I'm a hard-working single parent, so WHERE'S MY GODDAMN REFUND?

[liberalhistorian]

I'm the single mother of a twelve-year-old boy, with a B.A. and a paralegal certificate, who earns $25,900 a year. I could desperately use the $400.00 child tax credit refund the IRS began sending out yesterday. Mine would certainly go toward "stimulating the economy". I'm hard-working and responsible and pay my fair share of taxes. Other families that are better off financially and don't need the refund as much will be getting theirs, $400 PER CHILD. So, again, I ask, WHERE'S MY GODDAMN REFUND AND WHY AREN'T I GETTING ONE??????????

[oneighty]

1. Only the rich are worthy!

You and your child can eat cake.

Sarcasm, of course, Miss liberalhistorian.

180

[liberalhistorian]

8. Hey, I love cake and so does the kid,

but it's a little too expensive to eat all the time!

[amazona]

2. I wish I knew

With my income in the high four figures I could use a little help myself but not a chance. It must be much tougher for those who have children.

[Occulus]

3. from the IRS website

"If you claimed this credit on your 2002 tax return, you may be eligible for up to $400 for each qualifying child."

http://www.irs.gov/newsroom/article/0,,id=109816,00.html

Did you claim it on your 2002 return? If not, well, that would be why.

If you did claim it, you may just have not yet received it. However, if you have knowledge that you will not receive the refund, tell us, please.

[liberalhistorian]

6. I did claim the credit on my 2002 return.

I don't think I'll be getting it because I read, in an IRS "information" booklet, that those who would be receiving the refund would be sent a letter explaining the amount of the refund and when to expect it (based on the last four numbers of your social security number), since they will be sending checks out in three batches. The letters were to be sent out on July 21. Well, it's now July 26 and I've gotten nothing in the way of a letter. Also, my income falls below the income of those expected to receive it. Those earning between $10,500 and $26,000 a year will not receive the refund, and my income is $25,900 a year. And last year, it was only $24,000, since I had to take medical leave for a hysterectomy.

[preciousdove]

4. Ask here

http://www.irs.gov/individuals/article/0,,id=111546,00.html

[HFishbine]

5. Wow!

"I'm the single mother of a twelve-year-old boy, with a B.A. and a paralegal certificate, who earns $25,900 a year. "

Wow. That's one smart 12-year-old.

<grin> (please don't hit me.)

[liberalhistorian]

7. HIT HIT HIT!

Okay, ya got me, that wasn't the best way to structure the damn sentence! As the daugher of not one but TWO English teachers, I should have damn well known better. Actually, the kid is pretty smart, but not quite THAT smart!

[sandnsea]

10. Wait 3 years

He will be that smart then and he'll let you know every single day!

I'm the best parent in the world, I raised kids who know EVERYTHING!!!

:-)

[DiverDave]

12. I was hurt

in a work accident, I had 2 operations on my knee.
My disability payments where HALF of my take home, my wife's salary didn't make the cut.
We have 2 children and no tax rebate.
And to top it off I just got laid off and, because of my knee, cannot go back to my original job.
I am so happy that the rich folks make out under the new tax rules, maybe they will by the burgers I'll be serving soon.
Oh and the repuke notion of working hard to get ahead is bullshit.
I spent 15K on school and since I have no experience in IT, I cannot find a job.
But, to them, I am a leach that loves living on unemployment (89 dollars a week)Yup, a princely sum alright.
Fuck the repuke party and Fuck the rich assholes that support them.

[liberalhistorian]

16. Hey, ya leech! Get up off your lazy bum and start

contributing to the society that's keeping you in style with such a large weekly unemployment check!

Sarcasm OFF

I know, it's really sickening to think of what people like you have suffered and how you're continuing to suffer at the hands of silver-spoon repukes who do nothing but chant mantras about "hard work and responsibility" and "work hard, reap the rewards", and all that cheerleading bullshit. And these are people who, for the most part, have never had to work an honest day in their lives (Shrub, anyone?), and who've never had to worry about such a trivial thing as money. And a large share of their money comes from the hard work and sweat of others, whom they then fuck over to get even more of the green stuff (Enron, Halliburton, WorldCom, etc., etc.). I've come to believe that what they really mean by all of their "hard work and work hard" mantras and platitudes (that would make a great title for an anti-repuke book, wouldn't it? Mantras and Platitudes: The Republican economic solution) is that if people work hard, they'll make the REPUKES even richer!

[indigo32]

21. I feel for ya trying to break into IT

right now... A terrible time. All I can say is network, network, network. What was your previous job, could they point you anywhere?

[sandnsea]

9. You don't pay taxes, get with the rhetoric!

You are most likely in the category of those who 'don't pay taxes' because the child tax credit you already get offsets any taxes owed. Why should you get a tax credit if you don't pay taxes? Remember?

I've done the calculations on single moms with one child and that is the group least likely to get a child tax credit that still paid taxes. Send a copy of your 1040 to Denny Hastert and any other Republican you can think of. Get a page of quotes of the 'they don't pay taxes' mantra. Ask them to help you fix the mistake and get your taxes back.

[alaine]

15. Thanks sandnsea. I knew this was political from the

very beginning. The right won't reward what they slyly term as "immoral behavior" as if dropping bombs on civilians is not an act of immorality. The right's message to women has always been, "come girls, get your asses out there and start trying to control a whole bunch of shit you have no control over". It also hosts the dichotomy of praise for middle-class "stay at home" mom, vs. scorn for poverty class "welfare mother" without acknowledging the hypocrisy.

I am so FREAKING sick of hearing about how the poor don't pay taxes. My income has fallen below poverty level for most of my adult life and I sure the hell have paid SOMETHING every paycheck and I have been single and childless the whole time, so I've paid more than people with kids. If anybody out there has a link that breaks it down PLEASE post it here or p.m. me, I really want to refute this. I just want to say to these rich m.f.s then, fine give up your millions and be poor if you are that pissed about having to give up 50 out of every 100 million. These folks are so out of touch they really have no idea what poverty is, they really think working classes are lazy and get handouts. Either that or they really do want to starve off a generation of poor kids.

[liberalhistorian]

22. Exactly! Couldn't have said it better myself!

And I hear you about being sick of hearing that the poor don't pay taxes, the hell they don't! And I think you probably do pay more taxes simply because you don't have children which is WRONG!!!! Yes, children (even one child, like I have) are extremely expensive, but so is life in general and just because you're single and childless does not, by any means, mean that you don't also have a lot of expenses.

I don't know if you've heard of this organization or not, but I joined it last year and it's a really wonderful group, the American Association of Single People (www.unmarriedamerica.com). They might have some of the tax breakdown info you want, since fairness for singles in the tax, financial, legal, and social security areas is a major issue for them.

[alaine]

23. Thanks for the link!

That was a slam on the right, by the way, not a whine about having to pay more taxes than those with kids. I don't care as long as my tax money doesn't go to build bombs and make bullets (which I'm sure it does).

The thing that sickens me is that even though I am not rich I am perfectly at peace with paying for the benefits of this society, from interstate highways to libraries to helping fund medicaid and social services for the poor. I don't understand people who don't understand this, it's in the constitution under "providing for the general welfare". I also know that I have an extremely high standard of living compared with most of the history of humanity. I'm at peace with it. I am so tired of the rich people portraying themselves as hard workers when they don't know what "work" as in labor really is. They may be hard deal-makers and hand-shakers and money-takers but that is NOT labor.

Someone needs to break down what the upper class and top-out-of-sights really spend their money on, and rest assured most of it is not "providing for the general welfare" except in rare exceptions. I read an article the other day about a dispute over a trust a wealthy woman had left for the Met in the amount of 64 million bucks. 64 million dollars and children are starving to death every second. Sorry but I have no sympathy for the "overtaxed" wealthy.

[XanaDUer]

24. I had my head ripped off by a freeper

(poor as hell, and living in the same hovel-like apartment complex that we do, but what the hey...) when I tried to explain how, thanks to the regressive payroll taxes in the US, people like us pay more taxes.

What can do you with the dumb?

[zoidberg]

28. Huh, I've always thought singles were treated unfairly...

Now I know that I'm not the only kook who thinks that way. I have no problem with my taxes going for schools, health care for poor kids, Head Start and the rest. But it's insane that people with kids get tax breaks that people without kids don't.

But having kids are expensive, some will say. No joke having kids is expensive. That's why I don't have one. Having a dog can be expensive too, but the government shouldn't give tax breaks to people with dogs.

[liberalhistorian]

32. I so totally agree! I may be a parent, but I'm also a single parent

and I'm very well aware of just how differently singles are treated in so many areas, especially when it comes to financial (taxes, social security, etc.) and legal issues. Singles get screwed in a lot of ways in this society because the repukes have always encouraged marriage, believing that it's the end-all and be-all of everything, when it's really none of their damn business whether someone is married or not or why or why not, and why should you be discriminated against because Mr. or Ms. Right has not yet appeared, or you just choose not to be married?

Check the link above that I gave another poster, www.unmarriedamerica.com, it's the web site of the American Association of Single People. I joined last year; it's a wonderful organization that addresses many of these issues.

[liberalhistorian]

20. That's a great idea, sending my 1040 to

Hastert, because I sure as hell DO pay taxes and I'm fucking sick and tired of hearing about how I don't pay any taxes and that giving me the refund would be akin to giving me a welfare check! PUH-LEEZE!

[Generic Other]

11. You paid for Uday's nosejob

Sorry for being so flip. You should be getting money back. We really have reverted to the stone age in this country.

[liberalhistorian]

13. "You paid for Uday's nose job",

LOL! I can think of a lot better things to pay for, frankly!

[Momof1]

14. I wont get one either

I have one child and I'm not recieving a refund either.
My neighbor with 3 children, is not recieving one.
My friend from High School, who just volunteered to go to the desert (not Iraq, but near there)
He has 2 children, and has been in the Air Force since '92, is also not recieving this refund.

But all of us do have one thing in common....we are not in the richest 1% category

[liberalhistorian]

18. And THAT, my friends, is most likely why we're not getting

the refund, we're not in the richest 1% category!

[twilight]

30. Welcome to the DU Momof1!!

:hi: and welcome!

You aren't alone - nothing to be coming here either and not part of the 1% that apparently do get something.

Did not get anything the last go round, wasn't expecting anything this go round.

Alls I know is the taxes on everything are going up up up while California pisses away $60 million on a bogus recall election, or should I say, "sElection" in the works?

:dem:

[LiberalLibra]

17. Being a single parent means you probably aren't a repub, need I say more??

Never mind that lives change - the repubs don't care they are just out to buy votes.

[IDUDOYOU]

19. If you only paid taxes

I jest, of course.

Just repeating the mantra of the Tom Delays of the world.

[mbee]

25. Nancy Pelosi was on C-Span last night with a number of people from

the Congress and they had a family who made under $26,000 (is that the cut off for the child tax credit?) Anyway, they were making the case that these people pay more in SS and Medicare tax than millionaires! I thought it was great that they did this. They're giving little chimpy a taste of his own medicine! Exposing him for another of his lies that if you pay taxes you get relief!

[nini]

26. Biff and Bunny's parents got your share and others..

... so they can buy that summer house at the Hamptons they need.

[JohnKleeb]

27. because people like you arent Bush campaign contributors

Sorry for sounding jerky but its the truth thats why Bush wont give help the people who deserve tax breaks because they arent his contributors his campaign contributors are rich people.

[Fixated]

29. ...

The average single parent tax cut was 5 bucks. For couples with kids it's about $980. For the upper 1%, it's about $100,000.

[Joeve]

31. We got ours!

Well, my wife did...she has two kids (from a former husband). She worked a low-paying job until she got fired about two months ago. I've been out of work for almost a year now, and we're being evicted from our apartment on Thursday. We have no money to move and no place to move to: in short, we'll probably be homeless.

The check was for thirteen dollars and fifty cents.

Meanwhile, some schmuck making seven figures got our $400, they probably won't even notice it.

Personally, even if we got the whole damn $800 (2 kids) I'd gladly trade it in for a Clinton economy: one where I could actually find work.