What if you had to file your tax returns 4 times over, in different ways each time?
What if your reward for marking up 4 packets of forms, crunching 4 sets of calculations, and combing 4 returns for audit-triggering mistakes was paying more money in taxes?
What if the only reason for your quadrupled tax day workload is because you're married?
Would you throw your abacus out the window? Rip your W-2's to shreds? Or would you cartwheel over to the divorce lawyer, if only to make the filling out forms stop, please God, just stop?
Welcome to the unsexiest part of same-sex marriage: the federal-state tax return waltz.
You see, I'm a man, legally married to another man, in a state (New York) that recognizes our marriage as, you know, a marriage. But to the federal government, we're just two dudes, living together, with joint bank accounts and a propensity for having sex with each other ("Totally okay by us since 2003!"--The Supreme Court). We're roommates with benefits, if you will.
That's because of the Defense of Marriage Act (DOMA), Section 3:
Section 3. Definition of marriage
In determining the meaning of any Act of Congress, or of any ruling, regulation, or interpretation of the various administrative bureaus and agencies of the United States, the word 'marriage' means only a legal union between one man and one woman as husband and wife, and the word 'spouse' refers only to a person of the opposite sex who is a husband or a wife.
So what does that mean, according to the
IRS?
Q. Can same-sex partners who are legally married for state law purposes file federal tax returns using a married filing jointly or married filing separately status?
A. No. Same-sex partners may not file using a married filing separately or jointly filing status because federal law does not treat same-sex partners as married for federal tax purposes.
But
according to New York State tax law:
Same-sex married couples must file using a married filing status for tax year 2011 and after.
--You must file your New York personal income tax return(s) using a married filing status even though your marital status isn't recognized for federal purposes. Because the law only applies starting for tax year 2011, you can't amend a prior year return using a married filing status.
--To complete your New York return you must recompute your federal income tax return (including all credit forms, schedules, and other attachments) using a married filing status, applying all the federal rules for married taxpayers. Don't submit this federal as if married return to the IRS. Use it only to complete your New York return and keep it with your tax documents.
Got that? In New York, we file "married jointly". To do that, we have to prepare a federal "married jointly" return. But we don't file that one, oh no--that's just to compute our state tax burden. For the feds, as long as DOMA is on the books, we file as single people. 2 federal "single" tax returns + 1 dummy federal "married jointly" return + 1 official state "married jointly" return = 4 entirely different tax returns prepared.
For 2 people.
But that's not the end of the fun for this charming yearly ritual. We use tax preparation software which includes a handy little window that estimates our tax refund as we prepare our returns. Here's what my single guy federal refund looked like:
Not bad! And my husband's federal refund:
Okay, nothing to write home about, but that's a nice dinner out for 2. When I prepared our dummy federal "married jointly" return, however, I got to find out how much we'd get back if DOMA didn't exist:
Our combined tax refunds with DOMA: $1,487. Our combined tax refunds in a hypothetical no-DOMA parallel universe: $4,918. That's a tidy $3,431 more we'd have lining our pockets (and our credit card company's pockets, and our student loan company's pockets, and our health insurance company's pockets, and our--you get the point).
Now, every cloud has a silver lining. If the Supreme Court overturns the part of DOMA affecting our federal benefits status, we'll file amended tax returns for the last couple of years, and we'll get that big ol' chunk of money back. But in the meantime, we've lent the government--and by extension, Sens. Murkowski, Pryor, and the 56% of Medicare-gobbling seniors who are still "evolving" on the issue of marriage equality--thousands of bucks, interest free.
No need to thank us, guys.
There is a school of thought surrounding marriage equality, espoused even by some on our side, that worries about a sweeping "Roe v. Wade" style legalization of same-sex unions across state lines and federal laws. Some of these concerned citizens urge the LGBT community to be patient while the knuckle-draggers come to grips with my shocking lifestyle choice to pledge eternal devotion, set up a home, and file taxes with another human in the same state in which they live.
I don't need their acceptance. I need my money.
Happy Tax Day!