Your filing status is one of the most impactful items you report on your individual tax return. It affects the rates at which your income is taxed, the amounts of certain deductions (e.g., the Standard Deduction and the Health Savings Account Deduction), your income limitations related to eligibility for credits, your ability to deduct certain retirement plan contributions, etc.
In this article, we’ll provide a brief overview of each of the five available filing statuses.
1. Single
This applies to never-married, unmarried, legally separated, and divorced taxpayers. You are considered single for the entire year if you were legally single on the last day of the year. This is the “default” filing status for a taxpayer.
2. Married Filing Jointly (MFJ)
Similar to single status, you are considered married for the entire tax year if you were married on the last day of the tax year. Also, as a result of the U.S. Supreme Court ruling in the 2015 Obergefell case, same-sex marriages are legal in all 50 states, and so the IRS filing status rules apply nationwide to all married couples, regardless of gender.
When you file jointly, both spouses report their income on one Form 1040, and both filers may be held responsible for any tax due (including penalties and interest). This is the case even if only one spouse earned all the income. It’s not difficult to imagine how this rule could become problematic for a taxpayer if, for example, their spouse failed to meet their share of the couple’s income tax payment responsibilities. This situation might require a taxpayer to invoke the IRS’s “Innocent Spouse” relief rules, available to taxpayers in certain circumstances.
On the plus side, the MFJ option has the largest standard deduction of any of the filing statuses and offers certain tax credits that are not available to other filing statuses, including the child and dependent care credit, the adoption expense credit, the American Opportunity credit (the Hope credit), and the Lifetime Learning credit. Additionally, the tax brackets/tax rates for the MFJ status are generally more favorable compared to those for the married-filing-separately filing status.
3. Married Filing Separately (MFS)
Here, couples segregate their income, deductions and exemptions and file two separate individual returns. This might be advisable in rare cases where, for example, a taxpayer has a significant amount student loan interest debt, and the repayment schedule is driven by their reported taxable income. If the taxpayer’s spouse has a significantly higher annual income, it may be beneficial for the taxpayer to choose MFS status since this could potentially reduce the taxpayer’s payment requirements related to their student debt. Caution should be used with this approach however, since the higher earning spouse will also be required to use MFS status. If a taxpayer chooses to use MFS status, the additional income tax cost to both the taxpayer and spouse from the loss of MFJ filing benefits (see MFJ above) could exceed the taxpayer’s savings generated from the reduced student loan debt payment requirements. You should consult your CPA if considering this strategy.
It should be emphasized that only in the most unusual of circumstances does the MFS status produce a lower income tax bill vs. the MFJ status, and it is most commonly utilized for non-income tax reasons, for example, to shield one spouse from the financial-related legal issues of the other spouse.
4. Head of Household (HOH)
This status applies to unmarried taxpayers who, during the tax year, provided more than half the cost of keeping up a home for the filer and also a qualifying person who lived in the home for more than six months. Tax rates for qualified HOH filers are generally more favorable than those in the single or married-filing-separately categories. Head-of-household filers also receive a larger standard deduction amount than do single filers. In some cases, married persons who have not lived with their spouses may qualify for this status. Despite being generally beneficial this filing status is occasionally overlooked by eligible taxpayers who conclude they only qualify for “single” filing status.
5. Qualifying widow or widower with a dependent child
You may still a joint return for the tax year in which your spouse died. After that, you might be eligible to file as a qualifying widow or widower if you also have a dependent child.
This filing option is available for two years following the year of a spouse’s death and generally allows a qualifying taxpayer to the use the more beneficial filing rules afforded to married joint filers. The key requirement for this status is that the surviving spouse cared for a dependent child who lived with the adult for the full tax year. During that time, the taxpayer must have paid for more than half the cost of keeping up the home. All things remaining equal, a taxpayer would generally select qualifying widow status over either HOH or single filing status, since it would produce a lower tax bill.
David Selliman, CPA.
If you’d like to discuss your filing status or have other questions about your individual or business taxes, please contact us at 781-453-8700 and ask to speak with one of our tax professionals.