Here we are again, income tax time. I venture to say, that unless you are expecting a nice refund, you really don't like filling out your taxes. Even those people getting refunds, most likely, go to an accountant or tax expert of some kind to let them fill out the forms for them. I used to fill out my own forms but I found that I was overlooking some deductions that I should be claiming and now I use an accountant. I even used tax software but didn't like it for a couple of reasons:
1. The price of the software usually didn't include the price of the state tax software and by the time you added that in, it came to almost the price I was paying to have my taxes prepared.
2. I still had questions about filling in the forms.

Ah, if I only could get a refund like Boeing. They are going to receive a 1.1 Billion Dollar refund. I just heard that fact announced on the radio today. They must be doing something right.

What are the ten most common blunders on tax forms? As reported by CNN Money they are:
1. Wrong Social Security Number - one digit can make a big difference
2. Wrong calculation of tax owed. - double check your figures
3. Wrong earned income tax credit - again it never hurts to double check
4. Child Tax Credit miscalculated - aren't those mathematical errors a pain?
5. Wrong refund or wrong balance due - another mathematical error or error carrying the amount to a new box
6. Missing documents - hey don't forget to attach your W-2s
7. Not listing carryovers from prior years - you might get a bigger refund
8. Unclaimed credit for child care - why shouldn't you get the extra money?
9. Not claiming mortgage interest - yes you can still claim mortgage interest
10. Paying taxes on something that is tax free - no excuse for this

This year tax refunds are expected to jump 27%. (USA Today). The average per family is said to be $2,500. The government says that an additional eight million people who had no tax refund last year will receive one this year. My friends, you will have an extra $100 Billion to spend in the first half of 2004 because of the new tax cuts. I am not saying that these tax cuts are a good thing, only that they will exist. After all, if Joe gets $900 and his rich boss gets $90,000 is this really aimed at helping Joe, I leave this question to be answered by you? Are these just election year refunds and will taxes have to be raised again if this country is to survive the huge deficits that this and the wars have created?

Did you know that if you are a married couple with a combined income of between $46,700 and 56,800 you dropped out of the 27% bracket to the 15% bracket (USA Today).

We are told that these tax refunds will give the economy a push, but nobody in the government is mentioning the fact that over 2,000,000 people are going to lose their unemployment benefits soon and if you aren't working, as are many people, you can't get a refund for the period of time you had no income.. Unemployment and under employment are becoming a huge problem in this country and until this problem is solved, it jut might be that no matter how many tax refunds are issued, the economy may not get better. We are all told things are just peachy, but all of us know people who are out of work and can not find jobs.

Tax preparation is now a big business with tax prepares making billions. But beware of their tax refund loans. The rates can be as high as 135 to 137 percent annually. But this isn't the whole story, there are sometime high fees besides the interest, and sometimes the default amount is three or four times higher than other loans.(See Knight Ridder/Tribune News Service, Washington Bureau, March 15, 2003). The people that need their refunds are the poorest among us and least equipped to pay this outrageous interest.

Not all the refund checks get where they are going. Last year almost 92,000 checks were returned. It is very important to put in a change of address with the post office if you move, so that your mail gets forwarded to your new address. In 1999 alone their were 2.2 Billion Dollars worth of unclaimed tax refunds. The biggest block was filers in foreign countries, second was tax filers living in U.S. Possessions and third were filers in the U.S. military (see http://www.bankrate.com/brm/itax/news/20010205b.asp)

Now let me give you a laugh. Remember all those companies caught up in those accounting scandals where they over inflated their earnings? These same companies are now asking Uncle Sam for tax refunds saying that since they over inflated their incomes, they paid too much tax. This is almost like the child who killed his parents and then threw himself on the mercy of the court saying he was an orphan. If the government does give them any money back, then at the very least, they should be charged for causing extra work to the IRS, but what should really happen is that they should be fined the extra amount for filing a fraudulent tax form.

I guess we have the Mesopotamians to blame, because it is said that they invented taxes. There tax was aptly named 'burden'. Click Here for a short history of taxes