Taxes and death are two things most people can be certain of.  This year’s Tax Day, the day on which tax returns are due, is April 17.  Tax rates are a politically volatile subject.  Some believe that wealthy people ought to be taxed at a higher rate, while others believe that taxes  are already too high and ought to be lowered.

This brief blog does not discuss the pros and cons of each position, but offers a guide to completing tax forms as current law requires.  Lockwood Library prepared a 2011 Tax Quick Guide discusses:

• Federal taxes.
• State Taxes
• Tax Tips
• Tax Clinics—free area services that help people who meet income requirements complete their tax forms.

Please note the following disclaimer:  Library staff lack training as tax professionals and cannot answer tax-related questions. Use the links on this Web site and the tax materials available in the library or online at your own risk. Consult a qualified professional if you need assistance preparing tax returns.

Do you ever wonder where your tax dollars go?  Your 2010 Federal Taxpayer Receipt, a database created by the Whitehouse, that tells you.  Entier your 2010 Social Security, Medicare, and Income tax to see how Washington spent your money.

The University at Buffalo Libraries is providing EndNote™ citation management software to UB’s academic community. EndNote™ helps you organize bibliographic references to journal articles, book chapters, Web sites and other information sources.

The current version is EndNote X4.  Version X5 will be available soon.

Download EndNote™ Today!

The UB site license for EndNote™ is funded by the University at Buffalo Libraries, with partial support from the Technology Fee.

Study Spaces in the UB Libraries

Need a place to study? In addition to the general study tables and carrels located in each campus library, there are also group study rooms, quiet study areas, and individual lockable carrels in some of the UB Libraries.

Check out the list of Study Spaces in the UB Libraries, and you’ll find the perfect spot to write a paper, prepare for a presentation, or study for finals.

Have you ever used Web of Science?  Well, then you definitely want to give Scopus a try!

Scopus is the largest abstract and citation database of scholarly peer-reviewed literature containing 18,000 journals from a broad array of disciplines including health, life, physical and social sciences; as well as the arts and humanities (3,500 journals).  For business researchers, Scopus includes ~900 journals categorized as “Business, Management and Accounting.”

Like Web of Science, Scopus is a valuable tool not only for discovering new research as it emerges, but also for tracking and analyzing trends in research over time.

The UB Libraries are currently trialing Scopus — give it a try and let me know what you think.

One of the new arrivals here in the UB Libraries is an important book called The Plundered Planet: Why We Must – and How We Can – Manage Nature for Global Prosperity by Paul Collier.  The book provides a balanced analysis of the issues surrounding the urgent need to save the planet while also alleviating poverty:

“I think there’s quite a few battles going on out there, but I think environmentalists bring a key insight which economists have missed—and that is that natural assets are special. Nature is distinctive, and why is it distinctive?  It’s because we don’t own nature in the same way that we own the things we’ve made. Natural assets have no natural owners. We haven’t created nature, it’s there because previous generations didn’t plunder it. And so we don’t have the rights to plunder it, burn it up and consume it for our own benefit.”

More books on this topic are available from the University Libraries under the subject heading, “sustainable development.”