I simply cannot stand it: I have to pay $5K+ extra taxes.

[Tyler Durden]

WHY this is happening is immaterial. The thing that is absolutely KILLING ME is that I feel like George Bush is standing beside me with his hand out and a big shit-eating grin saying, "Thanks a HEAP, Pardner" in that contrived Texas accent.

I'm dyin' over here.

[GOPisEvil]

1. I had to pay a penalty this year too.

It sucked, but at least I had sufficient fundage to cover it.

[Tyler Durden]

3. I don't. I'm going to have to make fucking PAYMENTS.

It will be like eating SHIT once a month till it's paid off. AND it's going to make installing the new heat pump almost impossible.

[GOPisEvil]

5. That sucks major ass!

Sorry to hear that. :(

[salin]

6. what type of penalty? What should I be worried about

dare I admit that the last several years I have hired someone to do my taxes (once I finally had things to deduct - so doing the short-form that I had used for years no longer made sense... )

[GOPisEvil]

7. I withdrew some retirement funds.

So, it's just a one-time penalty. I'll go back to refunds next year. ;)

[salin]

8. thanks

that one I don't yet worry about. But the creep down of the ATM is going to hit a family member in retirement - we haven't yet figured out how badly. I still don't understand the mechanics (why this is a year that it creeps further downward on incomes, though I do know that it was originally designed for the much more wealthy back in 1968 - and has never been indexed for inflation.)

I don't what else I might be hit by .... but in this no-tax pf the rich atmosphere - but with escalating govt debt, I rather expect that things might have been snuck in (tax law changes) that have been unnoticed by the media until we have to pay (we aren't the rich, after all.... much easier targets)


One suprise in 2005, was hit with a one-year spike in local property taxes (paid almost double in 2005, because the home was in foreclosure and in ownership of a bank before I bought it - but in the window in which property is considered eligible for a home-stead (primary living) exemption/breaks - but those have already been paid - and the ones due next month have dropped back down.) Granted that had more to do with timing of foreclosure and classification of property than a direct effect of the bushco deficits and preferential for the very wealthy...

Sorry you were hit this year - but glad that you could absorb it - and bounce back! :hi: :D

[GOPisEvil]

9. The AMT is catching more and more people every year.

It really does need to be revised so that it is impacting the people it was designed originally to impact.

I got my homestead exemption and a appraisal hike in the same year. They almost canceled each other out. :shrug:

[salin]

10. It is an odd position

I am not quite at the ATM cut off - but I am not that far away. I spent the better part of the last two decades working for nonprofits at very low wages, or being in school/grad school - so to suddenly have to pay attention to the ATM is reallly odd. Just ten years ago I was living in a community that was so poor that it only got its first ATM in 1996 - and that had been designated a few years earlier as a 'per capita murder capitol of the country.' Now, finally at a comfortable income ... I have to pay attention to the creep down of ATM. Really odd. In many ways I can't complain (after living for years on the edge in expensive markets), I can afford to absorb higher costs/taxes - but I can't help resent a wee bit that those making a lot more are not hit in the same way. I still don't understand enough of the ATM - but I keep reading that at a certain higher income level - it doesn't apply ... or that there are ways around it. I don't mind paying more than those with lesser income - but it really irks me to pay more (at least percentage wise, but sometimes - shockingly - in net payments) than those with a much higher income. THat is absurd. Or maybe not in this society that has reengaged in full-out class warfare tipped favorably to the really wealthy.

How is that for a rant?

[deadparrot]

2. But...but...your taxes *aren't* being cut?

My family's, either.

:hug:

Sorry to hear that. It's all bullshit.

[Tyler Durden]

4. My rePuke ex-immediate family...

...now THEY get a tax cut.

[pitohui]

11. i'm sorry that stinks

i had better say no more, for some reason i had a refund

i got caught one year for $7K back when $7K was real money, it is painful

be strong, friend

[DBoon]

12. We got a big refund

amazing how that works when your income drops.

Note: The drop was in my "outside" income and my wife's extra bonus, so we don't need any sympathies - we are still doing fine. It just had the interesting effect of causing us to pay less taxes than we thought we would.