- 1). Total all of your income and deductions in order to compute your Adjusted Gross Income and taxable income. Subtract your above-the-line deductions and then your standard or itemized deductions. Then subtract your personal and dependency exemptions to arrive at your taxable income.
- 2). Go to the IRS website and look up your income in the tax table. Be sure that you are looking at the correct column of figures when you do this, so that you get the right number. The leftmost column is for single filers, the next one is for married filing jointly, the third from left is married filing separately and the right column is for head of household filers.
- 3). Look at the column that corresponds to your filing status and find the number that also corresponds to your income range, which is listed in $50 increments. This is the amount of actual tax that you owe on your income for the year. Enter this number on line 44 of your 1040.
- 4). Look at the directions on page 36 of the 1040 Instructions for more information. If you have tax from Form 8814, Child's Interest or Dividend Income, or Form 4972, Lump-Sum Distributions, add these amounts to your actual tax, as well as any amount of recaptured Education Credit. See Form 8863 for more information on this.
- 5). Do not bother with the above steps if you are doing your return by computer; the program will automatically calculate the amount of tax you owe once you have entered in all of your other information. After you figure the amount of tax you owe, subtract all relevant credits along with your tax withheld for the year to arrive at your balance due or refund.
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