Except the overall tax paid for the year has nothing to do with the refund you get. A refund just means you overpaid in withholding the prior year. Even if you got a smaller refund , that doesn’t mean you paid as much in taxes. That certainly happened for me; I got hit by the SALT changes and ended up without a refund, but comparing my returns I paid less in taxes than I did the last year despite making more.
The ideal situation is that you pay $0 and get a refund of $0 at tax time. The IRS is revising withholding forms now to help reach this goal.
Comments
Except the overall tax paid for the year has nothing to do with the refund you get. A refund just means you overpaid in withholding the prior year. Even if you got a smaller refund , that doesn’t mean you paid as much in taxes. That certainly happened for me; I got hit by the SALT changes and ended up without a refund, but comparing my returns I paid less in taxes than I did the last year despite making more.
The ideal situation is that you pay $0 and get a refund of $0 at tax time. The IRS is revising withholding forms now to help reach this goal.