General Discussion
In reply to the discussion: Fellow childfree folks, how much did you love writing the check out to the IRS after hearing all the [View all]hfojvt
(37,573 posts)and also ignoring the EIC.
A single person gets a standard deduction of $5,800 (I used $5,700 because I had a 2010 booklet, for 2011 it was $5.800). They also get the $3,700 exemption, For a taxable income of $2,500 for a tax of $250. However, they also get an EIC of $110 for a net tax of $140. (Again I am using the EIC from 2010, I generally used 2010 numbers which are only slightly different from 2011 numbers).
Now for a single person with a child. First, they get an standard deduction of $8,500 because they get to file as Head of Household. Then they get two $3,700 exemptions. Which takes them up to $15,900. Suppose, they have an income of $30,000. Then subtract the $15,900 and they have a taxable income of $14,100 which the 2010 tax table gives a tax of $1,521 on line 44 of the 1040. However, then they goto line 51 and subtract $1,000 for the accursed child tax credit, leaving them with a tax of $521. Then they goto the Earned Income credit table and get an EIC of $881. Giving them a tax bill of negative $360.
Single person making $12,000 pays $140
single person with child making $30,000 pays minus $360
$500 less in taxes despite having 2.5 times the income.
Ain't progressive taxation wonderful?
And curiously enough, the brackets are the same at $8,300, but if you go higher in the tax table to, say $15,000 then it reads
single - $1,835
married filing jointly - $1,503
married filing separately - $1,835
head of household - $1,656
and so on
What I want, is for the accursed child tax credit which started as $200 under Clinton, but then, just as I predicted at the time, got jacked up to $1,000. I want that accursed piece of excrement to go away.