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Show Simplified Rules Given to Aid in Making Out 1944 Tax Returns on New Forms I i u " r - s -:J J ? J. ; 4 W9" , .? .4, , - I ' 1 3r, - & I . ' fS rp'i j i-l'i-fl-JifivV- r-t- . J.J.,;.v.. ,. O . .:p. jf Aid Will Be Given Taxpayer. Answers to Puzzlers Found in Filling Out Income Blanks (EDITOR'S NOTE: The article below be-low was prepared as a service to the readers of this newspaper in an effort to assist in the filing of income lax returns re-turns us required by law. While the forms have been simplified, it is urged that returns be filed as far in advance of March 15 as possible.) Released by Western Newspaper Union. REMEMBER all that talk last year about abolish-- abolish-- ing income tax returns? We hope you didn't believe it, because the treasury reminds us that the law requires an income in-come tax return not later than March 15th from every person per-son (even children) who had $500 or more income in 1944. The truth is that congress and the treasury simplified the Income tax forms quite a bit, but still insist on the annual March 15 accounting between you and Uncle Sam. Altogether, the treasury figures that about 50,000,000 Americans must file 1944 returns. A few million, mil-lion, Including many farmers, have already got the chore out of the way by filing their returns January 15. Those early-birds filed early so as to combine the filing of their "returns" "re-turns" with the filing of their "Declarations "Dec-larations of Estimated Tax," thus winding up all their 1944 income tax chores. But most of us still have our returns to fill out and file between be-tween now and March 15. Here are the answers to some of your inevitable questions about the Job: Q. What kinds of forms or blanks do we use? A. There are two forms. One Is the withholding receipt, officially called Form W-2 (Rev.), which your employer gives you if you have been working for wages from which income tax was withheld. The other blank, the standard Form 1040, is not being mailed out generally this j er states, moreover, a combined return re-turn can be made on a withholding receipt only if their combined income in-come is within the limits mentioned at the beginning of this paragraph. If husband and wife file a combined com-bined return on a withholding receipt, re-ceipt, their tax will be figured either on a separate or joint basis, whichever which-ever is to their advantage. Q. Who can use the short-form Form 1040? A. Anyone whose income was less than $5,000. Q. Who uses the long-form Form 1040? A. The long-form must be used by anyone whose income in 1944 was $5,000 or more, and by anyone who claims more deductions (for charities, chari-ties, etc.) than the standard allowance allow-ance of about 10 per cent which is given automatically to taxpayers filing fil-ing withholding receipts or the short-form. Q. Can I save money by using the long-form instead of the other forms? A. That depends on your deductions. deduc-tions. If you use the withholding receipt re-ceipt or the short-form, you can- I the others. Then mail the receipt or receipts to the collector of internal inter-nal revenue in your district. That's all. Don't send any money if you file this way, because the collector will figure your tax, give you credit cred-it for amounts already paid, and then either send you a bill if you owe more or a refund check if you have overpaid. Q. How do I Ell out a short-form? A. Get a copy of Form 1040. If all your income was from wages, dividends divi-dends and interest, you write only on page 1, and find your tax from the table on page 2. If you had other income for instance, from a farm, a business, rental property, annuities, etc.) you also fill in part of page 3. Page 3 is printed on the back of page 1, so you can tear off and throw away the other half of the form. That's why it is called a short-form. short-form. When you file Form 1040, and find (in item 8, page 1) that you still owe some tax, you must pay that amount in full at the same time you file your return. Q. What do you mean by the word "income"? A. As used in the income tax blanks, income means all kinds of TELEFACT INCREASE OF INCOME BEFORE TAXES IN U.S.A. t7, (1939 -100 V.) a a 304 I I 3 1 V I ll T? 158 snil ll 1 1 iill 1939 1943 19391943 1939 1943 1939 1943 CORPORATIONS FARMERS BUSINESS INDUSTRIAL LUKruKAMUNS r AKMtKo PROPRIETORS WORKERS income, - including wages, (or salaries), sala-ries), dividends, interest, business profits, rental profits, and profits on selling or trading securities or other property. For tax purposes, however, "income" does NOT include in-clude certain items specifically exempted ex-empted by law, such as the first $1,500 of active service pay for members of the armed forces and their mustering-out payment when discharged. Also exempted i,s the government's contribution to monthly month-ly family allowances to relatives of servicemen, social security benefits, bene-fits, gifts, bequests and inheritances, and amounts received as the beneficiary bene-ficiary of a life insurance policy by reason of the death of the insured person. Q. What kind of taxes do we pay? not take any deductions for nonbusiness non-business items such as charitable contributions, interest, taxes, medical medi-cal expenses, and casualty losses, but receive instead a standard allowance al-lowance equal to about 10 per cent of your income. For instance, if your income last year was $4,425, and you use your withholding receipt re-ceipt or a short-form, your tax is automatically figured as if you had $442.50 of deductions. Now, in this example, if your actual deductions were less than $442.50, it would save you money to use your withholding receipt or a short-form. If your actual deductions were more than $442.50, it would save you money to make a long-form return on Form 1040. Q. How do I fill out a withholding withhold-ing receipt? A. Simply answer the few questions ques-tions about your income and exemptions ex-emptions which are printed on the front and back of the receipt. Be sure to correct any mistake in your name and address which your employer em-ployer has already written on your receipt. Sign the receipt. If you have more than one receipt, fill out only the last one but be sure to attach A. The 1944 income tax is made up of two kinds of tax. There is a "normal "nor-mal tax" (formerly called "victory tax") at the rate of 3 per cent, and a "surtax" (formerly called "income "in-come tax") at rates ranging from 20 to 91 per cent. Q. What kind of exemptions do we get from these taxes? A. For normal tax, a taxpayer filing a separate return is allowed only a flat exemption of $500. If husband and wife file a joint return and each had at least $500 income, they receive a joint normal-tax exemption ex-emption of $1,000. If they file a joint return, and one of them had less than $500 income, the joint normal-tax normal-tax exemption would be $500 plus the actual amount of the smaller income. in-come. For normal tax, there is no exemption for dependents. For surtax, you may get exemptions exemp-tions of $500 for yourself, plus $500 for your wife (or husband), plus $500 for each of your dependents. However, How-ever, you can claim an exemption for your wife (or husband) only if you file a joint return with her (or him), or if she (or he) had no taxable tax-able income and was not a dependent de-pendent of another taxpayer. year, but copies should be easily obtainable ob-tainable from local collectors' offices, of-fices, banks, post offices, and employers. em-ployers. . Q. I hear there are three ways of making a return this year. Is that true? A. Yes. You can use Form 1040 as either a short-form or a long-form long-form return. That makes two methods meth-ods of filing. The third method, which is one of the major simplifications simplifica-tions in the new law, is to use the withholding receipt. Q. Do we have to fill out both the withholding receipt and Form 1040? A. No. If you are eligible to use the withholding receipt as your return re-turn and desire to do so, forget about Form 1040. If you fill out Form 1040, attach your withholding receipts to the form, but do not fill out the receipts. Q. Is this standard allowance exactly ex-actly 10 per cent? A. The tax on a withholding receipt re-ceipt or a short-form is taken from a table in which the tax and d ductions are averaged for income brackets, such as from $2,000 to $2,025, from $2,025 to $2,050, etc. The 10 per cent allowance and the tax are figured in the middle of each bracket. Q. Who is allowed to use a withholding with-holding receipt as a return? A. Any wage earner whose total income was less than $5,000. provided pro-vided not more than $100 of his income came from dividends, interest inter-est and wages from which no tax was withheld, and all the remainder of his income was from wages from which tax was withheld. However, in the so-called community property states of Arizona, California, Idaho, Louisiana. Nevada, New Mexico. Texas and Washington, a withholding withhold-ing receipt cannot be used by a husband or wife alone. In those states, married couples can use the withholding receipt only as a "combined "com-bined return." In those and all oth- TELEFACT I U.S. PER CAPITA TAXES REACHES NEW HIGH I J357 p 2 WSI u c A THIS IAST GT THIS USI -.NADA tHIS fISCAl ' FISCAL FISCAl HSCAl hscai urwu HSCAl A YEAR YEAH """"' YEAR YEAR YEAR |