do you want your tax rebate?

No don't worry about paying your taxes at all.

Taxes are optional ... roads build themselves, government employees work for free, etc.

In 2006, did you make $12 or $12k?

You absolutely have to pay for 2007 ... better get crackin' ... they're due April 15 (of this year)

Since you get a 1099 MISC, shouldn't you be paying the self-employment tax (employee and employer portions of fica + medicare) regardless of whether the regular personal deduction exceeds your income or not? You should be paying ~15% of your net income (5K and 12K less expenses for that year) for fica/medicare. You most likely do not have to pay federal income tax after factoring in your personal deduction/exemption, but you're still on the hook for the fica/medicare contribution.

There seems to be some pervasive idea that if you neglect to file for a given year, there is some special procedure you have to follow or that you have to get someone to do something magical for you.

There is one and only one way to rectify the situation: file the missing tax return(s). It's really that simple. You can get the federal forms and instructions for previous years here. Click on the links, print out the forms, fill them out, and send them in with your payments. Don't worry about penalties or interest, the IRS will calculate those and send you a bill. Then do the same for your state taxes. If you are totally clueless about how to fill out a tax form, go to the web site of your favorite tax software company and you can buy the software for previous years.

Just get the forms or the software and file. That's it.

Since you were self-employed (1099 rather than W-2), you are required to file in any year in which your net self-employment income exceeds $400. The IRS will come after you. It takes them a few years, but rest assured they will. In the meantime, the interest and penalties just keep growing. If you don't file a return, there is no time limit for the IRS. I am seeing a lot of people posting on deadbeat boards that the IRS is just getting around to bugging them for 2000 to 2002.

As far as 2007 goes, get your return filed on time. File on time even if you can't pay. The penalty for filing late is 10 times as much as the penalty for just paying late. File on time even if you can't get around to filing your past due returns yet. Not filing on time for 2007 will just start a whole new set of penalties adding up for a whole new year. It will not help you with your problems from previous years.

Don't worry about it, I like paying extra because deadbeats like you rationalize reasons why they don't need to pay their taxes.

Beerbong, you should absolutely file your taxes, because eventually IRS will catch on, and then they will make your life reallly hard, e.g., by helping themselves from your bank accounts.

However, there are some things to remember that will make your tax burden potentially lower:

1. If your income is reported on 1099-Misc, that means you are self-employed, right?
You might be able to claim some business related expenses to reduce your tax liability.

2. If the 1099 income was the only income you had, you might not owe much Federal taxes on the $5K, because of standard deduction and personal exemption. Similarly, for the $12K.

However, as mentioned by some posters, because you are considered self-employed, you will have to pay self-employment tax, which is the double of the social security + medicare rate that regular employees pay. Also, you WILL owe penalties and interest for 2005 and 2006, and possibly for 2007. There is just no way around that at this point.

BTW, you are making confusing statements. You said, "my 07 salary was $22K". Was that also reported on 1099-Misc? If so, that's not your salary. That's your gross receipts from operating a business, i.e., self-employed "income". Again, you might be able to expense some business-related expenditures to reduce your tax burden.

frootmall said:There seems to be some pervasive idea that if you neglect to file for a given year, there is some special procedure you have to follow or that you have to get someone to do something magical for you.

There is one and only one way to rectify the situation: file the missing tax return(s). It's really that simple. You can get the federal forms and instructions for previous years here. Click on the links, print out the forms, fill them out, and send them in with your payments. Don't worry about penalties or interest, the IRS will calculate those and send you a bill. Then do the same for your state taxes. If you are totally clueless about how to fill out a tax form, go to the web site of your favorite tax software company and you can buy the software for previous years.

Just get the forms or the software and file. That's it.

Since you were self-employed (1099 rather than W-2), you are required to file in any year in which your net self-employment income exceeds $400. The IRS will come after you. It takes them a few years, but rest assured they will. In the meantime, the interest and penalties just keep growing. If you don't file a return, there is no time limit for the IRS. I am seeing a lot of people posting on deadbeat boards that the IRS is just getting around to bugging them for 2000 to 2002.

As far as 2007 goes, get your return filed on time. File on time even if you can't pay. The penalty for filing late is 10 times as much as the penalty for just paying late. File on time even if you can't get around to filing your past due returns yet. Not filing on time for 2007 will just start a whole new set of penalties adding up for a whole new year. It will not help you with your problems from previous years.

Frootmall gives the best advice for this. The only thing I'll add is that you can calculate the penalties in advance if you use a tax preperation software, and if you send this in with your completed taxes, you'll have that much less interest to pay while the IRS calculates this for you - which can take months to years. I say wake tomorrow morning, get on your darn computer, download the latest and greatest tax software, and complete all of your taxes once and for all. By tomorrow night you will be good to go, and you can get drunk and not worry about anything else for a while.

I am pretty sure you only have to pay self-employment tax on your net, not gross - so if you have a 12k 1099, and you are able to write off 13k - you didn't make any money TO pay self-employment tax on..

I did mystery shopping for a few years - put in 80-100k mileage a year for a couple of years, and didn't have to pay SET.