Category: Taxes Made Simple
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No bill to untax Social Security has moved since 2025, and what seniors got instead is a $6,000 deduction
The federal income tax on Social Security benefits has not been repealed, reduced, or scheduled for a vote. Three separate bills in the current Congress would end it outright, and all three are sitting exactly where they were filed, in the committees that received them, with no recorded action since 2025. What did become law…
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$166 billion in tariffs is being refunded with interest, and the checks go to importers, not shoppers
On April 30, 2026, the federal government’s customs-duty receipts for the fiscal year stood at $188.6 billion. Three months later the same line in the Treasury’s books read $154.5 billion. That roughly $34 billion swing is not a collapse in imports or a bookkeeping quirk. It is a refund program running in reverse through the…
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A new IRS report shows a lender or employer that you filed and paid on time
A single PDF, downloadable at any hour from an IRS Individual Online Account, now exists for the sole purpose of being handed to somebody else. The Tax Compliance Report states whether a taxpayer filed returns and paid taxes on time, and it is built to be shared when a lender, an employer or a benefits…
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Unpaid tax still costs 7 percent, compounded daily, through the end of the year
Interest on an unpaid federal tax balance is not a fixed annual charge that sits still. The Internal Revenue Code re-derives it every three months from a market benchmark, and whatever comes out of that formula then compounds daily against the balance until the balance is gone. For the quarter that begins Oct. 1, the…
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Working parents can now shield $7,500 of child care costs from federal tax through a workplace account, up from $5,000
For the 2025 tax year, the most a worker could run through an employer’s dependent care account and keep out of taxable income was $5,000. For tax years beginning after December 31, 2025, that ceiling is $7,500. The difference is $2,500 of child care spending that moves from after-tax dollars to pre-tax dollars, and it…
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Overtime pay up to $12,500 is deductible this year, and it lands in box 12 of your W-2 under code TT
Box 12 of the Form W-2 carries a code this year that was not on the wage statement workers opened last January. Employers must now enter qualified overtime compensation there under the two-letter code TT, and that single entry is what makes the new overtime deduction usable at all. The Internal Revenue Service set out…
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The FTC says tax debt relief firms take a fee to settle back taxes for pennies on the dollar, then often do nothing
An FTC consumer alert warns that tax relief firms promise to settle back taxes for pennies on the dollar before reviewing a file, charge a fee, and often do nothing.
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Proposed IRS rules would cap Trump Account fund fees at 0.1 percent
Treasury and the IRS proposed rules defining eligible investments for Trump Accounts: an unleveraged U.S. equity index fund charging no more than 0.1 percent a year.
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The small-business ownership filing millions were told was mandatory has been permanently scrapped
Anyone who set up an LLC for a rental property, a consulting practice or a side business in the past few years likely encountered a federal filing described as compulsory, backed by penalties, and carrying a hard deadline. A great deal of money was spent on services offering to handle it. That requirement no longer…
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Starting with 2027 contributions, the government will match up to $1,000 a year into a retirement account
A tax break that most eligible workers never claimed is being converted into something harder to miss: cash deposited straight into a retirement account. Treasury and the IRS have begun writing the rules for the Saver’s Match, a federal contribution worth as much as $1,000 a year to low- and moderate-income savers. It applies to…
