Tax forms

[sendmorechuckberry]

I just sent this to my congressman. Please help by doing something similar.

I am 70 years old. I live on Social Security. Like many Americans, I was not able to build a substantial 401k. I had to work full time in manufacturing to pay for living expenses. When you add up all the taxes I've paid (income, sales, property, utilities, licensing fees, road tolls, gas taxes, school taxes, etc.,) there wasn't much left to save for my retirement. I'm not against paying taxes. I understand that we need the services that our government provides. But now that I'm retired, I'm starting to sell off things that I no longer need or want to help enjoy the few years my wife and I have left on this earth. Selling on eBay gives me the income to do that. Please do something about this new requirement. I feel it is unfair and that I have paid enough taxes over my lifetime. Selling on eBay is like having a garage sale. Are we taxing those now? Enough is enough. 

[sendmorechuckberry]

Thank you. If I knew how others would have reacted I would never have made that post. People can sure be rude. It won't happen again. My yearly income is so small that I'm sure I won't have to pay any taxes on what I earn anyway. It just makes me mad that the government reduced it from $20,000 to just $600 in so short a time. If I'm guilty of being political then some of the replies I've gotten are guilty too. We had better learn to get along or this country is toast.

[bonjourami]

The govt never 'reduced' taxable internet income, it has always been required to declare it.

[wes-4507]

---

@sendmorechuckberry wrote:

Thank you. If I knew how others would have reacted I would never have made that post. People can sure be rude. It won't happen again. My yearly income is so small that I'm sure I won't have to pay any taxes on what I earn anyway. It just makes me mad that the government reduced it from $20,000 to just $600 in so short a time. If I'm guilty of being political then some of the replies I've gotten are guilty too. We had better learn to get along or this country is toast.

---

You don’t seem to have caught on to this yet: the $20,000/$600 is ONLY the threshold for receiving a 1099-K; it doesn’t mean you used to be able to have up to $20,000 of income before you had to report it.

[sendmorechuckberry]

I will enjoy my "Golden Years" right here if you don't mind. Me and my employers have paid into S.S. since I started working at the age of 16. This is my country and it's the best one on the planet. But it's not perfect. It seems that anybody that tries to improve it's faults really takes a beating these days. And that's sad.

But I don't think you understand how hard it was to save for the future for most people. There are millions of people that have nothing to fall back on except S.S.. Is it their fault? Maybe it is for some of them. Maybe they lived beyond their means and didn't spend wisely. In my case I had an employer that contributed to a 401K for me. So I have a small retirement that I haven't tapped into yet. I've been waiting for it to go back up to where it was before I draw on it. My wife didn't work long enough to gain enough credits for S.S. because after the birth of our son we decided that she should stay home and raise him. She was the neighborhood mother to more than our son. Everybody was happy. So I worked and paid all the bills. That didn't leave much to save for the future. And I consider myself lucky. I had a job. Many of my friends lost their good jobs when all the companies moved to Mexico and China so Wall St could make more money for their wealthy stock holders. They were forced to move away or take "service" jobs that paid peanuts. They couldn't save for retirement. They were "thrown under the bus", you might say. So please don't criticize until you have walked a mile in their shoes.

[sendmorechuckberry]

I'm not worried about that because I have never tried to sell much until this year. And my tax returns will include my eBay earnings over $600 as required by law.

[wes-4507]

---

@sendmorechuckberry wrote:

I'm not worried about that because I have never tried to sell much until this year. And my tax returns will include my eBay earnings over $600 as required by law.

---

🤦‍

They need to include your earnings under $600 too.

[maxine*j]

---

@sendmorechuckberry wrote:

I'm not worried about that because I have never tried to sell much until this year. And my tax returns will include my eBay earnings over $600 as required by law.

---

No, the $600 is not the figure at which you must begin to include your eBay sales on your tax return.  It is the figure at which eBay must send you a statement of your sales (a 1099K).  The obligation to report income begins at $1.00.  Until this year, eBay did not have to send the 1099K until sales reached $20,000 but your obligation to report income still began at $1.00.

From everything you have said, it seems unlikely that you will owe federal income tax on your eBay sales.  However, no two people are in exactly the same tax situation as to whether they must file a return, what income must be reported on a return if they must file, and what, if any tax, they will owe on reported income.

I hope you will take my advice to contact the NY Office for Aging in your county to get tax assistance in the next tax season.   In the meantime, just jot down in a notebook every cent that comes in and every cent that goes out and have it ready for the tax preparer.

VITA is a good program, too:

https://www.tax.ny.gov/pit/file/vita.htm

-

[sendmorechuckberry]

I understand what your saying. In other words, the government wants you to report every single penny that you make. If I do my neighbor a favor and mow his lawn and he gives me a six pack in return, then I have to declare the value of that six pack as taxable earnings. If that's the case, then the entire population is guilty of tax evasion. 😯

[maxine*j]

---

@sendmorechuckberry wrote:

...  But I don't think you understand how hard it was to save for the future for most people...  So please don't criticize until you have walked a mile in their shoes.

---

Agreed.

A lot of people who tell others to "pull themselves up by their own bootstraps" forget two things: 

First that the old saying was, originally, a sarcastic remark on the impossibility of doing so.

Second, that even if it were  possible to pull oneself up by one's own bootstraps, many people have only strapless boots and others have no boots at all.

I grew up poor, and I am grateful for that fact that it was not, in that time and place, considered shameful to be poor.

-

[sendmorechuckberry]

I think you're right.  🤣

[bonjourami]

"I understand what your saying. In other words, the government wants you to report every single penny that you make. "

That part of your post is accurate.The rest? Dramatic,but not so much.

[frugalmarketplace]

We know who didn’t pay any taxes . 🤫🤫🤫

[chapeau-noir]

---

@sendmorechuckberry wrote:

Thank you. If I knew how others would have reacted I would never have made that post. People can sure be rude. It won't happen again. My yearly income is so small that I'm sure I won't have to pay any taxes on what I earn anyway. It just makes me mad that the government reduced it from $20,000 to just $600 in so short a time. If I'm guilty of being political then some of the replies I've gotten are guilty too. We had better learn to get along or this country is toast.

---

Wise words!  👍 

Don't worry about the return - trust me, I've cleared four small estates where nothing had a receipt and I just took it in an orderly step-wise manner, got a reasonable valuation and went from there.  We used Turbo-Tax for home and business - it's very user friendly and steps you through everything.  It's better to be clean and on the right side of things.  A lot of us who worked hard weren't happy about online sellers being able to cloak up to $20,000 from the IRS, when we paid every penny of our tax on our earnings - that's where the bitterness comes from for a lot of people.

[616gooddeals]

I am new to this tax reporting.  If I made a little over $600 will I have to file a tax report?  Will ebay send me a form in the mail?  I hope someone can answer my questions. I am 73 and not up on all this tax stuff. thank you

[rfmtm]

You have to declare the income whether you get a 1099 or not.  This does not mean you owe any tax.  Any tax preparer, accountant, or tax software, can take care of the this.