AGI of $360,000 -- paid $20,000 less in taxes in 2018 than in 2017

[Anonymous]

Very similar situation here - child tax credit (4 kids for us) and elimination of AMT and marriage penalty at our income made a huge difference. VA. SALT was always phased out for us anyway by AMT, so losing some of that not a big deal. All of the people upset about paying more, interested to know what percentage of your income you paid in federal taxes.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Very similar situation here - child tax credit (4 kids for us) and elimination of AMT and marriage penalty at our income made a huge difference. VA. SALT was always phased out for us anyway by AMT, so losing some of that not a big deal. All of the people upset about paying more, interested to know what percentage of your income you paid in federal taxes.

Why? You are obviously way wealthier than the 185k families posting. So you can afford a higher percentage.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Surprisingly, even though we live in a high-tax area (Bethesda, Maryland), and even though we had the same adjusted gross income (AGI) in 2018 as in 2017, we paid $20,000 less in taxes in 2018 due to Tax Reform. We paid $93,000 in taxes in 2017 and $73,000 in taxes in 2018.

Our CPA said that people with higher incomes benefitted much more from Tax Reform. He said that, unfortunately, a family with 2 kids and an HHI of $100,000 might even pay more under Tax Reform.

Some of the benefits for us in 2018 from Tax Reform were --

Reform of the Alternative Minimum Tax. That saved us $10,000.
Reform of the child-tax credit (to increase the income ceilings). That saved us $6000 because we have 3 children (ages 10-15).

So the SALT loss was OK for us because we gained in other areas.

Well I'm glad it worked out for someone. It is a travesty for our country and our kids. HHI of $150K, had to pay for the first time ever. It was several thousands to the Fed, got a small VA state return. It was a HUGE blow for us. I hope the wealthy in this country realize the trajectory we are on and that in the end your gains are literally killing the middle class. In the end it will not end well for our country or society.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:We are 1%ers (at the very lowest end of that threshhold) and saw a 5% decrease in effective rate. But that isn't good for the country.

Nothing is stopping you from sending that money to the IRS.

[Anonymous]

I don’t recall what our AGI is but our gross is about $390k and we paid $10k less in 2018 than in 2017.
I didn’t vote for this.

[Anonymous]

I have a question. How the heck do people that make as much money as the OP and other posters do have time to post on this board? If you make that much money how do you have time to do anything other than work?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I have a question. How the heck do people that make as much money as the OP and other posters do have time to post on this board? If you make that much money how do you have time to do anything other than work?

Probably because they're being paid for their skills and what they can accomplish vs. total number of hours worked.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I have a question. How the heck do people that make as much money as the OP and other posters do have time to post on this board? If you make that much money how do you have time to do anything other than work?

Is that a joke? I am an attorney (partner) at a small firm. I don't work that hard and clear 250K a year (and many of my partners make double that because they work harder than I do). My husband is an academic and works a ton, but has plenty of time to dick around on twitter and other websites. He makes 350-400 with consulting. A person who makes minimum wage working in a factory probably works way harder than I do but I have a skill set that they don't have, so I can work less and make more and still find plenty of time to post on DCUM.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I have a question. How the heck do people that make as much money as the OP and other posters do have time to post on this board? If you make that much money how do you have time to do anything other than work?

hmm? NP, we make similar and I spent a lot of time on this forum because I learn from a lot from people around here.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Surprisingly, even though we live in a high-tax area (Bethesda, Maryland), and even though we had the same adjusted gross income (AGI) in 2018 as in 2017, we paid $20,000 less in taxes in 2018 due to Tax Reform. We paid $93,000 in taxes in 2017 and $73,000 in taxes in 2018.

Our CPA said that people with higher incomes benefitted much more from Tax Reform. He said that, unfortunately, a family with 2 kids and an HHI of $100,000 might even pay more under Tax Reform.

Some of the benefits for us in 2018 from Tax Reform were --

Reform of the Alternative Minimum Tax. That saved us $10,000.
Reform of the child-tax credit (to increase the income ceilings). That saved us $6000 because we have 3 children (ages 10-15).

So the SALT loss was OK for us because we gained in other areas.

Well I'm glad it worked out for someone. It is a travesty for our country and our kids. HHI of $150K, had to pay for the first time ever. It was several thousands to the Fed, got a small VA state return. It was a HUGE blow for us. I hope the wealthy in this country realize the trajectory we are on and that in the end your gains are literally killing the middle class. In the end it will not end well for our country or society.

I understand your frustration. It does not seem fair.

Out of curiosity, is it possible you paid less in overall tax in 2018 than in 2017, because less was withheld from your paycheck, even though you had to write a check on 4/15 for the first time?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Surprisingly, even though we live in a high-tax area (Bethesda, Maryland), and even though we had the same adjusted gross income (AGI) in 2018 as in 2017, we paid $20,000 less in taxes in 2018 due to Tax Reform. We paid $93,000 in taxes in 2017 and $73,000 in taxes in 2018.

Our CPA said that people with higher incomes benefitted much more from Tax Reform. He said that, unfortunately, a family with 2 kids and an HHI of $100,000 might even pay more under Tax Reform.

Some of the benefits for us in 2018 from Tax Reform were --

Reform of the Alternative Minimum Tax. That saved us $10,000.
Reform of the child-tax credit (to increase the income ceilings). That saved us $6000 because we have 3 children (ages 10-15).

So the SALT loss was OK for us because we gained in other areas.

Well I'm glad it worked out for someone. It is a travesty for our country and our kids. HHI of $150K, had to pay for the first time ever. It was several thousands to the Fed, got a small VA state return. It was a HUGE blow for us. I hope the wealthy in this country realize the trajectory we are on and that in the end your gains are literally killing the middle class. In the end it will not end well for our country or society.

This is unquestionably false. Oh, I know what you meant, but that isn't what you wrote. Your rants would have a lot more force if you didn't reveal yourself to be lacking knowledge of the most basic tax structures.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Thanks for the helpful analysis, OP! Based on your post, I went over our returns. My situation and results were similar. I used turbotax.

We only saved $10k on similar income. Net net a good year -- especially because of spectacular stocks returns.

Interesting--this was one area that saved us on taxes this year given how bad 2018 was for stocks overall. Did you time it really well to sell before the December crash?

We didn't sell anything. Made investment in december 2017 that worked very well in 2018 and invested more in the valley of december 2018 which is what I meant by spectacular returns...bought AAPL at $142 and it's around $200 already!

Right, but if you didn't sell it, you don't have any stock returns on that yet, spectacular or otherwise, and thus it wasn't relevant to your 2018 taxes.

Oh Lordy.

We have over $200k of unrealized capital gains in investments made since December 2017. Very real if you check our brokerage account, and very relevant to the tax story because tax reform is a major driver why they happened, but if you prefer to live in gains-free LaLaLand feel free to

NP here. This thread is about the impact of tax reform on individual taxes, you nitwit. While I'm sure you enjoyed throwing in an unrelated humblebrag, it's not at all relevant to this topic.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Thanks for the helpful analysis, OP! Based on your post, I went over our returns. My situation and results were similar. I used turbotax.

We only saved $10k on similar income. Net net a good year -- especially because of spectacular stocks returns.

Interesting--this was one area that saved us on taxes this year given how bad 2018 was for stocks overall. Did you time it really well to sell before the December crash?

We didn't sell anything. Made investment in december 2017 that worked very well in 2018 and invested more in the valley of december 2018 which is what I meant by spectacular returns...bought AAPL at $142 and it's around $200 already!

Right, but if you didn't sell it, you don't have any stock returns on that yet, spectacular or otherwise, and thus it wasn't relevant to your 2018 taxes.

Oh Lordy.

We have over $200k of unrealized capital gains in investments made since December 2017. Very real if you check our brokerage account, and very relevant to the tax story because tax reform is a major driver why they happened, but if you prefer to live in gains-free LaLaLand feel free to

NP here. This thread is about the impact of tax reform on individual taxes, you nitwit. While I'm sure you enjoyed throwing in an unrelated humblebrag, it's not at all relevant to this topic.

DP: It's 100% relevant. If you don't get it, your bad.

[Anonymous]

Our AGI this year is around 245. Last year we made 230 and our federal taxes were basically the same amount (32K).

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Surprisingly, even though we live in a high-tax area (Bethesda, Maryland), and even though we had the same adjusted gross income (AGI) in 2018 as in 2017, we paid $20,000 less in taxes in 2018 due to Tax Reform. We paid $93,000 in taxes in 2017 and $73,000 in taxes in 2018.

Our CPA said that people with higher incomes benefitted much more from Tax Reform. He said that, unfortunately, a family with 2 kids and an HHI of $100,000 might even pay more under Tax Reform.

Some of the benefits for us in 2018 from Tax Reform were --

Reform of the Alternative Minimum Tax. That saved us $10,000.
Reform of the child-tax credit (to increase the income ceilings). That saved us $6000 because we have 3 children (ages 10-15).

So the SALT loss was OK for us because we gained in other areas.

Well I'm glad it worked out for someone. It is a travesty for our country and our kids. HHI of $150K, had to pay for the first time ever. It was several thousands to the Fed, got a small VA state return. It was a HUGE blow for us. I hope the wealthy in this country realize the trajectory we are on and that in the end your gains are literally killing the middle class. In the end it will not end well for our country or society.

This is unquestionably false. Oh, I know what you meant, but that isn't what you wrote. Your rants would have a lot more force if you didn't reveal yourself to be lacking knowledge of the most basic tax structures.

Wait, what are you talking about, pp? Are you implying that NO ONE with a HHI of 150k paid more tax this year than they did last year on the same 150k?