Tax Moves To Make Now

From the Wall Street Journal via Yahoo Finance:

Congress still hasn't settled 2013 tax rates on income, investments, large gifts and estates. Deductions and other breaks are also in doubt, now that politicians from both parties are calling for cutbacks—although in different ways. And huge questions remain unanswered even for the 2012 tax year...

Yet despite the uncertainties, advisers say year-end tax planning is possible. The best move this year, says Paul Gevertzman, a tax specialist at accounting firm Anchin, Block & Anchin in New York, is to avoid "crystal-ball planning"—or thinking it's possible to know exactly what will happen. Instead, taxpayers should focus on what is known, maximize breaks while they still exist, reduce vulnerability to unknowns without acting rashly and, above all, stay flexible, he says.