The law discriminates against women who don't work.

[Tom_Mi]

Please forgive this rant...

My wife is a homemaker. The trustee (a female attorney - with an attitude) claimed that on our exempted JOINT return, my wifes 50% exemption was invalid...because she doesn't make money.

Then why does your refund go UP when you file jointly?????

My atty offered a compromise and my wife only has to give up 1/2 of her half..but this sucks. That trustee knows how much it would cost me to fight this and win, and she planned her compromise because she knows the fight would cost more money.

There ought to be remedies so that when you fight the trustee and win, SHE PAYS the extra legal costs.


I'm taking the October LSAT. And I'll remember this.

[frogger]

Without getting too political here, EVERYTHING in our laws are designed to discriminate against married couples, from the tax codes to the welfare benefits.

Our lawmakers are buying and paying for votes every day by placing more and more people on the public dole. There's much more money to be made by being single and having babies than having a husband/wife and traditional family.

[jennordhavn]

I'm taking the October LSAT. And I'll remember this.

Good luck on the LSAT. I'm taking the CA bar exam in 4 days....YIKES!

[JRScott]

Without getting too political here, EVERYTHING in our laws are designed to discriminate against married couples, from the tax codes to the welfare benefits.

Our lawmakers are buying and paying for votes every day by placing more and more people on the public dole. There's much more money to be made by being single and having babies than having a husband/wife and traditional family.

Yep the tax laws are very unfriendly to us single folks with no dependents. We have to subsidize everyone else kids etc by paying more taxes while they use up more services.....highly unfair if you ask me. That's why I'd love to see the 16th Amendment repealed and a national sales tax implemented instead, one that has no exemptions etc. It would be far less discriminatory than our current system.

I agree the lawmakers also pretty much look to pay for votes, that's why there are laws that give this group or that group special dispensation, it is also what has immensely screwed up our nation.

[Over our heads]

Your wife doesn't make money huh. I call BS. According to some government 'calculator' that I have no intention of finding again, a SAHM's salary should be roughly 120k/year.

So mayhaps I don't bring in any actual money, but I have learned to stretch the money that does come in enough that I completely bewildered our own attorney. Yes, you can feed a family of 6 +4 animals for 600$ a month.

Someone should explain to that TT that the refund that your wife is intitled to is her paycheck, that she receives once per year.

[Minnymouth]

Yeah JRScott,

My single-no children paycheck has paid thousands in "school taxes" to help put kids thru school - hope some of them got an education.

Being single cost us a lot more tax wise - with no breaks on income tax, property taxes, NOTHING................

Personally, I've never understood how my brother with several kids can get back $3-4K a year in a refund and they have NEVER PAID that kind of income tax in???

Lots of things in our judicial systems and tax system need to be addressed.

And some of the Trustee's.............LEAVE A LOT TO BE DESIRED. Some have been in the business TOO LONG, and GIVEN TOO MUCH FREEDOM - UNCHECKED BY THE COURTS.

Just my opinion........

[Tom_Mi]

Maybe my trustee is single, and that's why she's upset that my wife may want a claim to our taxes. Even if the tax code didn't raise our refund, the very notion of it's being "joint" should permit exemption.

In our stipulation, the legalese says:
"The trustee is disinterested in this case and the parties involved."
baloney. She's *really* interested...and if I wasn't broke, I'd find out what percentage of her cases attack homemaker exemptions compared to that of other trustees.

[falken]

Your wife doesn't make money huh. I call BS. According to some government 'calculator' that I have no intention of finding again, a SAHM's salary should be roughly 120k/year.

You should report that on your taxes as income then.

[aces67]

That's crazy. It doesn't matter if she works or not. I don't work and the UST wanted to raise issue about that but my lawyer quickly told him that they cannot force me to work and that we have small children with health problems that were better off with me than at daycare.

[blankslate]

It's funny the different different views that were brought out by this thread. The ire of laws not respecting "traditional families" and then the ire of the single person with no children. Both feeling they have the burden of all of the taxation and discrimination. I'm neither, I'm a single mom with a teenager who soon will be paying her own taxes.

I agree on the flat sales tax idea. I wonder how individual states would implement their income taxes with that and if state sales tax would also be added on top. It is an interesting theory and would be harder for the wealthy to skirt their way out of paying. Though there will always be ways. That is human nature. No matter what we do with social programs there will always be someone who wants a handout and someone who doesn't want to pay their share.

I'm sorry that the TT didn't rule in your favor for the joint status. I wonder if she thought you should be Head of Household claiming your wife as a dependent. When I was married, I worked so I don't think there was ever any other option but to file joint.

I can see both points of view on the stay at home spouse. It is work and a lot of it. That work doesn't have a limited 8 hour day either, it is 24/7. I also understand the many reasons a parent would choose to stay at home. Daycare is unbelievably expensive. My daughter got to the age where she could be at home after school without supervision just as the daycare costs were doubling and tripling. I don't know what I would have done as a young single mom who was trying to work if day care had been $1000 a month when she was little.

At the same time, no one pays me to maintain my home. I work 50-60 hours a week and still have to come home and take care of the pets, cook meals, clean floors, wash laundry, dust, go over my daughter's homework and take her to her activities, etc. I don't get a tax credit for this either. Now that my daughter is over 17 I just get enough of a credit to break even if that or owe a little less at the end of the year on top of the 35% I've already paid out.

Just bringing in another point of view and not trying to bring down anyone else's point of view either.

[Mi Bankruptcy]

Yeah JRScott,

My single-no children paycheck has paid thousands in "school taxes" to help put kids thru school - hope some of them got an education.

Being single cost us a lot more tax wise - with no breaks on income tax, property taxes, NOTHING................

Personally, I've never understood how my brother with several kids can get back $3-4K a year in a refund and they have NEVER PAID that kind of income tax in??? Lots of things in our judicial systems and tax system need to be addressed. And some of the Trustee's.............LEAVE A LOT TO BE DESIRED. Some have been in the business TOO LONG, and GIVEN TOO MUCH FREEDOM - UNCHECKED BY THE COURTS. Just my opinion........

I could never figure this out either. The first time I did my taxes with all my kids I redid my tax return 3 times to make sure I was not messing something up because I was getting so much back. However, I claim 0 for wages being withheld. So, that is one reason why we get allot back at the end of the year.

As for more kids...lol.. you will need more to pay into the bankrupt Social Security...

[daedalus]

I find it interesting that social programs are commonly referred to as "handouts", and anyone who utilizes such limited opportunities in our capitalist system is somehow looked down upon. All of us here find ourselves in a position where we need to take advantage of a government provided and administered system (bankruptcy) that allows us some relief. Step back and ask yourselves why?

If we had more of a social safety net, perhaps many of us would not have needed to file in the first place. Socialized medicine would have helped many whose solvency collapsed under the crushing weight of medical bills. Many of us look down our noses at people who we believe take "handouts", because, I conject, that there is a "pick yourselves up by the bootstraps no matter what" mentality that pervades our society. Unemployment is in the double-digits. Many of us are waking up to discover that our bootstraps have been stolen. If you have health insurance, it is probably heavily subsidized by your employer. As an employer, I can tell you no matter how much you pay, your employer is probably paying a small fortune on your behalf.

Now, ask yourselves why each and every large employer in the US is not clamoring and lobbying for a government-run health care system for all? It would save them a heck of a lot of money. Simply put, a worker who depends on his job to ensure the health of his family is a demoralized and dependant worker indeed! Not likely to make too many waves.

Also, we all take advantage of government subsidized programs everyday - libraries, schools, parks, roads and public works projects, museums, etc. If there were a strictly profit-driven motive to providing these things, it WOULD NOT happen.

If you want to be truly righteous in your indignation against "handouts" and other government subsidies, your ire should be directed squarely at the oligarchs who take much more than their fair share from each and every one of us. The name of the game to them is internalize profits, externalize losses and risks. They use the rest of us to their advantage by pitting us against one another - somehow a middle class bloke can look down upon a "poor" person without the slightest bit of irony, even though middle class is generally only two paychecks away from poverty.

Personally, I refuse to be a pawn.

[OhioFiler]

Yeah JRScott,

My single-no children paycheck has paid thousands in "school taxes" to help put kids thru school - hope some of them got an education.
Being single cost us a lot more tax wise - with no breaks on income tax, property taxes, NOTHING................

Personally, I've never understood how my brother with several kids can get back $3-4K a year in a refund and they have NEVER PAID that kind of income tax in???

Lots of things in our judicial systems and tax system need to be addressed.

And some of the Trustee's.............LEAVE A LOT TO BE DESIRED. Some have been in the business TOO LONG, and GIVEN TOO MUCH FREEDOM - UNCHECKED BY THE COURTS.

Just my opinion........

I think property taxes as a method to finance schools is awful but I disagree that you are overtaxed as a single paying property taxes. In many communities home values are established as much by the quality of the school system as any other variable. If you pay for a high quality school system your home is worth more.

As to the OP's statement that the law discriminates against women. This is patently false. I assume your complaint is the particular trustee you are dealing with discriminates against stay at home parents, regardless of gender. If she only uses this arguments when the stay at home parent is a woman you'd have a fantastic case of gender discrimination.

Anyway, this TT is not the law. The laws have been skewed in favor of women for the last several decades.

[SocalBroke]

I find it interesting that social programs are commonly referred to as "handouts", and anyone who utilizes such limited opportunities in our capitalist system is somehow looked down upon. All of us here find ourselves in a position where we need to take advantage of a government provided and administered system (bankruptcy) that allows us some relief. Step back and ask yourselves why?

If we had more of a social safety net, perhaps many of us would not have needed to file in the first place. Socialized medicine would have helped many whose solvency collapsed under the crushing weight of medical bills. Many of us look down our noses at people who we believe take "handouts", because, I conject, that there is a "pick yourselves up by the bootstraps no matter what" mentality that pervades our society. Unemployment is in the double-digits. Many of us are waking up to discover that our bootstraps have been stolen. If you have health insurance, it is probably heavily subsidized by your employer. As an employer, I can tell you no matter how much you pay, your employer is probably paying a small fortune on your behalf.

Now, ask yourselves why each and every large employer in the US is not clamoring and lobbying for a government-run health care system for all? It would save them a heck of a lot of money. Simply put, a worker who depends on his job to ensure the health of his family is a demoralized and dependant worker indeed! Not likely to make too many waves.

Also, we all take advantage of government subsidized programs everyday - libraries, schools, parks, roads and public works projects, museums, etc. If there were a strictly profit-driven motive to providing these things, it WOULD NOT happen.

If you want to be truly righteous in your indignation against "handouts" and other government subsidies, your ire should be directed squarely at the oligarchs who take much more than their fair share from each and every one of us. The name of the game to them is internalize profits, externalize losses and risks. They use the rest of us to their advantage by pitting us against one another - somehow a middle class bloke can look down upon a "poor" person without the slightest bit of irony, even though middle class is generally only two paychecks away from poverty.

Personally, I refuse to be a pawn.

Well said!

[MrSmithster]

The law discriminates against women who don't work.
actually same thing if the man doesnt work and wife does, so the biased title above seems a little bigoted to me. hate to sound snarky, but as a male who was screwed over in my divorce(yet now has custody of my kids), i have to disagree when you say the law discriminates againt women when it comes to money