UPDATE: And here's an op-ed in the NYT making the point I noted yesterday, that tax software makes people far less aware of the AMT and therefore much more likely to tolerate it. From the op-ed:
In a world without paid preparers and TurboTax, taxpayers would face the tedious process of calculating their taxes twice - once under the regular income tax and once using the cumbersome alternative minimum tax rules. But software does that calculation in the blink of an eye - and for taxpayers who have to pay the tax, tell them how to adjust their withholding so that next year they won't even notice that they're paying it.Too true!
ANOTHER UPDATE: How hard did the AMT hit me? More than $6,000!
पोस्ट्स
५ टिप्पण्या:
Ask some of your friends what their refund was and they'll know.
Ask them how much they PAID, and they probably won't.
Umm, cumbersome AMT rules? They really aren't that cumbersome. Much less cumbersome than the regular tax. A standard deduction of income excluded, then two brackets with no other deductions.
Of course, the amount paid can be heavily, but that's a different thing. But the AMT is a stealth flat tax; if everyone paid it, then many tax preparers would be out of a job.
Instead of Congress writing tax laws in a legal form of English that everyday accountants and attorneys can understand, and then having Intuit put it into computer code, why not have Congress simply pass the computer code itself? In other words, rather than say, "Your tax is your income minus these deductions, multiplied by these tables -- now go buy a private computer program to try to get it right," Congress could simply say, "Your tax is what this computer language says you owe after plugging in the income and expense information that it calls for."
Expanded comments here. Thanks for the great grist for the blogmill.
My income for 2008 was less than 2007. Our deductions were basically the same amount for all of the separate deductions. Actually had less education credits. But the AMT hit me this year and not last. Is there a reason for this?
टिप्पणी पोस्ट करा