Tax News

While many tax limits and threshold amounts are fixed by the Tax Code, a great many others are adjusted annually for inflation by law or IRS discretion. Despite the fact that the rate of inflation has...

There are many current needs—health care premiums; mortgage payments—that use up our hard-earned dollars, making it challenging for many people to save money for future needs. Fortunately, Uncle S...

Whether you prepare your return yourself (on paper or electronically) or use a paid preparer, you need information to input. Hopefully, you’ve kept great records throughout the year to simplify your...

With the real estate market heating up in most locations across the United States, a personal residence is again an important tax shelter for homeowners. You can garner tax breaks when you buy, while ...

The Affordable Care Act (ACA) imposes an individual mandate starting in 2014: carry minimum essential health coverage for you, your spouse, and dependents under age 18 or pay a penalty. The penalty do...

Each year the IRS announces cost-of-living adjustments to dozens of tax items, including standard deductions, personal exemptions, and retirement plan contribution limits. But there are some dollar am...

More than 50 tax breaks that expired at the end of 2013 were extended for 2014 and can be used on 2014 tax returns. Many of our readers have expressed confusion about which breaks have been extended, ...

A new tax year is set to dawn shortly and recently released cost-of-living adjustments can help you plan for 2015. Due to low inflation, increases in the tax brackets and other tax items are minimal; ...

As a holiday gift to the nation, Congress passed the so-called extender bill. This extends retroactively to January 1, 2014, nearly all of the 55 provisions that expired at the end of 2013. The extens...

The Social Security Administration announced the 2015 wage base used for figuring the Social Security portion of FICA and self-employment tax. For 2015, this wage base is $118,500, up from $117,000 in...

The IRS reports that 13 million taxpayers are on extension for filing their 2013 returns. If you are one of them, don’t miss the filing deadline of October 15, 2014; returns filed after this date ar...

IRS interest rates are unchanged for the fourth quarter of 2014 (October 1, 2014, through December 31, 2014). These are the rates changed on underpayments and overpayments: 3% for overpayments (2%...

For the past 5 years, taxpayers with adjusted gross income up to a certain amount ($58,000 in 2013) have been able to prepare their federal income tax returns and file them electronically at no cost. ...

The numbers are out and they’re not comforting. Taxpayers spend an exorbitant amount of time and money filing their federal income tax returns each year, and this filing season had been no different...

Tax Freedom Day is April 21, which is three days later than last year. This is the day that the Tax Foundation computes as the time when the entire nation has paid enough to satisfy tax obligations fo...

The IRS is holding refunds totaling $760 billion for about 918,600 taxpayers who did not file their 2010 returns. The last day to file and claim the outstanding refunds related to these returns is Apr...

The president’s budget proposal for the government’s 2015 fiscal year contains a measure to expand the earned income tax credit (EITC). This credit is fully refundable, so low- and moderate-income...

The IRS’s annual list of the Dirty Dozen Tax Scams has been released. Taxpayers who use or fall victim to these scams expose themselves to additional taxes, penalties, and in some cases, criminal pr...

Income from whatever source derived is included in gross income unless there is a specific law treating the income as wholly or partially tax free. This means that the winnings awarded by the U.S. Oly...

With tax seasons comes the advent of tax scams by email and phone, including text messages. The IRS cautions taxpayers to be wary at this time of the year. Here are some pointers to help you: The ...