Hey, Taxman!

One of my favorite tax-related movies is Stranger Than Fiction.

Will Ferrell, Maggie Gyllenhal, Queen Latifah, Dustin Hoffman and Emma Thompson couldn't make tax preparation more appealing. Seriously.

That's about as excited as I get about taxes. Mostly, I just dread having to do them each year.

I used to do paper forms by hand, by myself. It was tedious, and involved my looking up small print in the big book of forms and instructions, and occasionally calling my accountant cousin for help. Often, I would procrastinate and simply file an extension...as I learned to do by example throughout my childhood and adolescence.

The advent of telephone filing was a tremendous achievement. Then came e-filing, of which I was a late adopter. One year, I knew I was owed a refund and ended up going to the local IRS office for assistance after April 15 for help. They were great. Kind and efficient.

Last year, my taxes were excruciatingly complex. I had to file for two jobs, two occasional jobs, and unemployment, along with a myriad of itemized deductions. It took hours, but in the end, I received a sizable refund.

This year, I only filed for two jobs, one occasional job and a lesser myriad of itemized deductions and ended up owing 10% of what I received from the government last year. Not sure where I went wrong, other than taking home 36% more income than the previous year. Definitely not going to shake a stick at that.

Let's hope I owe more in taxes every year for the rest of my working life if that's how it works.

This year, I also realized something that made itemizing much, much easier. I went to my health insurance provider's website, as well as my prescription benefit provider's website and found the totals of my out of pocket expenses for doctors' visits, lab work, and medications.  It made the whole process much less painful.

I'm really happy to contribute to most of what my taxes pay for, especially the things that continue to be cut from the federal budget: help for low-income families, public education, veterans' benefits, infrastructure and social security.

Our new Constitution is now established, and has an appearance that promises permanency; but in this world nothing can be said to be certain, except death and taxes.

—Benjamin Franklin, in a letter to Jean-Baptiste Leroy, 1789

 I'm looking forward to a long life as a taxpayer.