Federal Income tax rebate less than 50% and why?

[acelungger]

Hi All,
I hope that this is okay to post. I am in hopes that maybe some one has came acrossed this same deal or not. My Wife and I make around $22500.00 a year and we allways do the short form and have used the same person for 25 years, My wife dropped our papers off and found out that the lady that does Our taxes is in the Hospital but would be out in a few days, 3 weeks goes by and we get our state check, a couple more weeks go by and my wife called down and ask if our Fed. taxes had been done and if so how much would we get, she told my wife $939.00, we got $1700.00 last year and nothing has changed from last year, she told me that there was a deduction that is no longer there?????
I am really sorry to ask this, but I am lost! I know that they say any one can fill out the short form, and that might be true but I just soon that be on someone else's shoulders.
I would be deeply great full!
Greg
HELP

 

[HMFIC]

What deduction did she say is no longer there?

 

[tran]

I am having to pay an additional 1100.00 this year on top of the 24,300.00 we payed thru out the year. The sad part is we had extra money held out to try to off set this. This is ********!

 

[Buddhaman]

I'm assuming its the $800 Make Work Pay credit that you're no longer getting (same here). I'm not too thrilled about it either.

 

[Old Fart]

Suxfest.

I'm not at all looking forward to seeing how much I'll owe this year.

 

[Hump66]

Mine was shorter by about $400, I'm assuming it's the making work pay thing.

 

[Fyrtwuck]

Whats make work pay?

 

[KOPBET]

Pay your taxes and smile. It's the patriotic thing to do (according to Biden).

 

[ripnbst]

Whats make work pay?

Yeah, I don't know either. Care to enlighten us?

 

[Werewolf]

Hi All,
I hope that this is okay to post. I am in hopes that maybe some one has came acrossed this same deal or not. My Wife and I make around $22500.00 a year and we allways do the short form and have used the same person for 25 years, My wife dropped our papers off and found out that the lady that does Our taxes is in the Hospital but would be out in a few days, 3 weeks goes by and we get our state check, a couple more weeks go by and my wife called down and ask if our Fed. taxes had been done and if so how much would we get, she told my wife $939.00, we got $1700.00 last year and nothing has changed from last year, she told me that there was a deduction that is no longer there?????
I am really sorry to ask this, but I am lost! I know that they say any one can fill out the short form, and that might be true but I just soon that be on someone else's shoulders.
I would be deeply great full!
Greg
HELP

1st - If you meant $225,000 and not the $22,500 you wrote just go on to the next thread.

But if you and your wife did only earn $22,500 combined in 2011 then the 1040 EZ is the way to go and paying a tax guy is just plain silly. Hell you can file the thing over the phone. Don't pay someone to do your taxes.

One key point missing from your story is how much of that $22K was with-held.

As for deductions: The standard deduction far exceeds any you could claim with just a $22K annual income unless you've got some really heavy duty medical expenses but if that were the case you'd need to file a long form and you stated you filed a short form.

The make work pay credit may be gone but the earned income credit is still there. If you've got kids then welcome to the glories of income redistribution because with the EIC you'll get back way more than you paid in.

Then again you mentioned having used the same person to do your taxes for the past 25 years. Maybe you're retired and all your income is from dividends (seems unlikely), a pension or social security. If it's dividends you pay a flat 15% of the total. Pension - not sure how that works but IIRC it's just regular income. Social Security has its own wierd rules.

Good luck with your problem but without knowing the source of your income and how much was with-held it's almost impossible to say whether you're getting back the correct amount or not.