Tax Planner - taxable Social Security [edited]

Lenn

Tax Planner does not automatically add an adjustment for taxable Social Security. So why is the line item still labeled "Taxable Social Security"?

markus1957

To clarify and reinforce that the amount displayed in that field will be treated as taxable income. Because as you mention, Quicken does not make that determination automatically, so the user must manually split a Social Security income received transaction into taxable and non-taxable income categories.

Chris_QPW

https://community.quicken.com/discussion/comment/20449673#Comment_20449673

Or add an adjustment to that field, for the part that isn't taxable.

Boatnmaniac

What I do is use one of the several free online taxable SS income calculators. Then I enter the result from the calculator into the User Entered field in Tax Planner so it overrides the SS transactions history and projections in Tax Planner. It's easy, simple and can be easily done at the beginning of the year.

The online calculator I use most frequently is CalcXML (https://www.calcxml.com/calculators/how-much-of-my-social-security-benefit-may-be-taxed) because it is so easy to use.

First, make a list of the projected annual taxable incomes from jobs, SS, interest, dividends, cap gains, etc. (Some of these, like interest, dividends and cap gains will be difficult to project so I usually use the prior years' actuals. Then during the year if there is something that happens that significantly impacts the estimates used, run the calculator, again, with the new income numbers and update Tax Planner.)

Once that income info pulled together it takes just a couple of minutes to enter it into this calculator and get a taxable SS income estimate which can be used in Tax Planner.

Personally, I think something like one of these online calculators is what could and should be built into Quicken so it automatically calculates the amount of SS income that is taxable based upon all of the inputs and changes to those inputs that are made into Tax Planner. Hopefully, that will happen sometime before too much longer.

Lenn

Thanks to those who responded to my concern about the way Quicken handles taxable Social Security. My work around is to enter a negative adjustment to compensate for the untaxed portion. Appreciate everyone's interest. I love messing around in Quicken!!

James Courtney

Earlier this year the Tax Planner (Scenarios 1, 2, and 3) was changed to automatically calculate the portion of Social Security income that is not taxed (usually 15% for most people), instead of asking the user for the taxable portion of Social Security income. Now the Tax Planner has reverted to requiring the user to calculate the taxable portion. Printing the Tax Planner shows "Total Social Security Income" instead of "Taxable Social Security Income". This is very annoying.

Chris_QPW

@James Courtney whereas it would be nice if the Tax Planner had a way for the user to input the amount of Social Security Income that was taxed and calculate the amount automatically, it was the "right thing to do" to revert not to assume 15%. First off, I sort of disagree that this is "most people", but more to the point, the Tax Planner shouldn't "assume" things.

Boatnmaniac

@James Courtney - According to the IRS, in 2022 it was 42% of SS recipients that paid fed income tax on their SS income. That means that 58% (the majority) pay no fed income tax on their SS income. Of the 42% that do pay income tax on their SS income, they pay a graduated tax rate on it based upon their modified AGI. The majority of those 42% pay fed income tax on less than 50% of their SS income. The majority do not pay fed income tax on 85% of their SS income. So, it was a mistake for Quicken to have released earlier this year that change assuming all Quicken users pay tax on 85% of their SS benefits. And it was very appropriate of them to pull back that change shortly after releasing it.

Regarding your other point: Yes, I agree that the print out of Tax Planner should be showing "Taxable Social Security Income" and not "Total Social Security Income". This should be corrected. I suggest you report this to Quicken via Help > Report a Problem. I will be doing the same.