I do not have a business degree, but I was raised in a mom and pop hardware store, and by a bank manager, but here is some insight: his business is NOT safe. He is an independent contractor. He has a name he operates under, but I don't recall him actually having a business license. Because he did not form an LLC and subsequently hire himself, he does not get the same protection a genuine business would. It may be different in the states, but because he is just some small business operator, I believe that in the eyes of the law and the government, Phil Burnell and Burnell Productions (he really brainstormed that one) are the same entity. What he owns is his property, of which a portion is used for completing his contracts. But it's all in his name, if he had an LLC, the computer, consoles, basically his whole office setup would belong to Burnell Productions, not Phil the person, as such, a lot of the stuff he swears is protected is actually fair game. The onus is on him to prove that these items are for his business. In business talk, that usually means receipts, write off history, the like. He does not strike me as a book keeper, and I imagine he has no ledgers where he records his income. So basically, Phil taking the money is essentially taking the cash in the register and pocketing it, it's technically his, since he isn't a business entity, as far as I can tell, but by not reinvesting it, he is harming his ability to do further business (spend money to make money), in essence, he is robbing himself. And then nailing his balls to the wall if, God forbid, he get audited, he's gotta sit there and prove every expense he has ever claimed and he likely has no paper trail to support it. Lord help him if they look into it during this bankruptcy process. Now, I am not completely clear, but he may have accidentally done one thing right insofar as highering someone else to do his taxes for him. What I am unclear on is his language, a tax attorney is very different from an accountant. What he claims he pays to have his stuff filed is what an accounting firm usually charges small business operators. The taxes are dead easy, and the programs walk you through everything, from your name, right down to the last penny you made/spent, reductions, operating expenses, multiple sources of income, it's all in there, and for having four sources of income, it's still pretty straightforward. It could have been ever so slightly more complicated if he had rented out the CT condo and pulled in money there, but apparently throwing money into a burning pit was the better option for him. Anyways, when an accountant does your taxes, you're not really paying him to fill out the form, that's just a byproduct of the transaction, what you are really paying for is that in the case of an audit, the accounting firm will go to bat for you. I mean, within reason, it still ultimately falls on you to do the bare minimum and put your receipts in a fucking drawer. An accountant can help him ever so slightly here. An attorney will look at him, look at his book (or lack thereof), and say what the fuck do you realistically expect me to do about this? A bad, or unscrupulous attorney will still take the money and happily lose the case if he doesn't care to much about his win/loss ratio at the court level.
So, unless he has some amazing accountants, this man and his business is in danger being being stripped down to what the trustee feels two normal human beings can realistically live off of and not die, and most levels of government have very specific numbers of what that is. Maybe not die, but well, not thrive, anyway, you don't get rewarded for bankruptcy.