Husband and I got married in April last year. Things were WEIRD income-wise, so I can't trust 2014's tax owed to be the same as what 2015 will be.
*MY* job is the same, income roughly the same (can vary a small bit due to overtime, etc).
We got married in April, and I changed my W4 to "married", and claimed all zeros on federal and state.
My husband forgot to change his W4 to "married," got let go in August, got ~$1300 in unemployment, got a new job in November that pays less per hour. He also paid out-of-pocket for health insurance through the Marketplace in 2014, whereas this year his new employer pays most of his premium. He also becomes eligible for a 401k for the first time in his life this month (or next month?) and plans to contribute some - I'm not sure if he's decided what %, thus lowering his taxable income even further.
He also pays student loan interest. It was ~$700 this year.
His income is fairly variable, meaning he might get as many as 10 hours of overtime a week, or not.
This year, we ended up getting a refund of almost $2k from federal, and almost $200 from state.
Is there a way we can figure out reasonably well how to best optimize our withholdings, or are we best off letting it ride out one full year, so we have a better grasp on what his actual taxable income will be at this new job?
