The IRS' Latest BAD NEWS for Americans is Going to Be Tough to Swallow
Thankfully, our federal government is now open for business…at least for three weeks.
During that 33 day span of governmental impasse, we were repeatedly given conflicting updates about the state of the IRS. This was especially troubling for Americans who were beginning to work to prepare their taxes for 2018.
Worse still, we don’t know for certain that the government will remain open through Tax Day in April, imbuing more than a smidgeon of chaos to our financial lives.
The latest news out of the IRS doesn’t seem too hopeful…even if the agency remains open.
And this year many Americans are expected to be less than happy due to last year’s sweeping federal tax overhaul, which has Block and the rest of the tax-preparation industry bracing for plenty of sour reactions now that tax filing season is about to start ahead of the April 15 deadline. They’re doing things such as extra customer education, employee training and even role-playing exercises to prepare for the financial mood swings ahead.
The bill represented the biggest change in the U.S. tax code since 1986, altering the tax situation for many of the 154 million people expected to file individual federal returns this year with the Internal Revenue Service.
The latest redo, among other things, lowered tax rates for many individual income levels and raised the standard deduction. But it also eliminated many deductions that people had itemized to lower their tax burden — such as union dues and the fees that tax preparers charge — and it placed caps on others, such as state and local income tax deductions.
Advertisement - story continues belowThe upshot: While some filers will owe less or get a larger-than-expected refund, many others will be in the opposite camp, especially if they did not adjust their W-4 form that determines how much of their weekly income is withheld for taxes.
So, not only will your tax refund possibly be late, it may be smaller than usual as well.
