Wednesday, December 28, 2011

Same-sex couples pay more in taxes


The lack of federal recognition of same-sex couples results in higher taxes for those couples, CNNMoney reports.

CNNMoney based their information on a series of same-sex versus opposite-sex tax scenarios it presented to H&R Block. A seemingly equal household with one working parent earning $100,000 per year and one stay-at-home parent earning nothing produced radically different results when toggled between opposite-sex and same-sex situations.

In this particular scenario, says the article, the same-sex household would owe $4,543 more tax than the opposite-sex household. This is because the “head of household” designation pushes more income into a higher tax bracket and the individual filings provide lower standard deductions than “married and filing jointly.” The gay head of household is also subjected to a tax on the stay-at-home spouse’s health insurance premiums that the heterosexual breadwinner isn’t responsible for.

Also, there are many marital exemptions given to other families for inheritance taxes and gift taxes for which same sex couples do not qualify. In addition, same-sex households receive lower tax exclusions for capital gains on the sales of a home (unless the home is jointly owned and each spouse qualifies for the exclusion).

1 comment:

  1. It's about time we need to give equal rights to everyone! Orientation, race, age, who cares.

    ReplyDelete

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