Posts Tagged ‘Employment’

NH Governor John Lynch Announces a Three-Part Initiative to Help Workers

January 28th, 2010

By Michele Moon, NEJS Public Relations Manager

Governor John Lynch

Salem NH – January 25, 2010 – Governor John Lynch and Commissioner Tara Reardon announced at a NHES sponsored networking meeting NHnetWORKS, New Hampshire’s Three-Part Initiative to help its workers. This initiative focuses on keeping individuals working, employing the unemployed and training.

Part I – Stay at Work focuses on keeping individuals employed. As businesses experience a temporary slow down, they may find it necessary to adjust their personnel accordingly. Under this plan, instead of individuals being laid off, their hours would be cut, but their benefits would remain in place and lost wages could be augmented by unemployment benefits.

Part II – Return to Work focuses on assisting the unemployed in their effort to find employment. Under this portion of the initiative, companies would be encourage to bring in a prospective new hire and train them for up to 6 weeks (24 hours per week maximum) at no cost to the company. This benefits the candidate by giving them the opportunity to pursue a new career path or industry. During this training period, the individual participating in the training would continue to collect unemployment benefits until they are hired.

Part III – Skills Assessment and Training will evaluate a worker skill set. Based on the results, individuals will have the opportunity to upgrade their skills and they be certified as “Work Ready”.

This program will be rolled out in 3 stages. Part II is expected to be launched in late Spring, followed by Part I in July (after legislative approval) and finally Part III. Part III will be expanded further in 2011 when job training funds double over 2010 levels.

About NHnetWORKS

NHnetWORKS is a networking group of professionals either in transition or working, living, or interested in doing business in New Hampshire. Its purpose is to help people advance professionally and to assist them with successful business and organizational activities. Run by Nicole Tessier, Founder and Director, the Group meets from 9 a.m. to noon every Monday at SNHU’s 25 Pelham Road, Salem NH campus.

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Posted in Job opportunities, News

Tags: Employment Employment opportunities Governor John Lynch NH Three-Part Initiative NHES NHnetWORKS Nicole Tessier Return to Work Skills Assessment and Training Stay at Work unemployed

Job Search Tips: Middle skill jobs are going unfilled

January 20th, 2010

By Judit Price, MS, CDFI, IJCTC, CCM, CPRW

I have long been receiving job availability information from HR managers, recruiters and various organizations and state agencies. This year the number of positions sent to me has dramatically grown. When I saw an article in the Boston Business Journal that stated over 50 thousand jobs are vacant in Massachusetts, and a significant number are defined as “middle-skill”, I realized that a large proportion of the open position I receive fit that description.

Middle skills jobs are defined as requiring more than a high school education and less than a 4 year degree. These jobs, according to the Journal, make up “the largest part of our state and national market.” These are also positions that tend to be full time, permanent with good wages and opportunities for growth. They are difficult to outsource and provide long-term stability. Generally, a 2-year associates program or vocational certificate in a specialty is sufficient.

I raise this issue because when I present to groups the audience is almost entirely professional or managerial and I rarely get calls from this middle-skill workforce. As a result I fear that too many do not understand that the principles of career planning are fundamental to a successful job search for almost everyone. This includes assessments, job search strategies and networking training, solid documentation including resume, cover letters and other documents, and good interviewing skills.

The job hunt takes much longer than in the past, and that probably will not change. In addition, recruiters and hiring managers look for some other factors that help determine which candidates fits their needs as they move through the process. There are a number of you who have given up, at least temporarily. To those people I would say you need to ask yourself what are you are doing that is right and what are you doing that is wrong?

Middle Skill Job Seekers Take Note

» Read more: Job Search Tips: Middle skill jobs are going unfilled

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Posted in Job search tips

Tags: Employment Interviews job hunt Job search tips Judit Price middle skills Networking networking for work resume

Career Assssment: Starting Your Own Business, Part 6

December 10th, 2009

By Thomas Arrison, Certified Public Accountant

Quick Hitters

Tax Professionals
Owning your own business can be confusing and lonely. Legal and tax difficulties can appear at any time. If you hire a tax professional, they can help with your tax return and estimates. A good tax professional will also advise you on running your business and work with you to make it more profitable. They also can advise you on legal ways to reduce your taxes. Don’t depend on your friends and family when you are self-employed.

Checking Accounts
It is best to set up a separate business checking account for the business. Pay all your business bills from the business account and all your personal bills from your personal account. Transfer money from the business account to your personal account so your checks won’t bounce

Health Insurance
You can get health insurance from several sources. Cobra should be available to you from your former employer. Chambers of Commerce offer health insurance options and there are various other organizations that offer this benefit. Your payments for health insurance are not deductible on Schedule C as a business expense, but could be deductible on the first page of your Form 1040.

Employees
Do your best to avoid hiring employees. The requirements you must meet when you have employees are significant and time consuming. Contact your tax professional if you are seriously thinking about hiring employees.

Sales taxes
Very little of this blog talks about a business that sells things. Be aware that if you sell a product you must collect and pay sales taxes in most states. Some states, such as Connecticut, have a sales tax on services as well.

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Posted in Career assessment and transition

Tags: career assessment contract employment Employment Self assessment self employment Thomas Arrison

Career Assessment: Starting Your Own Business, Part 5

December 1st, 2009

By Thomas Arrison, Certified Public Accountant

Paying your taxes

Be sure you are sitting down. The taxes on the income from your business can be as high as 40 to 50% of your net profit. It all depends on what other income shows up on your tax return. The fact that your spouse is working can push you into this level of taxation as can investment income, unemployment compensation, or rental income. Here is how it breaks down:

The Social Security Administration gets about 15% of your wages or net income from self-employment to cover your Social Security benefits and Medicare. When you are an employee, you pay half and your employer pays half. When you are self-employed you pay the whole 15%. Your itemized deductions, such as mortgage interest and real estate taxes, do not effect what you pay for Social Security.

Your federal income taxes depend on your taxable income and marital status. This blog cannot provide all the alternatives. A large majority of taxpayers end up in either the 25 or 28% tax brackets. Your actual percentage will vary with your return.

Most states have an income tax. Even some states that do not have an income tax have a business tax that applies to self-employed people. New Hampshire is one of those states. Massachusetts has a tax rate of approximately 5%.

Using the numbers above you would be paying either 45% or 48% in total taxes. Now that you are totally depressed, let me back off from that statement a bit. The taxes you pay depend on how your tax return goes together. High mortgage interest and real estate taxes will reduce your federal taxes. A non-working spouse reduces your taxes. Many of my self-employed clients only pay Social Security taxes because their income is low.

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Posted in Career assessment and transition

Tags: career assessment career transition contract employment Employment Employment opportunities self employment Thomas Arrison

Career Assessment: Starting Your Own Business, Part 4

November 26th, 2009

By Thomas Arrison, Certified Public Accountant

Tax Deductions

The reason you need a bookkeeping system is so that you can deduct all the expenses possible to minimize the taxes you will be paying.

There are a couple of expenses that you will not collect in your bookkeeping system.

Automobile expense. You have two choices in calculating your deduction for your automobile. Under either choice you need to keep a log on your business miles and know the total miles you drive your car during the year.

One way is to record every expense, (gas, insurance, repairs etc.) you incur using your automobile. Once you know the total cost you multiply it by your business-use percentage. (Business-use percentage is your business miles divided by your total miles.) Alternately, you use the IRS automobile mileage rate (for 2009 the IRS mileage rate is $0.55 per mile) times the business miles. The vast majority of my clients use the IRS standard mileage rate. It’s simpler to work with.

Deduction for a home office. To deduct the cost to maintain an office in your home, you must use the area exclusively for business. Thus you cannot deduct the expense if you work at your kitchen table. You are allowed to deduct the business-use percentage of all the expenses to run the house. This would include mortgage interest, real estate taxes, utilities, heat, insurance, and general repairs. You cannot deduct repairs to the non-business use portion of the house, like your kitchen. As this is a complex deduction, it would benefit you to hire a tax professional to help you figure it out.

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Posted in Career assessment and transition

Tags: career assessment career transition Employment Employment opportunities self employment

Career Assessment: Starting Your Own Business, Part 3

November 23rd, 2009

By Thomas Arrison, Certified Public Accountant

Some details that you need to pay attention to

Record Keeping

The IRS requires that you keep accurate records of your income and expenses. They don’t tell you how to do it. You want to establish a system that is simple, accurate, and easy to maintain. It can be a paper system or computerized, whatever works best for you. It is important to do your record keeping regularly. Do it every week or at least every month. The goal of record keeping is to collect information together into the categories of income and expenses to determine your net income.

Do not throw your receipts under the seat of your car, in the basket on the back of your counter top, or in a box under your bed.
Do not take a big box of receipts to your CPA to prepare your return.
Be organized. You need to know how you are doing as the year progresses, but you can also save yourself a lot of money in tax preparation fees when you come prepared.

These are general descriptions of different record keeping systems. You will need to dig into the specifics yourself.

Dome Bookkeeping System. One of the simplest systems, you can buy it at most office supply stores. It is a paper and pencil system and is smaller than a crossword puzzle book. With this system you record your income and expenses as they are incurred. So when you make a sale today, write it down. When you pay a bill, write it down. At the end of the month you summarize your expenses by category and tally up your year to date activity. At the end of the year you hand the book to your CPA to have your taxes prepared. Quick, simple, accurate, and it saves you money with your accountant.

One-Write System. Another paper system, you can buy checks and a check register from a company like Deluxe . A check register is created at the same time you write checks and makes a permanent record of each transaction. It also keeps your checkbook in balance. The check register has columns to “spread” your expenses to. So every time you buy office supplies, you put the amount paid in the office supply column. At the end of the month you tally up the sheets. At the end of the year you summarize your activity for the full year to prepare your tax return.

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Posted in Career assessment and transition

Tags: career assessment Career planning career transition Employment self employment Thomas Arrison

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