Many popular tax breaks that folks have previously used to reduce their personal income taxes were either repealed or allowed to expire for 2010 and may not be around this year to help reduce your taxes.
These breaks include the college tuition deduction, deductions for teaching supplies, deductions for state sales taxes, deductions for property taxes for nonitemizers, and tax free IRA payouts to charities.
Further, the Alternative Minimum Tax is a huge deal this year as the exemption amounts that were used to keep many folks from being trapped by this tax have readjusted to pre-2001 levels, subjecting millions more people to the hated AMT in 2010.
Meanwhile, Congress is still (amazingly) diddling around with the estate tax for 2010, and are still trying to reinstate it retroactively to Jan 1.They are also talking about extending some of the foregoing income tax breaks and “fix” AMT. But along with the estate tax issue these are all hung up in a Congress that is afraid to raise taxes before the next election but also concerned about the public’s increased anger over the rising deficit.
So, at the top of our 2010 Missing in Action list maybe we should put POLITICAL LEADERSHIP.