Page 14 March 23, 2017 EL SEGUNDO HERALD IRS from front page the IRS, or to the California Franchise Tax Board. And, a federal refund can be held up to pay back child support or past-due student loans. That might explain why some taxpayers procrastinated. The reality is the IRS will be keeping a big chunk of this money because people have either changed jobs, left the state, or weren’t legally able to work in the United States and so they don’t qualify for a federal refund. Whatever the reason, the federal government is the beneficiary of whatever is left over from 2013’s collections after the April deadline, according to the IRS. “The IRS estimates the midpoint for potential refunds for 2013 to be $763; half of the refunds are more than $763 and half are less,” it said earlier in March. “In cases where a tax return was not filed, the law provides most taxpayers with a three-year window of opportunity for claiming a refund. For 2013 tax returns, the window closes April 18, 2017.” The revenue department stressed that a 2013 tax return must be properly addressed, mailed and postmarked by April 18 or the window for claiming a refund is slammed shut for good. Many Americans prefer to overpay their federal taxes during the year and collect a refund the following year. This way, there are no surprises but the federal government doesn’t pay interest for holding onto individuals’ refunds for an entire calendar year. Financial advisers refer to this practice as “the IRS savings plan. For these people, the refund is a safe bet and worth the wait. People stand to lose more than just the money deducted from their checks in 2013 if they don’t file these back taxes, the IRS added. Individuals and households that made $46,227 or less may qualify for a tax credit. The credit--up to $6,000--reduces any amount owed to the federal government and potentially increases the size of any refund. The tax credit helps individuals and families with low- to moderate incomes. To qualify, they had to show earnings for that year that don’t exceed: - $46,227 ($51,567 if married filing jointly) with three or more children; - $43,038 ($48,378 if married filing jointly) with two children; - $37,870 ($43,210 if married filing jointly) with one child; - $14,340 ($19,680 if married filing jointly) with no children. The 2013 tax forms and instructions are available on the IRS website at www.irs. gov/forms-pubs, or by calling 800-829-3676. Taxpayers missing their W-2, 1098, 1099 or 5498 earnings documents should request copies from their current or past employer, a bank or other source of taxable income, the department says. Taxpayers who are unable to get missing forms from their employer or other payer should go to IRS.gov and use the “Get Transcript Online” tool to obtain a Wage and Income transcript. Taxpayers can file Form 4506-T to request a transcript of their 2013 income. They can use information on the transcript to file their tax return, according to the IRS. Why is the tax-filing deadline pushed back to April 18 instead of the 15th, you might ask. The IRS says that because the 15th falls on a Saturday next month and the following Monday is a legal holiday in the District of Columbia, everybody in the nation gets an extra day to file. The IRS is in a generous mood, but that’s a limited-time offer. • Seniors 4 Things You Can do Today to Support Your Heart Health (BPT) - On the path to good health, it pays to follow your heart - literally. A healthy heart is essential to supporting good overall health, yet many people ignore the warning signs that their heart is not as healthy as it could be. A 2016 survey from the American Academy of Family Physicians, conducted by Harris Poll, found that nearly three in 10 men and women reported they had been diagnosed with high blood pressure. This result mirrors the findings of research from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. The findings translate to an estimated 75 million people with high blood pressure, and just slightly more than half have the condition under control. “This finding is concerning because we know that high blood pressure and heart attacks or chronic heart failure are so closely related,” said John Meigs, Jr., MD, president of the AAFP. “According to the CDC, seven out of 10 people who have a first heart attack have high blood pressure. Seven out of 10 people who develop chronic heart failure have high blood pressure. So it’s important that people know what their blood pressure is.” To lower your blood pressure and improve your heart health, the American Academy of Family Physicians offers these recommendations. • Be deliberate with your diet. Fruits and vegetables are essential, but pay special attention to their color too. Vegetables and fruits of different colors offer different nutrients, so mix them up. At the same time, avoid heavily processed foods and those high in sodium. You should also make sure you’re drinking plenty of water rather than soda or energy drinks. Aim for at least eight 8-ounce glasses every single day. • Balance your BMI. If you don’t know your BMI, a quick Internet search can lead you to several easy-to-use BMI calculators. And once you do know your BMI, you can start taking steps to reduce it, if necessary. According to the American Heart Association, losing just 5-10 percent of your body weight can dramatically reduce your risk of suffering a heart attack or stroke. And that leads us to ... • Jump start your heart with aerobic exercise. Your heart is a muscle, and like other muscles in your body, exercise strengthens it. So put your heart through a workout with activities like walking, biking or hiking to increase your heart rate. Exercise can also lower your risk of developing plaque in your arteries, allowing your heart to be more efficient in delivering blood and nutrients to other parts of your body. • Stop the stress. Aside from a poor diet, there may be no larger culprit for high blood pressure than stress. Successful stress management has been proven to reduce your risk of heart attack or stroke. So relax, exercise, meditate, breathe deep or just have some fun. Whatever you do to burn off stress, make it an essential part of your day. You and your heart will be better for it. “Get your blood pressure checked,” says Meigs. “If you have high blood pressure, work with your doctor to treat it and lower your risk factors. That same advice applies to knowing what your blood cholesterol levels are.” To learn more about how you can reduce your blood pressure and improve your heart health, have a conversation with your family doctor today. Your doctor will be able to give you an accurate assessment of your current health and offer ideas on where and how you can improve. And to find more heart-healthy tips, visit familydoctor.org. • Looking Up Creating the Coldest Spot in the Universe Based on Press Release from JPL, Provided by Bob Eklund This summer, an ice chest-sized box will fly to the International Space Station, where it will create the coldest spot in the universe. Inside that box, lasers, a vacuum chamber and an electromagnetic “knife” will be used to cancel out the energy of gas particles, slowing them until they’re almost motionless. This suite of instruments is called the Cold Atom Laboratory (CAL), and was developed by NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, California. CAL is in the final stages of assembly at JPL, ahead of a ride to space this August on SpaceX CRS-12. Its instruments are designed to freeze gas atoms to a mere billionth of a degree above absolute zero. That’s more than 100 million times colder than the depths of space. “Studying these hyper-cold atoms could reshape our understanding of matter and the fundamental nature of gravity,” said CAL Project Scientist Robert Thompson of JPL. “The experiments we’ll do with the Cold Atom Lab will give us insight into gravity and dark energy—some of the most pervasive forces in the universe.” When atoms are cooled to extreme temperatures, as they will be inside of CAL, they can form a distinct state of matter known as a Bose-Einstein condensate. In this state, familiar rules of physics recede and quantum physics begins to take over. Matter can be observed behaving less like particles and more like waves. Rows of atoms move in concert with one another as if they were riding a moving fabric. These mysterious waveforms have never been seen at temperatures as low as what CAL will achieve. NASA has never before created or observed Bose-Einstein condensates in space. On Earth, the pull of gravity causes atoms to continually settle towards the ground, meaning they’re typically only observable for fractions of a second. But on the International Space Station, ultra-cold atoms can hold their wave-like forms longer while in freefall. That offers scientists a longer window to understand physics at its most basic level. Thompson estimated that CAL will allow Bose-Einstein condensates to be observable for up to five to 10 seconds; future development of the technologies used on CAL could allow them to last for hundreds of seconds. Bose-Einstein condensates are a “superfluid”—a kind of fluid with zero viscosity, where atoms move without friction as if they were all one, solid substance. “If you had superfluid water and spun it around in a glass, it would spin forever,” said Anita Sengupta of JPL, Cold Atom Lab project manager. “There’s no viscosity to slow it down and dissipate the kinetic energy. If we can better understand the physics of superfluids, we can possibly learn to use those for more efficient transfer of energy.” The results of these experiments could potentially lead to a number of improved technologies, including sensors, quantum computers and atomic clocks used in spacecraft navigation. The Cold Atom Lab is currently undergoing a testing phase that will prepare it prior to delivery to Cape Canaveral, Florida. • Artist’s concept of a magneto-optical trap and atom chip to be used by NASA’s Cold Atom Laboratory (CAL) aboard the International Space Station. Image credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech.
Herald_032317_FNL_lorez
To see the actual publication please follow the link above