Official 2010 Only Dumbasses Get Tax Returns Thread

Tax season is nearing, and morons all across America will be giddy to find out how much of their own damn money they get back from the federal government.

Why are they morons? Because they just got done floating the most inefficiently run organization on the planet an interest free loan for an average of six months (that's one half of one year, for those that are mathematically, as well as economically, impaired). Think of it as a gigantic EB preorder without getting the free but useless in-game item.

Tax refunds aren't like annual bonuses that many employers pay. That is truly additional money and cause for celebration. Tax refunds are a result of these people's money doing less for them. It is, in most cases, the worst possible scenario for that money from a present value standpoint.

If people increased their W4 form deductions and kept more of their money throughout the year, they could invest it or at least put it in a savings account. That 2% interest beats the 0% Uncle Sam gives every time. When the tax bill comes, they can then pay the full amount and still have any interest they earned in their account, where it will continue to compound. Wise investing can obviously return even more.

So why is giving the government an interest free loan only the worst case scenario in most and not all cases? Well, people could make bad investments. A return of -5% does not beat the 0% the friendly feds offer. Similarly, if those extra few dollars received in each pay check go straight to Burger King and the moron-in-question's gut, then that's not helping to pay the tax bill, to increase net worth, or to decrease the value on the bathroom scale.

So if self control or investment ineptitude are issues, then the goal should be to hit $0. Don't owe anything and don't receive a return. The most common method to reach this balance seems to be to have the state return (which is harder to avoid) match the federal bill. This method is not optimal, because people's money is still not working for them very much, but at least it's not completely suboptimal like getting a big return.

Remember kids, when you spend all year bitching about the government but let them borrow money from every paycheck, you're part of the problem. Don't be that moron.

If i want to read about bad investments, i'll look up your posts in the haul thread.

SO WHAT ARE YOU GUYS GETTIN'? I'M BUYING A PLAYSTATION 3!~!


just kidding! only an IDIOT would waste money on one of THOSE.

The biggest problem with this, as far as the public is concerned, is that it makes far too much sense.

Yoshi is just jealous that I'm getting a tax return of $4,000 this year.

Here I am, trying to fund NASA's cocaine supply, and you're going to come in here and give me shit about it? No.


No sir.

I owe money :-(

If you are really smart, you wouldn't have to pay any income tax to fund all those programs you hate so much.

I'm afraid to do that because I don't want to come under and then owe when next year rolls around. I know there are calculators for it, but I just don't completely trust them.

So it's just a nice extra paycheck that I ignore until it comes. Sure, it's psychological, but whatever

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Originally Posted by kingoffighters

If you are really smart, you wouldn't have to pay any income tax to fund all those programs you hate so much.

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http://www.cinemablend.com/images/se...0564/10564.jpg

I'm using mine to fund moving to DC. It's well timed.

I wondered if I should make the thread this year, because Cowutopia or someone yelled at me for making it "too early" last year. Thanks Yoshi.

re: W4s and withholding; in general, as long as you have made estimated payments equal to 100% of your tax liability from the prior year, you're not going to be penalized. So one way to go about paying as little to the Federal Government as possible would be to make one big 1040 ES payment this quarter equal to whatever your amount is on your 2009 1040 Line 60.

I'm back at a tax prep place this year (since I've been unemployed since June) and I'm ready to go on a murdering spree by the end of every day. Most of the banks through which those RALs were offered (refund anticipation loans) have stopped giving them out or have changed the qualification rules, so everyone is psychotic this year just to find a place that gives them the $5000+ of EIC that they didn't earn as soon as possible. I've already had some organization like the BBB called specifically on me because I was unable to fully account for where a person's refund check was at. The Big Tax Year 2009 Lesson everyone is learning is that unemployment benefits are not EARNED INCOME, so that means if all you did was sit on your ass and suck the Fed's tit for the year, your tax return is going to be a mere fraction of what it was years before. Yes, even if you had taxes withheld from the payments. I can't tell you how many times I've sat through preparing a return from some mid-20's single mom who is filing her 3 kids, all four of them with no common last name between them, then have to take 15 minutes to explain why their return sucks because the only form she brought in is a god damned 1099G. People are getting laid off or otherwise asking for early withdrawals from pensions or other qualified plans and are flabbergasted that they are liable for a 10% excise tax on those payouts. A new credit created for this year is called the Making Work Pay credit which is entered onto a new form (1040 Schedule M), which basically gives everyone $400 for free unless they already received a so called $250 "economic recovery payment" in 2009, and nobody coming into the store has any idea what that means, so that basically means a good 25% more of the returns that we do are rejected because of Schedule M conflicts (for which we then have to explain why their return is going to be $250 less than the amount which is stated on their original paperwork).

By the way, I didn't suck my own cock about it before because I don't think anyone would really care otherwise, but since it's topical here - a while ago I finished a project I was working on for two years and it's been done, so believe me when I say I should be able to answer almost any tax question you may have because I have read and rewritten the United States Tax Code.

http://www.onelinetaxcode.com

No joke.

ps: For 09 I altered my W4 statement and had my wife do the same, so we may be owing a little this time. When I said that, she sorta pouted and said "But I want a check!", to which I replied, "Yeah, but you're not stupid".

I am irritated at a certain financial services company, because they won't release my 1099-DIV until February 10. That's the only thing I need to be able to get my stuff done and e-file. Of course, I will set up my payment to auto-withdraw on April 15.

I have an accountant who does his magic so I get more itemized deductions which translate to lower tax bracket and bigger refund.

Pray for no audits.

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I am irritated at a certain financial services company, because they won't release my 1099-DIV until February 10. That's the only thing I need to be able to get my stuff done and e-file. Of course, I will set up my payment to auto-withdraw on April 15.

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All I hope is that you have no stock holdings through e*trade. They totally suck when you sell shit and it comes time to file Schedule D.

I don't, but I will file that information away for future use.

Ive been working it every year, so I get back a little under a grand back. Its a little buffer zone so I don't get out of sync and need to pay a tax bill, but small enough that Im not giving them 6000 grand to sit on all year like I used to.

I'm pretty sure I get a refund this year. My taxes are all fucked up.

Wait for the New York City income tax! That one kicked me in the balls every year.

Taxes?

I made nothing this year on paper.

Like I said in a PM. Thank you Dog$ for helping me understand a few tax laws I will run into this tax season.

This is why TNL is a great community.

I end up getting something back every year. I could adjust my W-4's but I'm always concerned that I might end up owing at the end of the year. Interest free loan to the government? Yeah. But I'm always greatful to get something back come every year that I can put away. I don't really make all that much money now, so I guess the "interest free loan" payback is always helpful, otherwise I might end up spending it on things I can live without but may make sense at the time.

lolz. I work for H&R Block at the moment. I spend 9 hours a day answering questions about people's taxes and changing their PIN # and telling them when their refund will get there. In general, people are way too fucking stupid to even earn a refund. I've been there 4 weeks and have had calls from every single state. My conclusion: do your own taxes, wait the 8-15 days it takes to get your refund, avoid going anywhere to have your taxes prepared so you save all the fees ($800 to have your $1500 return prepared? Are you fucking retarded?), and don't listen to anything a "tax professional" says. They want your money, they will fuck you, they will not tell you about all the fees, and you'll call me all angry like. I got called a baby killer because a 9 month pregnant 21 yr old (lol fucking black people) didn't get approved for the 1-2 day loan but paid for it and she wouldn't be able to pay her hospital bills on time. I put her on mute and said some very bad things to her that she could not hear.

Do your own fucking taxes. It takes 15 minutes. Learn to math and then shut the fuck up and wait.

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Originally Posted by Pineapple

lolz. I work for H&R Block at the moment. I spend 9 hours a day answering questions about people's taxes and changing their PIN # and telling them when their refund will get there. In general, people are way too fucking stupid to even earn a refund. I've been there 4 weeks and have had calls from every single state. My conclusion: do your own taxes, wait the 8-15 days it takes to get your refund, avoid going anywhere to have your taxes prepared so you save all the fees ($800 to have your $1500 return prepared? Are you fucking retarded?), and don't listen to anything a "tax professional" says. They want your money, they will fuck you, they will not tell you about all the fees, and you'll call me all angry like. I got called a baby killer because a 9 month pregnant 21 yr old (lol fucking black people) didn't get approved for the 1-2 day loan but paid for it and she wouldn't be able to pay her hospital bills on time. I put her on mute and said some very bad things to her that she could not hear.

Do your own fucking taxes. It takes 15 minutes. Learn to math and then shut the fuck up and wait.

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That job sounds like a nightmare.

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Originally Posted by Pineapple

PIN #

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:(

I see titties in ur avatar i am offended and disappointed in the tnl coomunity for allowing such a thing to happem. sure it looks like a costime for there are definite nipples and with tax season coming up i dont see why we should have to suffer through another obama speech for chrstina aguilera and her obviously wanting black cock it's black history month afterall

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Originally Posted by Aurora

I see titties in ur avatar i am offended and disappointed in the tnl coomunity for allowing such a thing to happem. sure it looks like a costime for there are definite nipples and with tax season coming up i dont see why we should have to suffer through another obama speech for chrstina aguilera and her obviously wanting black cock it's black history month afterall

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:)

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Originally Posted by Aurora

That job sounds like a nightmare.

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Oh no, it's fantastic! Really!

Consider what I had happen to me yesterday:

Big 45ish woman comes in, eyes popped out due to her nature or drugs, who knows, her head slightly weaving as if it was on a weak spring. She first asks for people who worked at the office last year who aren't there. I inform her of that. Then, because of the RAL situation, our work is able to offer that but on different tax prep software so we need to know right off the bat which type of return product they want. Now she's completely confused as to why everything is different from last year. I have her sit at the chair for where to prepare the return when the phone rings. I excuse myself to answer it. The person calling is someone who called twice earlier in the day and I had to reconfirm for the third time that no, their 8-15 day check wasn't printed at our store yet. At the end of that phone call I hear this woman saying she'll go to another office where someone she presumably knows works at, and gets up and leaves. OK, bye.

Twenty minutes later I get a call from my boss (in charge of the region of offices, a rank below the franchisee) telling me that the woman went to that office and screamed bloody murder to everyone there about how I was the rudest asshole on the planet. When I explained this later to some of my employees, I was told that I'm not explicit enough in excusing myself to answer the phone and that if I don't get explicit permission to do so, that I am to let the phone ring away while attending to the customer in person. So because I had the audacity to answer the phone while that woman was in the office I got snitched on by people in the other office and got schooled by my manager about how to be nice to people.

See what I mean? Fun times!

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Originally Posted by Pineapple

$800 to have your $1500 return prepared? Are you fucking retarded?

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Man, the highest I've ever seen charged on a return I did was $1200, and that was the one that took me a few days to do - try reporting $2 million worth of stock transactions on Schedule D to see why, not to mention his several Schedule Cs and the like.

The business works because most EIC recipients are charged $500 and honestly the higher price makes sense because of all the due diligence forms required to be processed for it, and because those people have no regard for that money because they didn't earn it. They just see that big $5k+ figure on the check and sign their life away, which is no wonder because for most of those people $5k is a third of their yearly income. Whether it's worth $500 is a bit debatable but I've never held a gun to someone's head to file a return.

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I got called a baby killer because a 9 month pregnant 21 yr old (lol fucking black people) didn't get approved for the 1-2 day loan but paid for it and she wouldn't be able to pay her hospital bills on time.

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That's basically the theme of this job. It's a yearly ritual where people realize that their lives are shit and we are the sounding board and source of blame until they pick up their check and leave.

Actually, it's more accurate to say that this is the theme of the job for the first month. After all the EIC recipients have come and gone, then we actually do the interesting work of filing taxes for people with legitimate complications.

Last year my girlfriend went to H&R Block because my attempts to do it online didn't work out because the amounts owed seemed much larger than they should. My instincts were correct - it was pretty expensive IIRC but she ended up with a much bigger return than she would have had we just gone with my figures. But I think this year I am just going to do it for her.

Also, why is Yoshi so angry? Chill out dude...

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Originally Posted by Diff-chan

Also, why is Yoshi so angry? Chill out dude...

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I think it has something to do with his satisfying marriage.

Yoshi is really just trying to help, in his way.

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Originally Posted by kingoffighters

If you are really smart, you wouldn't have to pay any income tax to fund all those programs you hate so much.

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See, that's my argument against legalizing marijuana.

I'm doing just fine making 35,000 - 45,000 untaxed dollars a year for 20 hours a week.

You shouldn't take life too seriously, you'll never get out alive.

They still make movies branded National Lampoon. How did this happen.

I don't like the new Diff. Go away again.

I am not sure about this new Razor. Something is different.

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Originally Posted by Razor Ramon

I don't like the new Diff. Go away again.

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Who are you?

Razor is the one to mow your lawn

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Originally Posted by Pineapple

lolz. I work for H&R Block at the moment. I spend 9 hours a day answering questions about people's taxes and changing their PIN # and telling them when their refund will get there. In general, people are way too fucking stupid to even earn a refund. I've been there 4 weeks and have had calls from every single state. My conclusion: do your own taxes, wait the 8-15 days it takes to get your refund, avoid going anywhere to have your taxes prepared so you save all the fees ($800 to have your $1500 return prepared? Are you fucking retarded?), and don't listen to anything a "tax professional" says. They want your money, they will fuck you, they will not tell you about all the fees, and you'll call me all angry like. I got called a baby killer because a 9 month pregnant 21 yr old (lol fucking black people) didn't get approved for the 1-2 day loan but paid for it and she wouldn't be able to pay her hospital bills on time. I put her on mute and said some very bad things to her that she could not hear.

Do your own fucking taxes. It takes 15 minutes. Learn to math and then shut the fuck up and wait.

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my friends dad buys turbotax every year for his family/friends, I think they allow you 5 tax returns (or something like that). I just show up and do mine, easy peasy... and free (otherwise I pay $30 if no freebies are left). Even if you buy the software, go in with whoever wants a tax return... $20 a person (or whatever).

Just use the online version.

Yeah, I do the online one most of the time (last year I did it on paper). I don't mind waiting for my money to come.
I had a call last night from someone who took a vacation halfway across the states and was expecting to come home using their refund money, only to realize they didn't get the 1-2 day and would be stuck for a week without any money. In the rain. 700 miles from home.
Don't plan your vacation around when you *think* your taxes are coming.

I owed $4 to Federal last year. I recieved a check for $32 from State.

I'm not sure that $4 check ever made it out of my door. Is that bad? Thats probably bad. Sometimes I fear that Uncle Sam will come knocking down my door to collect the $4 in lunch money that I owe him.

I didnt change my tax filings so I'm expecting things to be about the same. I made ~$3,500 less than last year, so maybe I'll get something back? I dont know. I usually come out even, or my return is under $100.

I like this Diff; he's cool.

I had a lot of medical expenses last year that insurance didn't cover, not too sure how that's going to effect my return.

Unless you have mortgage interest and real estate taxes (or enough other itemized deductions to help surpass your standard deduction), it really won't - especially since you account only the expenses exceeding 7.5% of your income from the year.

changed my deductions from 3 to 5 this past year, looks like in order to zero out, i need to go to 7+

5 deductions? What in the world for?

He has a family.

Of miget circus freaks or like real children?

A wife and kids.

So a midget and some circus freaks.

My family always thinks it is sad that when I do my taxes every year I barely get anything back (like, maybe $200 federal.) My sisters (with several children) got back $8500 each, and my parents got back $5000.

Truth is I think like Yoshi. I'm also thinking if they gave me their combined $22,000, I could make that shit grow like a weed. It will all be wasted by the end of March, methinks.

I wouldn't trust you growing that money since you have trouble doing basic math.

What?

$8500 + $8500 + $5000 = $22000

I don't think kingoffighters is asian.

lol i fail at reading comp.

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Originally Posted by kingoffighters

I wouldn't trust you growing that money since you have trouble doing basic math.

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Why, because he gets back $200?

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Originally Posted by Yoshi

Just use the online version.

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Thanks for the tip. I was going to install a Turbotax CD I got in the mail, but I'll check out the website. Considering that all I've been doing this year is going for my Masters and doing some part-time work for my old job, it looks like the free version is probably all that I need.

This is going to irk Yoshi but apparently I'm getting $2k back in taxes. I figured they were taking out too much money from my paycheck but now I know for sure. I'm going to have to fix this.

The only plus side is that's $2k more that I can put towards grad school funds once I do go.

Well, a week ago I did my taxes and with Dog$ information, I'm getting money back(1100). The Schedule M was approved and I automatically got the $425 tax credit and then some.

Oh well ...

You better hate that money, Advocate. HATE. IT.

My refund would have been $400 if it wasn't for Schedule M. It seems that our withholding is pretty much OK otherwise.

That extra $800 and then some is going straight to real estate taxes. Yee haw.

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Originally Posted by GohanX

Truth is I think like Yoshi.

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Feel fucking great, doesn't it? ;)

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Originally Posted by Finch

If i want to read about bad investments, i'll look up your posts in the haul thread.

SO WHAT ARE YOU GUYS GETTIN'? I'M BUYING A PLAYSTATION 3!~!


just kidding! only an IDIOT would waste money on one of THOSE.

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It beats having to send your 360 in for repairs every year. My DVD drive is about to hit failure on my 360.

I jumped on Taxact and did mine in about 15 minutes. I'm getting $1,500 back. Will the fees I pay a professional to do my taxes outweigh any extra money I might have missed?

stfu noob

Probably not - at very least, there's no way to tell what you could have missed just from knowing your refund amount.

Are you married? Filing children? Have a home mortgage and pay real estate taxes? Make charitable donations? That's just some of the general questions to ask.

Nope, just a single guy without a mortgage and I'm greedy so no charities.

Pretty simple, I'll just do it online.