The financial news that actually matters
A rideshare driver logging 20,000 miles a year just picked up an extra $500 in tax deductions without changing a single route. That is the practical effect of the IRS raising its standard business mileage rate to 72.5 cents per mile for 2026, up 2.5 cents from the 2025 rate of 70 cents. The new…
Tax professionals across the country are flagging the same problem this filing season: retirees who prepared their own 2025 federal returns checked the “65 or older” box on Form 1040, claimed the higher standard deduction, and stopped there. What many of them did not realize is that a separate, brand-new deduction worth up to $6,000…
When Carla Mendez, a high-school counselor in Grand Rapids, Michigan, borrowed $80,000 in federal PLUS loans to send two children through college, she expected the standard 10-year repayment plan to cost roughly $930 a month at the 7.5% interest rate on her loans. After consolidating and enrolling in Income-Contingent Repayment, her payment dropped to about…
A freelance graphic designer in Austin who earned $9,000 in April and May but set nothing aside for taxes is about to owe the IRS a quarterly installment, and the clock is ticking. The second quarterly estimated tax payment for 2026 is due June 15. Anyone who skips it or comes up short will be…
June 15, 2026, is 21 days away, and for the roughly 64 million Americans who earned freelance or gig income last year, according to a McKinsey estimate, it carries a price tag most of them would rather not think about: the second quarterly estimated tax payment of the year is due. Miss it or come…
Somewhere in the U.S. right now, a warehouse worker, a home health aide, or a couple splitting retail shifts is owed thousands of dollars by the federal government and does not know it. According to the most recent IRS participation data, roughly 19.2 percent of workers eligible for the Earned Income Tax Credit did not…
Most married couples filing their 2026 taxes will not itemize deductions. They will not need to dig up charitable receipts, tally property-tax payments, or calculate mortgage interest down to the penny. The reason is a single number: $32,200. That is the new standard deduction the IRS set for married couples filing jointly in tax year…
By the time most Parent PLUS borrowers realize what changed in the reconciliation bill Congress passed this spring, the window to protect themselves will already be closed. Under H.R.1, the Department of Education will stop offering legacy income-driven repayment plans for newly consolidated federal student loans starting July 1, 2026. For the millions of parents…
When the IRS announced automatic pandemic penalty relief on December 19, 2023, through Notice IR-2023-244, the agency said it would return roughly $1 billion to about 4.7 million taxpayers who had been charged late-payment penalties on their 2020 and 2021 federal returns. For millions of people, the credits showed up automatically. But not everyone was…
When the IRS opened its electronic filing system for 2025 tax returns in early 2026, it accepted a deduction that had never existed before: up to $25,000 in qualifying tips, subtracted directly from a worker’s taxable income. A full-time bartender in Las Vegas reporting $22,000 in gratuities could keep roughly $2,600 that would have gone…