Have you ever wondered what consists of your taxable wages? If you belong to this category, know that you are not alone. Your taxable wage is the money you earn that should have income tax withheld. This is the direct opposite of non-taxable wages. This includes expenses reimbursement which has nothing to do with income tax withholding. Hence, what are FIT Taxable Wages? We will attempt to answer that and a few other questions in this piece.

What is fit taxable wages?

Fit stands for Federal Income Tax Withheld. It gets removed from your pay added to the Social Security Tax on Medicare Tax, Social Security Tax on Wages. Your net income gets calculated by removing all the deductions. The taxable wages for federal tax for withholding purposes is gotten by taking the gross pay and removing any exclusion that may exist for that employee. This depending on the exclusions for the employee based on Internal Revenue Service Publication 15B. These exclusions are sometimes referred to as pre-tax payroll deductions. Some of the exemptions from the gross pay include the dental insurance premium, medical insurance premium, retirement plan contribution, and qualifying transportation.

When you get the taxable wages, you calculate the Federal withholding tax based on Internal Revenue Service Publication 15. You also need to find out the marital status of the employee. And the number of withholding allowances such a person has claimed. This is all based on the W-4 of the employee.

The Idea Of Federal Income Tax Withholding On Wages

The money which the employer will withhold from the paycheck of an employee will always be subject to the amount of gross income that made as wages in the year. This is minus all pre-tax deductions paid from the wages before the calculation of all taxes. Employees use Withholding allowance to calculate the total of federal income tax. This is the one that should be withheld from the paycheck.

Social Security Tax

The Social Security tax is one that comes with a pre-defined flat rate of 6.2%. It gets removed from wages after all subtracting all pre-tax deductions. This is the ones that are up to the Social Security Wage base limit which is $118,500. The reason for this is that the Social Security tax is from using a flat rate along with a peak. Also, the Social security tax amount that is withheld is always the same as the Social Security tax upon which a person is liable. It should, but, note that there are a few exceptions to this.

1. Underpaid Social Security Tax

There are three ways via which the Social Security Tax can be underpaid. Several employees that do not report the tips they receive to their employers and do not have any tax withheld. In such an instance, the Form 4137 gets used in calculating the total amount of the medicare tax and Social Security tax. We do this on the unreported tips while the extra tax amount gets reported on the annual tax return.

Another way to look at this is that some workers may be being independent contractors by their employers. In such an instance, the earnings will not have tax withheld. Also, in such a case, there will be a need to use the form 8919 to calculate the medicare tax and social security tax that is on the earnings. The extra tax amount is then calculated on the annual tax return.

2. Overpaid Social Security Tax

For employees who work for at least two employers, they may get to know that they may have overpaid the social security tax. This is if the total amount earned from all sources is more than the yearly social security base. In such an instance, the amount overpaid will only get refunded in a situation where the taxpayer applies for a return. It is then he claims the overpaid social security withholding in the form of credit.

Medicare Withholding On Wages

The Medicare tax is usually withheld at a rate of about 1.45% of the gross earnings. This is after removing all pre-tax deductions that are not part of the Medicare taxes. Because Medicare tax is usually not assessed using a flat rate, the total amount of Medicare tax that is withheld is always the same as the tax amount that the person is liable. Since the beginning of 2013, a new 0.9% Medicare surtax for higher-income earners came up. There is a possibility that several taxpayers will not have the added Medicare tax removed from their pay.

What Do I Need To Know About Gross Income And Taxable Income?

Gross income has to do with all the income you get that is not exempted from the tax under the Internal Revenue Code. Taxable income is the part of the gross income which is subject to taxation. The deductions are usually deducted from the gross income to get the total amount of the taxable earnings.

What Is The Gross Income?

Your Gross income is the point from which the IRS determines the tax liability of a person. It is your total earnings from all sources before the deductions get done. This is usually made up of both incomes earned from salary, wages, tips, and self-employment added to an unearned income which includes interest on investments as well as dividends. One thing about Gross income is that it can include anything that is not designated as tax-exempt by the IRS. It also includes compensatory damages for injury, child support payments, and worker’s compensation. Added to this is the Supplemental Security Income. These sources are usually not added to your gross income because your gross income is not tax-deductible.

Also, certain withdrawals made from retirement accounts which include disability insurance income and required distributions are all added to the gross income. You must take note that Gross business income is not the same as gross revenue in the case of business owners. It is instead the total revenue gotten from the business subtracted allowable business expenses. So, the Gross income for business owners is the net business income.

Taxable Income

This refers to the adjusted gross income minus any deductions which you should claim or the standard deductions. The adjusted gross income is a consequence of making some adjustments to income. Those adjustments include student loan interest, contributions to an individual retirement account. This is added to contributions made to your health savings account. Taxpayers are usually permitted to either itemize their deductions paid over the year or take the standard deduction. But you cannot take the standard deductions and itemize deductions at the same time.

By claiming the standard deductions, an individual may have his taxable income reduced more than itemizing. This is owing to tax cuts and Jobs Act which increased the deductions by two times from what was obtainable back in 2018. Tax-payers will need a very large amount of charitable giving, medical costs. Added to other itemized deductions if he or she is exceeding the standard deduction amounts.

What Are The Types Of Tax Withholding In America

There are three major types of withholding tax in the United States of America. These include the withholding tax on payments made to foreign persons. The second is the Wage withholding taxes and the final one is the backup withholding on interests and dividends.

The Tax amount withheld is usually composed of social security, income tax, medicare, and social security. There are some amount of wages that are not subject to tax withholding. Wage withholding is often subject to wages paid. The Social Security tax withholding ends when payments made from an employee is more than the peak wage base for the year.

The total amounts which are withheld by payers should get remitted back to the government as at when due. But the amounts which are subject to taxes and withholdings are usually reported to the government and payees each year.

What Is The Origin Of Tax Withholding In America

The payroll withholding and tax payments got introduced by Congress during World Was 2. This was the Current Tax Payment Act of 1943. This process assisted in easing the tax collection process for both the Bureau of Internal Revenue and Taxpayer. It also reduced the awareness of the taxpayer as regards the total amount which is being collected. It suffices to say that it harmed the transparency of the process. This thus made it quite easy to increase taxes later on.

Take Home

A good understanding of the tax system in America is one easy way to stay away from the trouble of the IRS. But apart from that, it is imperative to note that there are some fringe benefits that the rules provide for those who are smart enough to recognize it. With the clear explanations on the terms relating to taxation discussed here, you should be able to get a better deal.

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