Taxes in Professional Sports

[Gummer12 134]

http://finance.yahoo.com/news/professional-athletes-big-league-tax-071447565.html

[chippa13 1844]

I can imagine that being a real nightmare. I remember when the notion of taxing visiting athletes was still fairly new.

[JTully317 11]

I read this article this morning. I was shocked to find out that that was the system in place. I could not imagine filing for 10-20 different states (not that the athlete is doing it anyway).

[chk hrd 164]

My brother-in-law played on the PGA tour for almost 15 years and currently plays on the Champions. He has to do a return for every state that he plays in and for money he has made in foreign countries.

[Chadd 916]

I recall Nashville implemented a tax aimed at football players that would often cost guys called up from the AHL more than they made for that game. It was capped at a certain total, but if you only got called up for one or two games, you could end up paying more than you made.

EDIT:

http://www.thehockeynews.com/articles/32472-Brian-Rafalski-says-state-tax-on-pro-athletes-takes-too-big-a-bite-out-of-cheques.html

[goblue9280 33]

We had a discussion here on MSH awhile back about equipment managers and how they also need to pay tax in the similar way. Thanks Joel for finding this.

Ouch, are CPA fee's generally part of an equipment managers (and other traveling support staffs) compensation/benefits package? I imagine it's not cheap to have all of those state tax forms prepared.

[chippa13 1844]

I'd assume that the out of town forms are pretty simple. It isn't like a player/team employee is going to have anything other than standard deductions in those cities. The toughest part would be doing the math to allocate a percentage of income to each.

[wrangler 157]

The forms can be quite complex, as many state income tax computations for nonresidents use all income and deductions, and work out a few allocations and percentages, through several forms. Also, tax paid to, or withheld by, other states can come into the calculations.

[215BroadStBullies610 435]

Taxation, just like accounting as a whole, is extremely vital to economic standing of America. I always like seeing both sports and business spoken about in the same sentence. This subject is one not many sports fans care about but can be used for healthy debate. As a self-proclaimed numbers geek, I enjoy reading articles that pertain to sports biz. Anyone who wants to pursue a career in accountancy, I would suggest it. These type of situations are always controversial yet interesting.

[gxc999 7]

This is a large part of what keeps accountants in business. For anyone who thinks law is complex, the tax code will literally make your head explode.

[215BroadStBullies610 435]

No doubt. It's mundane and mind-numbing at times but taxes are here to stay. If an opportunity opens for anyone taxation-wise, take it ha. Get that CPA and/or MST and you should be set.