The Foreign Earned Income Exclusion (FEIE), Housing Exclusion (HE) and Housing Deduction (HD) And TIPRA (Tax Increase Prevention and Reconciliation Act of 2005

    NEW YORK, NY, May 30, 2020 /24-7PressRelease/ — Founder at Protax Consulting Services, Marc J Strohl CPA, has just revealed essential information that U.S. expatriates need to consider when seeking a U.S. international assignment specialist. For more information please visit Protax Consulting Services, Inc.[1] (“Protax”).

TIPRA Changes:

FEIE:

Effective January 1, 2006 as amended by IRC Sec. 515 of the Tax Increase Prevention and Reconciliation Act of 2005 (TIPRA)- until December 31, 2005 the first $107,600 for 2020 ($105,900 for 2019, $103,900 for 2018, $102,100 for 2017, $101,300 for 2016, $100,800 for 2015, $99,200 for 2014, $97,600 for 2013, $95,100 for 2012, $92,900 for 2011 and $91,500 for 2010) of income earned overseas was excluded from U.S. taxation, with the next dollar earned overseas treated as though it were the first dollar of income and taxed at the very lowest tax bracket. This new law provides for “stacking”. “Stacking” results in the next dollar of income taxed at a much higher marginal rate of tax, as though it was the $107,601st dollar of income earned. Therefore this “stacking” feature assumes that the excluded foreign earned income is actually present for tax calculation purposes, effectively using the tax bracket in which it would have been taxed had the excluded foreign earned income actually been present for tax calculation purposes. This results in the taxpayer being pushed into an initially higher starting tax bracket at higher tax rates.

The implementation of the “stacking” mechanism results in three obvious factors, in addition to an additional tax grab: 1) The usefulness or effectiveness of the FTC and 2) the potential for the FTC carryover are both diminished, in addition 3) in the case of high tax foreign countries, it may be preferable to use the FTC alone. Protax continually optimizes and tests for these factors. Keeping in mind the deemed revocation implications, weighing the alternatives both quantitively and qualitatively.

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