The Homa Files

According to the WSJ …

The issue: 2011 tax-withholding tables.

Treasury officials must release the tables, which determine the take-home pay of millions of wage-earners, by mid-November because it takes payroll processors weeks to adjust their systems before Jan. 1.

But congressional leaders recently postponed voting on taxes until after the election and lawmakers don’t reconvene until Nov. 15.

The Senate is scheduled to take up several nontax issues when it returns and is expected to leave for Thanksgiving soon after, possibly pushing a vote on taxes into December.

Treasury officials’ most obvious option is the least attractive. If they publish tables based on expiration of the Bush tax cuts, which occurs Jan. 1, millions of low- and middle-income taxpayers who have paid little or no income taxes for a decade would likely see increases in January.

It’s estimated that higher withholding could take up to $10 billion a month out workers’ pockets due to higher tax rates alone.

Excerpted from WSJ: Delays to Tax Tables May Dent Paychecks, Oct. 7, 2010
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052748704689804575535861229293800.html?mod=WSJ_hps_LEFTWhatsNews

This entry was posted on October 8, 2010 at 6:50 am and is filed under Taxes. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.