Agricultural Funding Jeopardy

Courtney MeyerAgribusiness, News

Funding for Penn State Cooperative Extension and the University of Pennsylvania School of Veterinary Medicine is in jeopardy as a stalemate over paying for state spending continues. Pennsylvania’s 2017-2018 budget was adopted in July. But since then, lawmakers have not been able to agree on how to close the more than $2 billion hole in that budget. Gov. Tom Wolf plans fund schools and many state programs by borrowing money against future revenue from state liquor stores. However, that will not generate enough revenue to fund Penn State Extension and Penn Vet and there is now no clear path for those programs to receive state funding. Lawmakers must approve funding for Penn State Extension and Penn Vet separately from the …

Trump Tax-Cut Proposal for Small Construction Businesses is Unclear

Joshua EtemadiBonds, Construction, News

Tax bills for most small construction companies would fall under a broad tax-reform outline unveiled on Sept. 27 by the Trump administration and congressional Republicans. The proposal calls for cutting the corporate tax rate to 20% from 35%. Perhaps most important for small construction firms, the tax rate for pass-through businesses would be limited to 25%. Pass-through entities, such as sole proprietorships, partnerships and S-corporations, are taxed at individual, not corporate, rates, which hurts many construction companies in those categories. Tell me more >>>

Contractors Fronting Money for Materials Can Lose Investment

Joshua EtemadiBonds, News, Risk Management

Article provided by Cohen Seglias Pallas Greenhall & Furman PC Have you ever been in a situation where your subcontractor or fabricator did not have the financial ability to purchase material needed for a project? Have you ever offered your assistance by way of either directly purchasing the material and providing it to the subcontractor/fabricator or advancing funds to the subcontractor/fabricator to allow for the purchase? While this arrangement has its advantages, contractors should be aware of their exposure, particularly if the subcontractor/fabricator has financial issues down the road. Even though a contractor fronts the funds to purchase the materials, it could lose its interest in those materials to the subcontractor/fabricator’s lender, especially if that lender holds a security interest …

Liberty Mutual Hit With $546K Bedbug Bill

Amy MitchellNews

Liberty Mutual may have to cough up a sizable chunk of change over a bedbug infestation. The company, which acts as the insurer for the Hilton Garden Inn Ontario/Cucamonga in California, was named along with the hotel as a defendant in a lawsuit filed by a family that lodged there in 2013. A jury just awarded the family $546,000 – the largest judgment ever for a bedbug-related case. Read the full article >>>

Why the Average Retirement Age is Rising

Denise GillinHuman Resources, Medicare, News

Social Security, pension type, and education are factors that have contributed to the rise in the retirement age since the mid-1980s, writes Alicia H. Munnell, director of Boston College Center for Retirement Research, in this article on MarketWatch. Other factors that have also spurred an increase in retirement age are improved health and longevity, jobs becoming less physically demanding, writes Munnell. “While all these factors help explain the gains since the mid-1980s, I was concerned that they had played themselves out. At least for men, though, the increase in the average retirement age from 63.9 in 2013 to 64.6 in 2015 is encouraging.” Tell me more >>>