 Internal Revenue Service IRS tax news. Parents can boost their back-to-school budget by claiming tax credits and refunds. You know what would be even nicer than an education tax credit? If college tuition were not like 10 times the price they should be due to government subsidies. I mean, a $2,000 tax credit, that sounds great. But hey, wait a second. The price of tuition went up from like $5,000 to $40,000. This $2,000 tax credit seems just like that stimulus payment followed by massive inflation. It's basically worthless or less than worthless. This benefit's costing me money. Wouldn't it be better to make schools compete on their own merits? Markets driving down prices just like with any other business rather than subsidizing them? Because the subsidies are clearly resulting in bloated, greedy, government-beholding monsters of schools. Some people think that because schools are not for profit organizations, that they don't care about profits. And I'll tell you what, I'm sorry, but that's stupid. I mean, that's like the myth of saying that communist countries don't care about profits. Does it make sense to say like China doesn't care about profits, not for profit organizations, don't care about profit? I mean, it's ridiculous woke word game nonsense. Has everyone gone stupid? Okay, I got a little carried away. I got a little carried away there, Phil. Cut that last part out. I sounded a little crazy there. Cut that last part out, Phil. I mean it this time. This is my show, dang it, Phil. Cut that last part out. Honestly, sometimes I think like Phil's trying to make me look stupid. In any case, first an attempt at a joke. Man, we really should have read between the lines with that Inflation Reduction Act. You need to read between the lines. Why? There's just white space there. It turns out the Inflation Reduction Act increases inflation. Who's ready to get sweaty? Have a seat, Robin. A seat, but that's the opposite of cardio. I mean, it's almost like they lied to us right in the bull print at the top. That being the title of the big highly publicized bill. Yes, we have called you here under false pretenses. The increased inflation most likely resulting in increased cases of depression. Increased cases of depression most likely resulting in increased suicide. And some say their blood is on this bill's hands. What's that on your hands? Blood. Paint. Paint? I guess that blood was the red between the lines. And Americans being afraid of blood don't like looking between those lines. Well, it was. They back in business? How did they close down three years ago? It's been a really long time since we have. Oh jeez, it's been that long? I don't feel like Chinese tonight anyway. Frank, it's so sweet of you to be concerned about... Honestly, listening to this administration is like eating a spoonful of Drano. Like eating a spoonful of Drano. Sure, it'll clean you out. They'll leave your hollow inside. COVID tax tip 2022-134 August 31st, 2022. Summer is slipping away and another school year is starting. As kids head back to classrooms, parents are ticking items off the school supply list. Hey, how does the government know that I'm ticking stuff off my... Have they been spying on me again? I swear. Okay, any case. If they want to boost their back to school budgets, parents and guardians should make sure they aren't missing out on their 2021 refunds and tax credits. Many people don't get their tax refund because they don't file a federal tax return. Some people choose not to file a tax return because they don't earn enough money to be required to file. So this gets back to the question of, am I required to file? Being different from the question of, should I file or will it be beneficial for me to file? These days, even if you're not required to file, you probably want to at least check it out due to the fact that they have increased greatly. A lot of the benefits to the, especially the lower income side of things. So normally you would think, well, if your income is below a certain threshold, possibly like the standard deduction, for example, you might not be required to file because you wouldn't owe any taxes and the IRS you would expect wouldn't be coming after you. They're not going to throw you into jail for not filing when you don't owe taxes unless they're looking for something else like your personal information and so on and so forth, which they may be, but they're not going to come right out and say it at least at this point in time. In theory, they're just after your money, not after your personal information. They're not that bad. They're not like Facebook or something, but in case. So that means that you wouldn't have to file, but you might want to file because you still might have these refundable credits. They increase the refundable credits for the child tax credit. They increase the refundable credits for things like the earned income tax credit, the education credits and so on. And you have the capacity typically to get access to free software if your income is below a certain threshold to at least check it out. And so if you know anyone that hasn't filed, they don't think they need to file. If they're saying, hey, I didn't earn much money or I didn't have much withholdings. So it's not worth my time to file. Then you might want to say, yeah, it might be worth your time to file. And you might want to check check that out. And you also might want to be more vigilant for people that are thinking like that as well in terms of their personal information because these are the people that are often being targeted for identity theft. They're not people that are trying to steal their identity so they can file tax returns and try to get access to these types of credits and whatnot. So in any case, generally they won't receive a failure to file penalty if they owed a refund, but they won't receive their refund either. A refund isn't the end. Remember with a refund, this is another term that has become not quite correct. It's kind of a misnomer to call things a refund if you didn't know any tax. And the IRS gives you money. They're not refunding anything. That's a benefit type of program. But a lot of people that didn't earn a lot of money might still get money back through the tax code regulations, which they would call a refund. So a refund isn't the only money people might be missing out on when they don't file. If they're eligible for tax credits, like the child tax credit and the earned income tax credits, they're leaving that money on the table as well. And you don't want to leave stuff on the table because people might take it off the table, someone might take it from the table. It's like, that's my money on that table. If you leave it like in the table on your workplace, then that's not really a safe place to put your money. So the child tax credit. The child tax credit, there's a link to that here, helps families with qualifying children get a tax break. People may be able to claim the credit even if they don't normally file a tax return. Taxpayers qualifying for the full amount of the 2021 child tax credit for each qualifying child. If they meet all eligibility factors and their annual income isn't more than $150,000 if they're married filing joint, or if they're filing as qualified widow, widow were $112,500 if they're filing as head of household and $75,000 if they're a single filer or are married and file a separate return. Parents and guardians with higher income may be eligible to claim a partial credit. The interactive tax assistance can help people check if they qualify. So you might want to actually get the tax software, which you might have access to free tax software. If you go to free file software before the deadline of October 17th, if your income is below a certain threshold, and that's a great tool of course to kind of check out what you qualify for because they have usually question and answer type of format within it. So they earned income tax credit. This being one of the most complex credits to calculate, but it's aimed at the lower income threshold. Lower income tax returns are actually becoming more and more difficult because of these refundable credits and these changes to the earned income tax credit and so on. So the software quite useful. I wouldn't even really want to attempt this as even a tax professional without software. If I had all these credits that are mingled together and you get refundable components and so on and so forth and family dynamics with different dependence and whatnot. So check out the software to check this out. So the earned income tax credit helps low to moderate income workers and families get a tax break. If someone qualifies, they can use the credit to reduce the taxes they owe and maybe increase their refund. Low to moderate income workers with qualifying children may be eligible to claim the earned income tax credit if certain qualifying rules apply to them. People may qualify for the EITC, the earned income tax credit. Even if they don't claim children on their tax return, visit irs.gov, irs.gov, irs.gov. V for victory over tax quit to learn how to claim the EITC without a qualifying child. There's a link to that here. So there's a lot of components to the earned income tax credit. That's why it's confusing because the number of children are going to have an impact on it and your income is going to have another income impact on it. And you might be able to look at your income is going to have an impact. It's actually going to increase the credit up to a certain point and then go back down but have a different curve related to how many children you have. And then you might also be able to pick up income from a prior year if that resulted in a higher credit in this particular year because they're helping out that way to make things better. So you might be able to qualify for a larger credit even though it's totally confusing. But there it is. So people who qualify for the EITC may also qualify for other tax credits including the child tax credit and the credit for other dependents, child and dependent care credits, education credits, recovery rebate credits. There's links to all that stuff. You got more information here with links to it. Don't lose your refund by not filing earned income tax credits, child tax credit. You got all of this reading material. This is really where your tax dollars go by the way just to make this great reading material because the government's really kind of like an audible type of thing or like Amazon books, right? You pay them and they make all this wonderful reading material so that you could go and spend your time, spend your leisure time checking this stuff out. So there'll be links to all this stuff here. There'll be a link to this in the description.