Can I claim myself on my taxes as a dependent ?

STEVEN F

NO. The question is if someone else can claim you which affects your tax liability. In NO case can ANYONE claim themself as a dependent.

curtisports2

The personal exemption, and the argument over who gets to claim it, is no more as of 2018. The only thing to argue over now is who is entitled to take any education credit that is available. Read Publication 501. It will explain how to determine if you are your mother's qualifying child for her claiming an education credit - you both must meet ALL of the tests for qualifying - or if you may take the credit. As for getting back more or less than last year ...people are forgetting that last year, the tax rates were 3% higher across all brackets and that with the lower tax rates for 2018, less tax was withheld. Maybe you got back more last year than you will this year, but the IMPORTANT number to look at is how much tax you OWE for 2018 vs 2017, and on the same income for both years, that WILL be less. Your standard deduction for 2018 is $12,000. In 2017, it was $6,350 and your personal exemption was $4,050, for a total of $10,400 in income that was not taxed. Barring any tax credit, on $15,000 of income in 2018, you are only taxed on $3,000 of it (federal), and the rate on that is 10%, or $300. If you paid in $882, you would get back $582. State is different and I don't know your state, so I'm guessing that you'll get back most of what you paid in state. Again....you CANNOT compare last year to this year. Last year you earned less money but were taxed at a higher rate. This year you earned more but are taxed at a lower rate. It is not at all unusual for your refund to come out about the same. If you are entitled to an education tax credit, you'll do better. If your mother qualifies to take a credit, she will do better. Read Publication 501 on that.

Eva

You never claim yourself as a dependent. You either file as single or dependent of another. There are rules about whether you file on your own or as a dependent. Review the decision tree in IRS Publication 501 or use the interactive assistant on their website. This year the tax laws and rates are completely different than when you filed last year. You don't necessarily get more money back because you made more. It has more to do with how much tax you had withheld.

StephenWeinstein

Not "as a dependent", because the word "dependent" means "someone who is claimed BY SOMEONE ELSE". As for the real question of whether you can claim yourself at all: If your mom can claim you but decided not to claim you, then you cannot claim yourself. If she can't claim you, and wouldn't be able to claim you even if she wanted to claim you, and neither can anyone else, meaning that there is no one in the whole world who can claim you as a dependent, then you can claim yourself, but not "as a dependent".

Amy

You can never be your own dependent, just as you can never be your own child. There are certain deductions and credits that you will be able to claim because you are not a dependent. I notice that you are getting back $10 more than you actually paid! That probably didn't happen last year. Are you sure your mother cannot claim you? She probably can if you didn't pay rent and you were a full-time student for more than 4 months of 2018. As for the amount of your refund, that depends on how much you overpaid. When you earned more money, you owed more tax and you paid more through withholding. The ideal refund is zero, because that means you paid exactly the amount you owed.

amy lynn

First of all, even in the past, no one ever actually claimed themselves as a dependent. If the person was not someone else's dependent, then they automatically get their personal exemption. Trump changed the tax laws and instead of getting a standard deduction of around $6,400 and a personal exemption of about $4,100 - a single person gets just a standard deduction of $12,000. There is no longer an exemption for yourself or for each dependent. All you need to do is answer the tax question that says "can someone else claim you as a dependent" with the right answer for your situation and you will get everything you are entitled to. Next, you can never compare each year's tax return. The tax changes made by Trump before the beginning of 2018 slightly changed the percentage of taxes being withheld from many people's paycheck. Also, if you earned more income, then your tax liability would be higher which might also reduce any potential refund. I just can't imagine any situation in which your W-2 from 2016 and your W-2 from 2017 was exactly the same and even if they were, the changes in the tax laws would change the tax situation. Remember, when you are a single person, the refund you get is just YOUR MONEY that you overpaid. It is NOT some kind of bonus from the government. Getting money that was never actually "yours" to begin with involves qualifying for credits, such as educational credits or child tax credits.

P

The use of the word "dependent" is not correct, since you would not use the dependent section of the tax return. You can claim yourself as long as no one else is. If you answered "no" to the question "Can(is) anyone else claiming you on their tax return?" turbo-tax will take care of that for you. You cannot claim head of household. You are pretty much getting back everything you paid the feds; you can't get much more than that in the majority of cases.

hotstuffktr

Trump changed the tax law - and the withholdings..

Pascal the Gambler

If you were a full time student who paid more than half their own expenses, you can. If you did NOT pay more than half your own expenses and were a full time student, you can't, even if mom does not. How much you get back isn't based on only how much you made. You misunderstand how it works.

sara

No loool