Ugh!

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:OP. These are good points. Ugh, it's so frustrating because she does have the "it factor" and is the only nanny we've tried who does. This is so hard but I guess the search continues. DH and I do work for the government and while we don't have political aspirations, one just never knows. Not worth the risk.

A final idea to potentially make this work out... has anyone taken it upon themselves to pay the nanny's taxes themselves? Is that crazy?

If you’re a government worker, she should definitely pay her on the books

[Anonymous]

Maybe you could offer her quarterly bonuses off the table (also illegal) to help make up the loss she pays in taxes. I wouldn’t, but that could be a safer and slightly more morally sound way to break the law. But as everyone pointed out, she uses these services and is expected to pay taxes. If she doesn’t like it then she shouldn’t work here. She may not be legal to work here either. Not worth the risk and it is morally reprehensible.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:OP. These are good points. Ugh, it's so frustrating because she does have the "it factor" and is the only nanny we've tried who does. This is so hard but I guess the search continues. DH and I do work for the government and while we don't have political aspirations, one just never knows. Not worth the risk.

A final idea to potentially make this work out... has anyone taken it upon themselves to pay the nanny's taxes themselves? Is that crazy?

You can't pay her taxes for her--that would count as income to her, on which she would owe...more taxes.

You can not withhold her portion of taxes, and just pay the employer share, in which case the failure to pay her taxes would be on her. But you would still need to send a W-2 to the IRS, so she'd be quite likely to get caught.

I might point out to her that your salaries, out of which you pay a nanny, are funded by taxes, so you don't agree that taxes are worthless or a waste of time. And she does benefit from the things that taxes pay for so long as she's living and working in this country. And as others have noted, not paying her on the books can cause all sorts of problems--you can't use a dependent care FSA, you might run into liability issues if she is injured or injures someone else while working for you, it can affect her immigration status, etc.

You can actually pay her taxes for her, but it does up her overall salary, which you then have to account for. (Basically, it's more expensive for you to pay her taxes than for her to pay her taxes.) A good payroll service can help you pay her taxes legally, however, if that's what you want.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:OP. These are good points. Ugh, it's so frustrating because she does have the "it factor" and is the only nanny we've tried who does. This is so hard but I guess the search continues. DH and I do work for the government and while we don't have political aspirations, one just never knows. Not worth the risk.

A final idea to potentially make this work out... has anyone taken it upon themselves to pay the nanny's taxes themselves? Is that crazy?

You can't pay her taxes for her--that would count as income to her, on which she would owe...more taxes.

You can not withhold her portion of taxes, and just pay the employer share, in which case the failure to pay her taxes would be on her. But you would still need to send a W-2 to the IRS, so she'd be quite likely to get caught.

I might point out to her that your salaries, out of which you pay a nanny, are funded by taxes, so you don't agree that taxes are worthless or a waste of time. And she does benefit from the things that taxes pay for so long as she's living and working in this country. And as others have noted, not paying her on the books can cause all sorts of problems--you can't use a dependent care FSA, you might run into liability issues if she is injured or injures someone else while working for you, it can affect her immigration status, etc.

All of this is wrong.
1) You CAN pay her taxes, as long as you also count those payments as income and pay sufficient taxes on it.
2) FICA is the one type of tax you ARE required to withhold; you do not have to withhold federal or state income tax.
3) You do report all income and taxes withheld/paid to the IRS when you create her W2. If you only withhold FICA, and she chooses not to pay her income taxes, that's on her, but what she doesn't want is for you to report it at all.