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Compensation & Benefits

Grab bag of SECURE 2.0 guidance

01/04/2024
Right before our Christmas break, the IRS issued guidance on SECURE 2.0’s provision allowing you to provide de minimis financial incentives to employees to induce them to participate in your 401(k) plan. Since this provision became effective with the 2023 plan year, and considering that financial incentives are fully taxable for payroll purposes, we rushed out our analysis so you’d have time to deal with it in December. But the guidance contains much more.

Review compensation practices to identify potential sources of pay inequity

01/02/2024
Your employees probably no longer consider it taboo to discuss salaries and benefits with their co-workers and friends. That means they can easily tell how your compensation system compares with that of other employers. It also means they can easily spot inequities in how you pay employees up and down your org chart. If they determine that wage gaps exist, don’t be surprised if they decide to sue you for discrimination.

States considering tax incentives for employers that adopt four-day workweek

01/02/2024
Over the last few years, there’s been a lot of talk about the benefits and desirability of a four-day workweek. If that came to pass, it would fundamentally change a standard set in 1938, when the Fair Labor Standards Act established a 40-hour workweek as the norm for American workers.

Help Gen X employees close retirement wealth gap

01/02/2024
Many of your Generation X employees may be woefully unprepared to retire comfortably, according to an annual survey of 2,000 investors by the Schroders financial services firm. The Schroders 2023 U.S. Retirement Survey found that Gen Xers, currently ages 43 to 58, have the largest wealth gap of any generation.

February 2024: Employer’s business tax calendar

12/31/2023
Here’s your monthly guide to critical payroll due dates.

Keep it Legal: Wage transparency may lower wages

12/22/2023
More employees—especially younger ones—are openly discussing their pay and even sharing industry or employer-specific information they have collected in comprehensive lists. Perhaps paradoxically, recent research out of Harvard seems to show that all this information collected and shared may actually suppress wages.

Holiday cheer to everybody! Our final Friday wrap of 2023

12/22/2023
We checked out list twice, and here’s what you need to know before year-end.

Good tidings of (somewhat) great joy: The IRS abates $1 billion of penalties

12/21/2023
What a stocking stuffer! The IRS is abating approximately $1 billion in failure-to-pay penalties for individuals, businesses and tax-exempt organizations filing Form 990-T, whose 2020 and 2021 tax liabilities have lingered since 2022.

In the Payroll Mailbag: January ’24

12/20/2023
Your W-2s are due to employees and the Social Security Administration by Jan. 31, which means last-minute questions.

Paying a contractor $600? Remember to backup withhold

12/20/2023
Payments to independent contractors are free from withholding. An IRS Program Manager Technical Advice memo, however, reminds payers to backup withhold if a contractor didn’t provide you with their Social Security number prior to your first payment or you receive a Notice CP2100/2100A from the IRS.