Choosing the Correct Filing Status – Single

Choosing the correct filing status is very important, and is really the first step that you take in ensuring that you will end up with an accurately prepared tax return. You are required to file Single if any of the following conditions apply to you:

• You are unmarried on the last day of the tax year.
• You are divorced or legally separated under a separate maintenance decree on the last day of the tax year.
• You are widowed before the first day of the tax year and have not remarried during the tax year.

You normally file Single if you do not qualify for any other filing status, but there are some exceptions to the above if you provide for a child living with you, or if you are a surviving spouse (see previous post “Choosing The Correct Filing Status“). In these cases you will not be required to file Single, as long as certain other conditions are met.

Filing Single generally attracts a higher tax rate and has a lower standard deduction than some of the other filing statuses.

The primary objective of this article is to empower taxpayers to learn to do their own taxes. For information on how to choose the correct filing status, grab yourself a copy of “Doing Your Own Taxes is as Easy as 1, 2, 3,” ($6.98) on TaxConnections.com. See more of Milton Boothe’s eBooks in TaxConnections Tax Store.

Milton G Boothe is an IRS Enrolled Agent with over twenty years of tax and financial accounting experience, including several years at PricewaterhouseCoopers. He is also a British certified Chartered Accountant. He is currently employed in private tax practices where he helps people resolve their tax problems, minimize their taxes, and routinely represents the interests of taxpayers before the Internal Revenue Service. As an Enrolled Agent (EA) Boothe is a federally-authorized tax practitioner who has technical expertise in the field of taxation and who is empowered by the U.S. Department of the Treasury to represent taxpayers before all administrative levels of the IRS for audits, collections, and appeals.
Milton G Boothe is also the author of several tax publications, wherein he encourages people to empower themselves by learning to do their own taxes.

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