How the heck can someone make only 19k and still owe taxes???

[Maine Mary]

:eyes:

I'm not self employed and both of my employers withheld taxes on my income. Maybe I did something wrong? :shrug:

[SoCalDem]

1. It sure sounds like it.. Are you using software to do taxes?

You mmust have missed something ... I hope you did :)

[Maine Mary]

4. Yes. I used e-file

According to them I owe only 34 bucks. But I thought I'd get a little something back, not OWE anything!

[EC]

2. Tell me about it.....same thing....?????...n/t

[guitar man]

3. They have to

finance those tax cuts for the fat cats somehow. They are sticking it to the little guy bigtime this year. My wife and I got royally screwed on a combined income of about 35k. screwed bad.

[huellewig]

5. They go after you around..

7,500$...

[ProdigalJunkMail]

7. huh?

who goes after you for what about $7500???

tP

[Jeff in Cincinnati]

14. Fed Income Tax

Standard Deduction (Single) = $4,850
Personal Exemption = $3,100

Any income beyond $7,950 is going to be taxable. Looks like you're going to owe somewhere in the neighborhood of $1,300; if your withholding didn't cover it, you might want to have increased a bit this year.

[ProdigalJunkMail]

17. ahhh...ok

i was pretty sure that is what you meant but I thought you might mean that the IRS wouldn't come after you unless you OWED $7500...and, man, they will come after you for $5...

D

[GOPisEvil]

6. Couldn't tell ya, but...

...:hi: Nice to see you. :hug:

[GalleryGod]

21. Same Here, Sweetie! Great to See you!

:grouphug:

[catmandu57]

8. My wife had to pay this year

For the first time ever, both state and federal. It wasn't much and we did the tax ourself, if we had done things right she probably would'nt have had to pay anything. Next year we go to a professional.

[DistantWind88]

9. So you don't want to pay your

"fair share?" :-)

[catmandu57]

10. We're poor people

and we're paying the share of those who can best afford to pay, when one lives from paycheck to paycheck there isn't any wiggle room, and the 39.00 that the government wanted could have come from those damn piggies who don't worry about whether or not they have to worry about the car breaking down, the water heater going out, the roof springing a leak.
When the share is fair I'll gladly throw in to the pot.

[Name removed]

12. Deleted message

Message removed by moderator. Click here to review the message board rules.

[progmom]

15. I think the point is that a lot of people this year are surprised...

...that despite withholding the same amount as in years past, they find themselves owing more money at the end of the year. The fact that Bush keeps talking about how effective his tax cuts have been only makes it that much more painful. It's obvious that the tax cuts have not been beneficial to those with less substantive means.

I'm not sure what your position is here on this issue, but it does look like you're trying to bait someone.

[DistantWind88]

23. I actually wasn't

trying to bait anyone. I'm just curious as to if some people actually believe they should pay no income taxes at all.

[Zing Zing Zingbah]

13. I think if we had some one do our taxes

our whole refund would end up going to them.

We don't get much of a refund because my husband set up his w-4's to maximize the amount of money he can keep each check so that he can put more in his tax sheltered retirement fund. We figured it at the time so we basically wouldn't get much back at all.

[Zing Zing Zingbah]

11. I remember last year hearing a radio disc jockey

bragging about how he was getting $12,000 in tax refunds! Another person on the show was getting around $6,000 back. I believe it was the MJ guy on the MJ morning show on 93.3 FM in Tampa. That's a disgusting sum of money to get back. I was really annoyed that these guys were essentially bragging about how rich they were on their radio show.

I think my family made about $40,000 with both my husband and I working that year (2003). We wound up having to pay back some money. Apparently, that year President Ass-Wipe thought he'd trick families into thinking he was helping them out by giving them an advance on the child tax credit. I didn't realize it was only an advance at the time. I was thinking in was an additional refund from our 2002 taxes. They gave out additional refunds to us the year before, so we assumed that was what the money was. Anyhow, we of course forgot all about getting this money from the government (and we didn't realize it was the child tax credit either), so of course we claimed the child tax credit on our 2003 taxes. We wound up having to pay back the child tax credit that we claimed plus a few dollars in late fees because we weren't allowed to get the child tax credit twice.

I bet they didn't try that shit with the advanced child tax credit this year because the IRS probably got lots of calls from angry parents last year. I know I called them and complained.

[Hand]

16. Insh'Allah... nt

[Schema Thing]

18. plug in some charitable mileage

if you haven't already. You know you did some.

[redqueen]

19. How many exemptions did you take on your W4?

If you took the number you have, and your salary was at or near the top income level for your bracket, then they may have withheld just a bit less than you would owe.

Only reason I could think of...

[DrGonzoLives]

20. How many deductions do you claim

as far as withholding goes? If you're at a low salary, like you are, it's probably a better idea to just claim none, as you'll have a far better chance of overpaying that way. Sure, it leaves you with less money paycheck to paycheck, but that's still a hell of a lot better than having to fork over money to the IRS every Spring because you underpaid.

Also, start keeping every single receipt you get regarding medical expenses. If they amount to, I believe, 5% of your adjusted income, you can claim them.

[Lydia Leftcoast]

22. Hi, Maine Mary, haven't seen you around for a while

:hi:

Anyway, you may be a living example of the way Bush's tax policies rob the poor to enrich the rich.

Personally, as a self-employed person, I never get refunds, and even if I did, I would be wise to apply it to next year's taxes. But even when I had an employer, I never got a refund after Reagan's 1986 tax "reform."

[guitar man]

24. This is starting to confirm my suspicions

We have been hit with a tax increase here in the lower working ranks. I haven't been able to do a comparison of tax tables etc. yet, but we are the victims of a flim-flam to make up for GW's tax cuts for his wealthy buddies.