Plain-text accounting insights, tutorials, and updates from the Beancount.io team.
No federal law sets private-sector pay frequency, so each state sets its own floor — New York requires weekly pay for manual workers, North Carolina permits monthly, and Florida sets no private-sector minimum. This guide covers the four state buckets, lag-time caps such as California Labor Code section 204, per-employee penalties, and how to change a payroll schedule without delaying wages.
A house hack is two tax properties under one roof — a Schedule E rental and a Schedule A home. Split shared costs by a documented percentage, depreciate only the rental half over 27.5 years, use up to $25,000 of rental losses against wages below $100,000 MAGI, and expect unrecaptured Section 1250 gain at up to 25% on prior depreciation when you sell.
Public adjusters work for the policyholder, not the insurer, and typically charge 5%–15% of the settlement, with many states capping standard claims near 15%–20% and declared-disaster claims near 10%. This guide covers verifying a license and surety bond, which fee structures to question before signing, and how to book proceeds — claim receivable, gain or loss against net book value, and business-interruption income recognized at settlement.
Bankrate's January 2026 survey found 43% of U.S. adults consider financial secrecy at least as bad as physical cheating, and 40% of adults in live-in relationships admit to a money secret. For couples who co-own a business, a hidden card or debt also distorts pricing, payroll and joint tax liability — here are the bookkeeping controls, monthly review cadence and entity rules that make transparency structural rather than voluntary.
Private companies mail new LLCs and corporations official-looking notices charging $110 for $10 state filings, $125 for meeting minutes no state requires, and $89 for labor law posters the government gives away free. A 60-second checklist separates real government notices from solicitations, with steps to reverse a payment you already made.
Since 2005, the IRS has limited most vehicle donation deductions to the charity's actual sale proceeds reported on Form 1098-C — not Blue Book value. This guide covers the $500 and $5,000 paperwork thresholds, the three exceptions that allow full fair market value, and why a fully depreciated work truck can produce a $0 deduction plus taxable recapture income.
The March 2026 DOJ settlement caps Ticketmaster service fees at 15% of face value at Live Nation amphitheaters, limits venue exclusivity deals to four years, and guarantees rival ticketing access — while the FTC's all-in pricing rule already binds every ticket seller. A practical guide for independent venues and promoters on rebuilding per-ticket math, ASC 606 principal-vs-agent revenue calls, settlement-sheet reconciliation, and the seven contract terms to renegotiate now.
From January 1, 2026, Danish sole proprietorships, partnerships, and associations with net turnover above DKK 300,000 in both 2024 and 2025 — roughly 118,000 businesses — must keep books in a compliant digital system with NemHandel/Peppol e-invoicing, tamper-evident five-year storage, weekly automated backups, and SAF-T export on demand. This guide covers the two-year turnover test, the five system requirements, the five mistakes that trigger enforcement, and a seven-step migration checklist.
How to build an enterprise budget for a cut-flower farm, calculate true per-stem cost (total planting cost ÷ marketable stems, counting owner labor and 20–40% shrink), compare farmers-market, subscription, wholesale, and u-pick channels by net return per hour, and price mixed bouquets from a costed recipe — plus Schedule F vs. Schedule C rules and seasonal cash-flow practices.
Filing IRS Form 5768 swaps the undefined "substantial part" lobbying test for a formula — 20% of the first $500,000 of exempt purpose expenditures, sliding down to a $1 million cap, with grassroots lobbying limited to 25% of that. A single-year overage costs a 25% excise tax, not your exemption.
California's advisory pure premium rate for workers' compensation rose 6.6% to $1.65 per $100 of payroll on September 1, 2026 — the second consecutive annual increase after a decade of declines. Here is how the benchmark actually reaches your bill, how to estimate the impact from your own payroll, and five levers — classification checks, clean audits, X-mod management, shopping the renewal, and monthly accruals — that keep the increase small.
California SB 351 took effect January 1, 2026, barring private equity and management companies from controlling clinical decisions at medical and dental practices. Because the violations it targets — percentage-of-collections management fees, clinician payroll in the MSO, patient revenue landing outside the PC — are all visible in the general ledger, compliance is largely a bookkeeping project. Here are seven ledger fixes to make now.
