I’m not impressed.
In fact, I’m a little pissed.
I thought the Trump tax cuts were supposed to help me. Turns out, they haven’t done a damn thing to impact my life.
Before we begin, let’s take a moment to review the new 2018 tax withholding tables that the IRS put out on February 1.
Today, if you’re married and being paid every two weeks, your employer is supposed to take out $0 plus 10% if you’re making over $444 but less than $1,177.
If you make $1,177 to $3,421 every two weeks, you’ll see $73.30 plus 12% taken out of your check.
How does that compare to 2017?
Last year, if you made $0 to $333 you’d see $0 and 0% taken out of your check. If you made $333 to $1,050 every two weeks, you’d have seen 10% taken out of your check. Get up to $3,252 and that’d be 15% taken out.
To me, it seems that lower-income people are actually paying more in taxes this year than they were last year.
Now, what about my own pay situation?
Personally, I’m not sure my employers are using the new tables yet…or if they are, it isn’t really benefiting me much at all.
Let me show you what I mean.
First, let me show you two paystubs from my job at the University of Montana, one from May 2017 and one from February 2018.
I had to get one from nearly a year ago because I wanted two paystubs with the same hours. I was lucky to find two that had exactly 10.5 hours on them.
There is a bit of a discrepancy, however. Last year I was paid $8.25 an hour for this job, while this year I’m being paid $8.75. For 10.5 hours of work, that’s an extra $5.25.
So what’s the difference in how much taxes I have to pay? After all, I haven’t changed my W-4 withholding amount since I got this job in 2016.
When I look at the paystubs I see that in 2017 I paid:
- $0 in federal withholding
- $0 in state withholding
- $0 in state unemployment tax
- $1.26 in Social Security Medicare
- $5.37 in Social Security OASDI
That comes to $6.63 in total taxes that I paid on those 10.5 hours of work. That means my gross pay for that period was $86.63 and my net pay was $80.
Now 2018. For my most recent paycheck I paid:
- $0 in federal withholding
- $0 in state withholding
- $0 in state unemployment tax
- $1.33 in Social Security Medicare
- $5.69 in Social Security OASDI
That comes to $7.02 in total taxes for those 10.5 hours of work, giving me a gross pay of $91.88 and a net pay of $84.86.
So I actually paid $0.39 more in taxes than I did last year for the same number of hours, though the pay hike might have impacted that.
Still, I made $4.86 more than I did last year for the same number of hours.
Well, shit – where’s my damn tax cut? Or is it just that UM hasn’t started using those new withholding tables yet?
Next, let’s move onto another job.
This is my downtown job working at a bar on Friday and Saturday nights.
This one’s a little tougher, as I can’t quite match up hours. I’ll try my best.
On Friday, I got a paycheck for 25.9 hours. Taxes for that were:
- $0 in federal withholding
- $3 in state withholding
- $0 in state unemployment tax
- $3.81 in Social Security Medicare
- $16.31 in Social Security OASDI
I have to go back to October to get a comparable paycheck, which was 23.3 hours. Also, I was paid $8.15 back then while today I get $8.30.
In October my taxes were:
- $0 in federal withholding
- $3 in state withholding
- $0 in state unemployment tax
- $3.34 in Social Security Medicare
- $14.29 in Social Security OASDI
Total taxes for October were $20.63 while for the latest check they were $23.12.
Again, like the UM job, I’m just not seeing a huge drop in taxes here.
In fact, I don’t see any impact at all. Employers were supposed to start using the new tax tables this month.
Despite that, I don’t see any changes. So…I don’t think the Trump tax cuts have benefited me at all.
Finally, I’d like to mention my tax return.
I haven’t received it yet, but the accountant got back to my wife and I, telling us what we can expect.
It ain’t that good.
This year we’ll get about $1,250 for a federal tax return, plus $96 back from the state.
The accountant will charge $250, so that gives us $1,000 for the federal return, and divided by two, that comes to $500 each for my wife and I.
I was hoping for a bit more, but we made more money than last year…about $5,000 more.
Yep, our household income for 2017 was just over $35,000…meaning we both took in about $18,000 or so.
The average household income in the US is over $73,000, while the median is $59,000.
Here in Montana the average household income is $49,5000 while the median household income is $50,000.
So the state is $23,500 below the average household income in America, and $9,000 below the median household income.
For my household, we’re a lot lower than that. We’re about $15,000 behind, in fact.
And what will I do with my tax return? Probably go to the dentist, the eye doctor, get some car repairs and that’s it – that money will be gone.
Yep, there’ll be none left to pay the $1,700 filing fee to take out Jon Tester in the primary. Sarah Dean and I were the only ones with the courage to file to challenge him. Neither of us has the money to follow through, however.
That’s why I sent in my closing report to the FEC on Friday. I’m done – just don’t have the money.
It’s sad. The GOP has tons of people running for the Senate, and though all will probably lose, they’ll be back in 2020 and 2022 and just like in 2016, many of them will probably win.
For the Dems, I don’t see many of these 2018 hopefuls coming back at all after Gianforte wins again. Few will probably run for statewide in 2020, and I doubt any will be back for another House run, either in 2020 or 2022. I’m not sure how many of them could even win a spot in the legislature.
But I’m not too concerned about all that, mostly because it has no affect on my life.
I mean…look at those taxes we talked about. The Trump tax cuts haven’t affected me too much. In fact, I can’t think of anything that’s changed in my life since the 2016 campaign started and ended.
Sure, my income has gone up some, but that’s because I got out there and started working more.
As I’ve said on this site many times before: don’t look to the government to be the savior in your life. To them, you’re just another number.
If you want true change, you need to go out and make it happen. That’s what your grandparents did, as well as the first people in your family that actually made it over to this country.
It’s up to you, and I think you know that.
And Finally, Finally…
Those kids might do it. We haven’t had serious changes to gun laws in years, but those high school kids in Florida might do it.
I’m not sure they’ll be able to maintain the momentum, however. And if a bigger story comes up, the drive-by media will forget about those kids.
We know the Florida legislature doesn’t give a damn about them.
So it’s an uphill battle.
Personally, I don’t care.
I don’t care if AR-15’s are legal or not. I can’t afford one – they cost over $1,000 on average.
The NRA cares, however. All 5 million of their members. Remember, we have 320 million people in the US. In fact, there are more illegal immigrants in this country than NRA members.
Mostly, it’s just fear.
Politicians are scared to death of offending the NRA. In fact, politicians are some of the weakest members of our society.
They yearn for acceptance and praise and will do anything to win. Principles and morals don’t exist for them, except as talking points.
And we put up with it. Always have, always will.
Really, we’re the weak ones, the spineless nobodies that never stop complaining, yet when the time comes for change, we never have the courage to bring it about.
The country’s problems rest squarely at our own feet.
Always have, always will.
