Long time no update! Have been chipping away at debt, working, and mostly socializing by phone/zoom as we are still under a lockdown where I live. Looking back at my last entry, I can’t believe how quickly time has flown since this whole crazy thing started.
After various delays due to staff being out at home, finally received reimbursement for $1500 of work-related expenses from earlier in the year (mostly airfare for business travel, all pre-Covid). I applied this to my student loan, along with a check for some accrued overtime from the last quarter.
Current Loan snapshot:
Student loan balance (3.21%):
Principle: $104,993.91
Interest: 0
Total: $104,993.91
Daily interest: $9.23
The regular monthly payment of $2,388.76 that will autodebit on the 26th. Getting close to five digits! Will continue to throw any extra money in the budget at it, but I somehow owed quite a bit on federal taxes this year, so waiting for that check to clear my account this month. Still trying to figure out why the withholdings were too low, even though I didn’t claim any exceptions/dependents and money was withheld for taxes on every check, even for overtime.
Still here, time flies!
May 13th, 2020 at 06:36 pm
May 13th, 2020 at 08:22 pm 1589401362
In 2019, the tax rate for the money you made between
$39,476 to $84,200
Is taxed at 22 percents.
Lower than that, the first $9700 is taxed at 10 percent, the remainder up to 39476 is taxed at 12 percent.
Higher, up to $160,000 is at 24 percent. Even more for over that!
Withholding takes the amount on your check and annualizes it, then calculates a blended withholding rate using that plus the number of dependents you claim.
Your overtime checks might be so small that they have withholding based on 10-12 percent, but your actual blended rate might be more - maybe they might be what moves you to the 24 percent rate for that income amount.
This happens if you have two jobs too unless you compensate based on the number of deductions you take. Both are taxed at a lower rate than if they were added together.
The principle applies, sort of in reverse, to large bonuses, where withholding might end up at the highest, 37%, rate.
It all evens out when you sum it up at tax time!
But unless you have a lot of odd deductions, you can predict what you will pay in taxes pretty easily with a spreadsheet.
I used single rates, but the concept is the same whatever your status.
I got percentages from here. These are for 2019. 2020 might be a little different.
https://www.bankrate.com/finance/taxes/tax-brackets.aspxY
Remember that you subtract deductions from your total income before you break your income into tiers and apply the rate!
May 17th, 2020 at 08:18 pm 1589746726