Tip income only qualifies for the federal “no tax on tips” deduction if the job that earned it appears, by name, on a specific federal list — and that list just got longer than a lot of workers realize. Treasury and the IRS finalized the roster this spring at 71 occupations spread across eight industry…

Homeowners and car shoppers who spent the last few years factoring a federal tax credit into the price of a heat pump, a solar array or an electric vehicle are now shopping without one. Congress shut down three separate federal credits through the same law last year, and 2026 is the first calendar year households…

Every fall, people who buy their own health coverage through the ACA Marketplace tell the government what they expect to earn the following year, and that estimate decides how much of their premium tax credit arrives early as a lower monthly bill. Guess low and then earn more than expected, and the extra subsidy has…

The Internal Revenue Service has confirmed that its interest rate on unpaid taxes will hold at 7 percent for the last quarter of 2026, and that rate compounds daily rather than sitting still once it’s set. For anyone carrying a balance from a filed return, an audit adjustment, or a missed estimated payment, that means…

A federal proposal that started as a national-security measure on raw steel, aluminum and copper is now reaching into ordinary hardware-store shelves. The Commerce Department’s Bureau of Industry and Security published a notice on August 6 proposing to add 14 new categories of everyday metal goods — including propane cylinders, fire extinguishers, electric conductor cable…

Six counties in central and eastern Washington, three tribal nations, and one additional county are now working under a federal tax deadline that has effectively moved five months. The IRS announced August 31 that taxpayers affected by wildfires that began July 31 have until February 1, 2027, to file and pay most federal returns that…

People saving in a health savings account already know a number that most other taxpayers won’t see for months: what 2027 looks like. The IRS has set next year’s HSA contribution limits at $4,500 for someone with self-only coverage and $9,000 for a family, according to the revenue procedure the agency published this year. It’s…

Someone who sold roughly $8,000 of secondhand furniture and thrifted finds through Facebook Marketplace and eBay this year likely will not see a Form 1099-K from either platform — and under the rule now in effect, they are not supposed to. The IRS’s own guidance confirms that a 2025 federal law retroactively restored the reporting…

A freelance graphic designer who earns $1,800 from a single client this year should not expect a 1099 form to show up in January — and should not mistake the silence for a tax-free payday. The IRS’s own instructions for Forms 1099-MISC and 1099-NEC confirm that the reporting threshold businesses use to decide whether to…

The tariff rate on the average imported product is lower right now than it has been in months, and almost nobody has noticed, because it dropped as the result of a Supreme Court ruling rather than a tariff cut anyone announced with fanfare. The nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office estimates the country’s effective tariff rate at…