Name: What to know about the 2020 tax season
Uploaded: 2020-06-08
Duration: 4 min 12 s
Description: Thanks to the global pandemic, your tax return might look different in 2020.

Thanks to the global pandemic, your tax return might look different in 2020.

What to know about the 2020 tax season

Finance

Your tax return might look different in 2020.

2020 is going to be a weird taxi er, and with thousands of people working from home, it's raised a lot of tax questions. I spoke with a lead tax research analysts to get down to the bottom of some of these questions. Most of us don't want to think about taxes, even those of us who work in the tax industry. You don't really like to think about taxes outside of tax season, but this year in particular, it's really important just to make sure you're documenting. Um, you know, when you started working from home, what expenses If you're self employed or an independent contractor, what expenses you have incurred while working at home and the better records that you keep now, don't think easier tax season will be. What would you say to someone who's been working from home for the past couple months? If they ask, can I write off my rent? So a few years ago, all of us who are working at home and couldn't go into the office would have been able to deduct our home office expenses. But the Taxol changed a couple of years ago, and now employees cannot deduct home office expenses, even if you're working at home at the convenience of your employer. But self employed individuals and independent contractors can. So for all of us who have had to buy new monitors and desks and chairs for our home office, best we can do is, uh, after your employer for a reimbursement. Normally, the way this works is your state of residency taxes. You so the place that you live if you're in a state with an income tax, uh, that state taxes you on all income earned from wherever you work. If you work in a different state, that state the state that you work in taxes you only on the income that you earned while working in that state, you don't get double tax. So thankfully, because your state of residence, he gives you a credit for the taxes paid to the to the non resident state. When you file your state tax return and so your state of residence, he loses revenue because it's giving you credit for the taxes that you're paying to the state that you work in. And so what we'll have to do is we'll have to track the days that we work from home and keep track of the days that you went into the office, and then we'll have to allocate income on the state tax return accordingly. And so that's going to add a lot of complications when you go to file your tax return next year. If you commute to a city that has a city earnings back, you're also going to have the opportunity to request a refund from that city. When you file your taxes next year, those unemployment benefits are taxable and most people choose not to have, uh, income tax was withheld from those payments, and so when they go to file their tax return next year, they may discover that they end up owing taxes. Other thing to keep in mind is that those $1200 economic impact payments those stimulus payments those are not taxable have fans right now. They won't be able to deduct the expenses that they paid for with those loan proceeds that were ultimately forgiven. And that's going to have significant tax consequences. Uh, if you you know $25,000 in business expense payments with those proceeds that $25,000 won't be a deduction that that will be taxable income, and that was a rule that came from Treasury in Congress could change it if they pass a law. So that's certainly something that will keep an eye on going forward or any any new tax law changes at the federal or the state level. Is there anything I guess you could say to folks ahead of tax season a sentence of encouragement. Even though none of us like to think about taxes in the middle of the summer. This year in particular, it can really save you money and help you prepare for for the next tax season. If you do think about a little bit now.