Anyone else shocked with their 2018 tax return?

[hpdrifter]

about the same for me.

[kch73]

Can't base your taxes on a refund...many other factors go into this. For a lot of "normal
" folks the bracket went from 25% to 22%

[BowBuddy2]

That's not the point.



The point is NOTHING CHANGED.



Same jobs, some house, same mortgage, ect.



The only thing different is now we owe a crazy amount. I've been doing my own taxes for years but may go sit with someone to see if I am missing something but can't imagine what it would be.

I think you are missing something


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[Vermin93]

Very simple analysis required here.

Get your 2017 federal tax return and go to the last page. Assuming you filed a Form 1040, look at your taxable income in row 43. Now look at your total tax owed in row 63. Divide row 63 by row 43. This will give you your 2017 effective tax rate for comparison purposes. For example, say your 2017 taxable income on row 43 was $100,000 and your total tax on row 63 was $20,000. Your effective tax rate would be 20% (20,000 / 100,000).

Now, get your 2018 Form 1040, which looks nothing like the 2017 Form 1040 because it was completely redesigned for 2018. Look at your taxable income in row 10 and your total tax owed in row 15. Now divide row 15 by row 10 to get your 2018 effective tax rate. How does it compare to the 2017 number?

Another simple way to do this comparison is if your taxable income in 2018 was about the same as 2017, and your total tax owed in 2018 was more than 2017, then yes, Paul Ryan, Mitch McConnell and Trump screwed you. On the other hand, if your 2018 taxable income was different than 2017 (substantially higher or lower), then it's a harder comparison to make, but you can still compare your effective tax rate between 2017 and 2018 to assess whether you did or didn't get screwed by Trump and the GOP.

The amount of your tax refund is irrelevant. What matters is how much total federal income tax you owed against the total taxable income you earned. If someone's paycheck went up during the year because federal income tax was being withheld at a lower rate and they didn't notice it and they didn't realize their paycheck was seeing the benefits of a tax cut, their financial management could probably use some improvement.

[kmitchl]

What Vermin93 said is the correct way to evaluate 2017 taxes vs 2018 taxes. If your refund is smaller it just means you did not loan the government as much during the year interest free. If you owe you under with held during the year and used the governments money.

[12RingKing]

I have to adjust my numbers this year. We paid less taxes all year long and got back more when I did our taxes.

[Vermin93]

Anyone else shocked with their 2018 tax return?

I thought about this a little more and can see how someone could honestly be blindsided by this.

Someone could have noticed that their after-tax paycheck during the year went up because less taxes were being withheld. After hearing Trump brag about the tax cut incessantly, they may have assumed that not only was their after-tax paycheck going up, but they were also going to get the nice tax refund they usually get when they file their return.

Now they find out that the tax cut wasn’t as great for them as Trump made it out to be and that they actually owe several thousand in taxes. But the problem is they already spent the extra after-tax take home pay they got all last year because they were told by Trump that this was the greatest tax cut ever. So now they are screwed and have to tap into savings to cover their tax bill, whereas if they knew a big tax bill was coming, they would have saved some of that extra take home pay in order to pay Uncle Sam when they filed their return.

[be12hunt]

Very simple analysis required here.

Get your 2017 federal tax return and go to the last page. Assuming you filed a Form 1040, look at your taxable income in row 43. Now look at your total tax owed in row 63. Divide row 63 by row 43. This will give you your 2017 effective tax rate for comparison purposes. For example, say your 2017 taxable income on row 43 was $100,000 and your total tax on row 63 was $20,000. Your effective tax rate would be 20% (20,000 / 100,000).

Now, get your 2018 Form 1040, which looks nothing like the 2017 Form 1040 because it was completely redesigned for 2018. Look at your taxable income in row 10 and your total tax owed in row 15. Now divide row 15 by row 10 to get your 2018 effective tax rate. How does it compare to the 2017 number?

Another simple way to do this comparison is if your taxable income in 2018 was about the same as 2017, and your total tax owed in 2018 was more than 2017, then yes, Paul Ryan, Mitch McConnell and Trump screwed you. On the other hand, if your 2018 taxable income was different than 2017 (substantially higher or lower), then it's a harder comparison to make, but you can still compare your effective tax rate between 2017 and 2018 to assess whether you did or didn't get screwed by Trump and the GOP.

The amount of your tax refund is irrelevant. What matters is how much total federal income tax you owed against the total taxable income you earned. If someone's paycheck went up during the year because federal income tax was being withheld at a lower rate and they didn't notice it and they didn't realize their paycheck was seeing the benefits of a tax cut, their financial management could probably use some improvement.

I thought about this a little more and can see how someone could honestly be blindsided by this.

Someone could have noticed that their after-tax paycheck during the year went up because less taxes were being withheld. After hearing Trump brag about the tax cut incessantly, they may have assumed that not only was their after-tax paycheck going up, but they were also going to get the nice tax refund they usually get when they file their return.

Now they find out that the tax cut wasn’t as great for them as Trump made it out to be and that they actually owe several thousand in taxes. But the problem is they already spent the extra after-tax take home pay they got all last year because they were told by Trump that this was the greatest tax cut ever. So now they are screwed and have to tap into savings to cover their tax bill, whereas if they knew a big tax bill was coming, they would have saved some of that extra take home pay in order to pay Uncle Sam when they filed their return.

These are probably the best explanations of the situation the OP is dealing with.

OP I think you have something missing somewhere. Yes the withholding changed some, but the standard deduction did too. I don’t think you should’ve had such a drastic change.
We got back almost 12k last year so I adjusted my withholding to get back less. I made about 25% more in taxable income, paid almost the exact same amount of taxes in as we did in 2017, and got back $7500.

[flywise]

So we just put our info in turbo tax and I almost had a heart attack.....

we usually get a decent refund every year and now we owe almost 10k.....

Anyone have any similar outcomes? Trump can suck my you know what if this is the norm.....

Where do you live?

[More Liberty]

So we just put our info in turbo tax and I almost had a heart attack.....

we usually get a decent refund every year and now we owe almost 10k.....

Anyone have any similar outcomes? Trump can suck my you know what if this is the norm.....

Nope. Less was taken out so my return was smaller. I'm not a big advocate of giving the US government an interest free loan.

[ImThere]

We usually get back $2500 this year we get back $3600. Thanks Trump.



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[Buff]

You really can't go by how much return you get back.
Do people not look at what their total tax bill was for the year?

I wish everyone had to write a check every week and send it in for taxes so they would pay attention to what the bill is every week.
Some folks pay in $40,000.00 a year and the only thing they care about is the $5,000.00 they got back and never give any thought to the $35,000.00 they paid

[Calfroper81]

Got back $8700 last year. Ended up getting $12k this year so I’m happy

[rut-ro]

Closer to zero the better, no free loan from me.

[HeyMikey]

.....