I made over 130K last year...

[Baked]

I'm doing my taxes today. I hope I get a billion dollars in tax return 'cause I'm getting rape left and right by property tax. Fuck you LA county!

 

[Imp]

Ugh... Dreading taxes. I have to add up all my stock trades (over 50) and attach as a "memo".

I do keep track of every trade, but not the settlement date, and effing currency conversion complicates things further.

 

[AreaCode707]

You really can't keep track of high income people by hours. At the same time they have a lot more leisures.

That's kind of my point. It's laughable to me to see someone making 50k a year being pissed at someone making 100k a year (the "Pillage his house and make his belongings communal!" attitude) when the first person works 40 hours a week and the second person works 80... and their equivalent pay rates are about the same.


With apologies to Hacp for stealing his sarcastic remark

 

[ShawnD1]

I think canada has a ridicuious tax for person's. It's a socialist country right???

The taxes are higher, but it seems more fair. Everyone pays tax, everyone gets the same tax benefits. You and I would both get the same "free" health care. In the US, only one of us would get free health care. The person who doesn't get it will obviously hate the person who did get it because it feels like they pay money into it and get nothing in return.

The people who run the tax system really need to hire a team of psychologists or sociologists or something. Like what did they actually think was going to happen when all of the citizens are treated differently? Countries in Europe can get away with much higher tax rates because all people are still treated the same. Everyone pays tax, everyone gets the same write offs, everyone gets the same benefits. There's not as much "us vs them" going on.

 

[GotIssues]

My wife can't max out her 401k. Her employer routinely fails the income tests that HR has to run to comply with some whacky ratio between employees. Heaven forbid a high income earner wants to fully contribute to their 401k's. :roll:

She has coworkers in her dept making similar incomes and if they start contributing more than 13k or so to their 401ks they get a check cut back to them that they have to account for as being untaxed when it comes the end of the year.

Again...more evil high income earners how dare they be responsible for their futures!

There are a couple reasons why this could be true. She is either a) getting an asston from her employer dumped into her 401(k). The limit of contributions for employer and employee COMBINED is something around $50k (not sure if it changed with the increase in contribution limits this year), so if the employer puts $50k into her retirement, the employee can not put any in because it's already maxed out. I work in a larger healthcare org and quite a number of doctors fall under this category.

Or, b) it's the whacky "Highly Compensated Employee" (HCE) jazz, to which I do not remember the rules at all, but it amounts to the government saying "You can't give a disproportionate amount of 401(k) (and the like) money to the HCEs and ignore the rest of your employees." If this is the reason, I'd guess she works for a small-ish organization.

I'd forgotten to include those rules, but I'd be willing to bet your wife is the only person mentioned in this thread that fall under those rules.

 

[IronWing]

Or, b) it's the whacky "Highly Compensated Employee" (HCE) jazz, to which I do not remember the rules at all, but it amounts to the government saying "You can't give a disproportionate amount of 401(k) (and the like) money to the HCEs and ignore the rest of your employees." If this is the reason, I'd guess she works for a small-ish organization.

The rule seems wacky but it is the primary driver for companies to offer matching funds for all employees' 401k contributions. The big earners are limited unless the little fish also participate in the plan. So employers offer matching funds to induce the little fish to play.

I have mixed feelings about this. On one hand, it is a way to encourage taking responsibility for retirement. On the other, there are a whole bunch of little fish investing in stuff they know nothing about. Overall, the effect of 401k plans is to flood the financial markets with dumb, blind money leading to unwarranted price inflation as fund managers have to buy something, anything every pay period.

 

[Mr. Pedantic]

I'm confused. Doesn't your tax get deducted automatically from pay?

 

[Vic Vega]

I made over 130K last year...

So did I. Taxes are harsh indeed. Lots of stupid people need to be fed and housed.

 

[spidey07]

try paying AMT tax on unrealized gains on stock options that you purchased. 26% tax on any gain over $30K.

My capital gains day is coming up this sat (company went IPO last year), so I get to pay another15% pay tax on it AGAIN this year when i sell. And I also exercised more options from another company so I get to pay AMT on ISO's AGAIN.

Silly peasant, that's compensation. We'll take our cut again when you sell as well!

 

[steppinthrax]

I'm confused. Doesn't your tax get deducted automatically from pay?

I have rental income as well as consulting fees within 1099-misc. My salary from my employment is around 108K.

 

[Dr. Zaus]

I wouldn't worry about the CP part of the A.

 

[Stuxnet]

I'm confused. Doesn't your tax get deducted automatically from pay?

Shareholder distros for small business owners, stocks, etc.

 

[GotIssues]

The rule seems wacky but it is the primary driver for companies to offer matching funds for all employees' 401k contributions. The big earners are limited unless the little fish also participate in the plan. So employers offer matching funds to induce the little fish to play.

I know that much of it, it's in my post I just don't know the specifics.

I have mixed feelings about this. On one hand, it is a way to encourage taking responsibility for retirement. On the other, there are a whole bunch of little fish investing in stuff they know nothing about. Overall, the effect of 401k plans is to flood the financial markets with dumb, blind money leading to unwarranted price inflation as fund managers have to buy something, anything every pay period.

Most 401(k)s have limited investment options, though. If your plan administrator is worth his/her salt, they'll not carry really bad options.

I think your point around "dumb money" is very interesting. I don't think it's a problem right now because the savings rate is so low for the average American, but certainly something to think about.

 

[Mr. Pedantic]

I have rental income as well as consulting fees within 1099-misc. My salary from my employment is around 108K.

Oh ok. So if you only have a salaried job and no other income, you don't have to fill any forms or anything?

 

[SunnyD]

So did I. Taxes are harsh indeed. Lots of stupid people need to be fed and housed.

Yeah, and most of those people make more than the OP! :\

 

[IronWing]

Oh ok. So if you only have a salaried job and no other income, you don't have to fill any forms or anything?

It depends. To avoid filing a tax return, you have to make very little money and have had no taxes withheld or make very little money and have no desire to get any taxes withheld refunded to you. As a practical matter nearly every adult has to fill a tax return.

The complexity of the forms can vary greatly, even for the situation you've described above. Some folks can file a one page return (called the EZ form) while others file the long form with pages and pages of other forms attached. It depends on the deductions one is able to take as much as it depends on sources of income.

The problem we have is that Congress uses the tax code to reward friends and contributors and to curry votes. So year by year the tax code picks up special treatment for special folks. About once a generation we have real tax reform and sweep away the garbage. Then Congress starts putting it all back in. Our last round of tax reform was 1986 so we are due for another meeting of the tax code and the dumpster.

 

[quikah]

Oh ok. So if you only have a salaried job and no other income, you don't have to fill any forms or anything?

You still have to file, but if that is your only income you can just file the 1 page form, 1040EZ.

 

[Squisher]

I had $70K of lump sum payments that no taxes were taken out of. I'm hoping I'll only be in the hole $10K when it is all said and done when I see the CPA in march.

 

[actuarial]

The taxes are higher, but it seems more fair. Everyone pays tax, everyone gets the same tax benefits. You and I would both get the same "free" health care. In the US, only one of us would get free health care. The person who doesn't get it will obviously hate the person who did get it because it feels like they pay money into it and get nothing in return.

The people who run the tax system really need to hire a team of psychologists or sociologists or something. Like what did they actually think was going to happen when all of the citizens are treated differently? Countries in Europe can get away with much higher tax rates because all people are still treated the same. Everyone pays tax, everyone gets the same write offs, everyone gets the same benefits. There's not as much "us vs them" going on.

The taxes really aren't that much higher once you factor in a year of deficit (delayed taxes), and if you add working folk's medical insurance premiums on top of their tax payments it is probably actually lower.

 

[vi edit]

Or, b) it's the whacky "Highly Compensated Employee" (HCE) jazz, to which I do not remember the rules at all, but it amounts to the government saying "You can't give a disproportionate amount of 401(k) (and the like) money to the HCEs and ignore the rest of your employees." If this is the reason, I'd guess she works for a small-ish organization.

She's a pharmacist in a hospital that employees over 5,000 people. It's a really broad range of demographics and incomes. As far as actual hospital employees, her department is probably one of the highest paid as the hospital itself doesn't *technically* employee many physicians. It's a really weird situation where most MD's are paid by the state but the hospital cuts a check back to the state for their time. But they don't actually get paid by the hospital or benefits from them. The bulk of the staff are nurses making quite a bit less, with the rest being made up of ancillary services making even less than that and the custodial staff.

And that doesn't even take into account what many of those people are putting down for contribution amounts. I *highly* doubt that many nurses and below are putting in 10%-20% or more of their income back into their 401k's.

Still annoying that responsible people are penalized for other people either not making enough or not contributing enough.

 

[SZLiao214]

You pay more in taxes then i make in a year! HAHA .......

 

[steppinthrax]

I had $70K of lump sum payments that no taxes were taken out of. I'm hoping I'll only be in the hole $10K when it is all said and done when I see the CPA in march.

Your gonna get raped...

 

[steppinthrax]

You pay more in taxes then i make in a year! HAHA .......

Yeah I pay your annual income...

 

[Juddog]

/firstworldproblems

OP as a child:

 

[Train]

My understanding is 1% is supposed to be 500K +. And I think this may be 500K + AGI.

Tha magic number, for yearly income at least, is $384k AGI, to make it into the 1%