $65,000 and you had $8,000 in medical and/or dental expenses you would be able to deduct $3,125 (7.5% of $65,000 is $4,875. Take $8,000 expenses subtract $4,875 which equals $3,125 eligible for deduction). If you add all your medical expenses and they do not exceed the 7.5% threshold consider moving some dental/doctor visits, medical purchases or procedures to December in order to include them in the current tax year’s existing amount and give yourself that push over the 7.5% line. If you are nowhere near the 7.5% maybe consider the inverse and hold off on scheduling things until the new year, and make plans to maximize those expenses in the following tax year.

You will want to consider if your income will increase or decrease next year because it may change your tax bracket, which would change the percentages relating to your deductions. If you are looking at a significant increase, wait until the next year to take the deduction because it will be worth more as a percentage of the higher income. Likewise, if you will be making less money next year, you may want to accelerate purchases for the current year.

The end of the year is a great time to review your retirement plan. You may be eligible to deduct certain contributions to a traditional IRA. Pay attention to your annual contribution limits for accounts such as your 401(k) or 403(b).

As we round the corner into the next tax year make plans now so you can maximize your deductions and credits. You don’t want to leave yourself scrambling come April, you also don’t want to miss out on money you could be saving. As boring or redundant as it may seem, the best advice is always to plan ahead.

Rising Global Food Prices Pose Risk For Food Industry

Posted by Wendell Brock on Thu, Nov 03, 2022

Rising Global Food Prices Pose Risk For Food Industry

Wendell Brock
Nov 3, 2022
2 min read

In the U.S., as well as other advanced economies around the world, much of the public is not fully aware of the severity of the world’s hunger crisis. Not only has this crisis been prevalent, but it has increasingly worsened over the past 15 years.

Hunger and undernourishment had been quite high at the turn of the century, with the UN Food and Agriculture Organization reporting that 13.4% of the world and 32.2% of the least developed countries were undernourished. This share began to fall into the early 2010s and stabilized around 8.9% from 2012 to 2017. However, this improvement did not characterize much of the world. Even before the COVID-19 Pandemic, undernourishment rates rose in Sub-Saharan Africa, Latin America, the world’s least developed countries, and much more of the world.

Three factors behind recent rises in global hunger are skyrocketing food prices, the invasion of Ukraine, and the pandemic, which has changed the lives of almost everyone across the globe affecting those in already poor situations the most.

The UN Food and Agriculture Organization’s Food Price Index is a measure of change in food commodities, measured monthly based on international prices of meat, dairy, cereals, vegetable oil, and sugar. In 2016, this measure reached its lowest since 2009, a decline that had a very short stay. Not only did this index rise in the years up to 2020, but it also skyrocketed in 2021 and reached an all-time high in March 2022. At its peak just this year, the Food Price Index was more than double its value just 18 years sooner. Simply put, food prices are on a steep incline, reaching levels far higher than in other recorded years.

Food prices were not alone in raising global hunger; the COVID-19 Pandemic had extremely severe effects. In its breakout year, 2019-2020, the State of Food Security and Nutrition in the World reveals that about 160 million people fell into hunger, meaning 811 million people around the world regularly went to bed hungry, roughly one in every ten people. Not only that, but over 48 million people face emergency levels of hunger according to the World Food Programme (WFP). The Global Network Against Food Crises reports that the number of people facing acute food insecurity rose by 40 million people in 2020-2021, with an estimated 193 million people facing this extreme level of hunger in 2021.

Photo by Siegfried Poepperl

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