Do you usually get a tax refund or have to pay

[Hall]

But most people are ignorant. Getting a refund is “good” while writing a check is “bad”. They actually have no idea how much they’ve paid over the year, or in which marginal bracket they are.

I still laugh at people when they are all "Whoo-hoo !! I'm getting a $3000 tax refund!!" because they truly believe it's free money. We owed this year. Last year we were supposed to get a couple thousand dollar refund but it seemed to be from the combination of our daughter and my wife attending college, so those education-related expenses seemed to be the reason. In fact, I know it was stuff related to my wife's because TurboTax shows you a running amount (owed or refund) and it jumped after I finished inputting her data. Something else was wrong though and I really think I should look into it but the IRS later said "there was an error on your return...." and adjusted our refund down to a few hundred dollars. They said it was related to claiming our daughter and they felt we can't claim her.

I wrote a check this year. Not much. About a grand. Not enough to incur a penalty

I'm surprised we didn't get penalized. When I first ran through our taxes and saw what we were going to owe, I started sending payments to the IRS. I will "file" officially in a week or two and they will have already rec'd all that we owe. No mention of a penalty from Turbotax though (it has given us a penalty amount years ago when we owed). All it did do was give us estimated quarterly payment coupons Reason we owed was my wife hadn't adjusted the # of dependents but she's done so now (plus an add'l $ amount withheld).

 

[TiGeo]

It is just income tax. I'm referring to when you hear about rich people or those with creative accountants and how their same "effective tax rate" is 0%. When you Google "presidents effective tax rate", the first result says the current president's rate is 24.6%. If you Google a former president's rate, it says it's 4%.

Not many folks that have earned income can do much creative accounting to have a zero tax liability. The only time I got there/close was when we had our second child, my wife stayed home, we had a new mortgage so lots of interest for an itemized deduction and I had a modest income of around $50K. After the dust settled on that return my total liability was a few '00 and my effective tax rate was 0.something%; that was in 2004. They used to call that a "lucky ducky" or something like that. The funny tax numbers happen when folks have businesses, real-estate, and income from investments allowing large deductions of losses. This is not the norm for most average people even higher-earners.

 

[Chester11]

There was a killer podcast episode of planet money (NPR) about a year ago that laid out our tax system fairly and planinly and it was shocking how little we actually pay vs. the ROW but most here don't undestand or get that...but we also have less public services than many countries so that makes sense.

I definitely did not have a Planet Money reference on my BITOG bingo card. I only recently stumbled on it - off topic, but they had an episode on ticket scalping that was also fantastic.

My gripe is that we allow companies like Intuit to overly complicate filing, and basically make it their own cash cow. A few years back, my accountant suggested I free file for my kids, as they were eligible. It was ridiculously difficult, with upsells at every step. (The whole time I was kicking myself for not just filling out the PDF).

I end up carrying over a balance to avoid estimated taxes.

When guys say they are doing it themselves, are we talking Turbotax, IRS website, or something else? Every year inertia brings me back to the accountant, who is getting very spendy.

 

[TiGeo]

I definitely did not have a Planet Money reference on my BITOG bingo card. I only recently stumbled on it - off topic, but they had an episode on ticket scalping that was also fantastic.

My gripe is that we allow companies like Intuit to overly complicate filing, and basically make it their own cash cow. A few years back, my accountant suggested I free file for my kids, as they were eligible. It was ridiculously difficult, with upsells at every step. (The whole time I was kicking myself for not just filling out the PDF).

I end up carrying over a balance to avoid estimated taxes.

When guys say they are doing it themselves, are we talking Turbotax, IRS website, or something else? Every year inertia brings me back to the accountant, who is getting very spendy.

I have used Turbo Tax forever.

 

[Pablo]

Turbo tax was stupider than ever this year!

 

[dlundblad]

Would you loan your neighbor $100 each pay period and allow them to pay it back to you once a year with no interest?


It’s your money. That money could be going into savings, retirement accounts, etc.

My thoughts exactly. The people who think the tax refund is somehow extra income make me laugh.

 

[Astro14]

Turbo Tax - But I skip through their moronic questionnaire and go straight to the actual forms and start working.

 

[Ws6]

Just curious how many people get a tax refund or are having to mail in a check.

I just finished mailing in my due amount. Not as bad as some years but still....

It depends on if I did anything that gets me a tax credit. If not, I usually get enough back from state to pay federal. I typically claim S/0.

 

[Pablo]

MIL had to pay a lump sum north of $50K to the IRS

Today an $1100 check arrived

I guess her CPA was a bit cautious not sure yet what the IRS recalculated

 

[wpod]

It is just income tax. I'm referring to when you hear about rich people or those with creative accountants and how their same "effective tax rate" is 0%. When you Google "presidents effective tax rate", the first result says the current president's rate is 24.6%. If you Google a former president's rate, it says it's 4%.

I have never been employed by a poor person. poor people cost society the most yet pay the least taxes.

 

[BHopkins]

Well, if you get a refund, that means you gave the gvt a free loan for the year. Buy yeah, cranking out another check at tax time ain't no fun.

Many years ago I worked in a seat belt manufacturing facility where my son also worked, in Process Engineering. One of his friends, that also worked in PE, used to get so excited at tax time. He would get a huge tax refund, in the range of $4000 - $8000. This just always flabbergasted me. I could not understand why anyone would deny themselves the use of their earnings, all so they could get a huge tax return. The kid explained that he and his wife knew that they had little self control, and by having 0 exemptions on their W2, they were allowing the IRS to be essentially a Christmas savings account for them each year.

I've always targeted for a fairly modest return, at most $300 - $500. but preferring to pay a few hundred dollars at tax time. I have no intention to give the Fed's a tax free loan each year.

 

[mattd]

With the Solar credit and my kids we got 17,000 back this year. We usually have returns in the 7-8K range every year

 

[Thermo1223]

Last tax season I had to pay out the rear from those child payments. I should have opted out. This year I got a small refund because I overpaid out of fear from last year.

 

[TiGeo]

Turbo Tax - But I skip through their moronic questionnaire and go straight to the actual forms and start working.

I just end up doing the "choose your own adventure" method vs. the forms but yeah, I don't need a full walk-through.

 

[TiGeo]

Last tax season I had to pay out the rear from those child payments. I should have opted out. This year I got a small refund because I overpaid out of fear from last year.

ha - same. I should have opted out and finally did for both my wife and I but just adjusted my last estimated to handle it that year. Won't do that again.

 

[wander2039]

Small refunds from the states and couple grand from federal, it's been that way since the boys have been born at least. I could even it out but ehh. Maxed out the 401k the last few years and changed things a bit. I like to keep it same year to year.