My partner and I just got married and we're thinking about the fiscal elements of this.
After putting me on his insurance, BF mentioned how he needed to update his W4s to account for me as a "dependent"--to which I scoffed, as I have a (modest) income and claim myself. He has since moderated his position to adding me as a tax exemption, but if he does that I have to knock my own exemptions down to 0, correct? (He also thinks if I claim an exemption, we can't file our taxes jointly--to do that, all our exemptions have to be on one W4...)
And ultimately, if we file jointly, it's a six one way, half dozen another proposition, right? I've included my basic understanding of why the scenarios are the same below.
What I'm proposing looks like this:
BF's Annual Income - $75,000
Tax Exemptions on W4 - 1
My Annual Income - $20,000
Tax Exemptions on W4 - 1
2015 Married Filing Jointly Taxes
Total Income - $95,000
Total Exemptions - 2
What he's proposing looks like this:
BF's Annual Income - $75,000
Tax Exemptions on W4 - 2
My Annual Income - $20,000
Tax Exemptions on W4 - 0
2015 Married Filing Jointly Taxes
Total Income - $95,000
Taxe Exemptions - 2
The income disparity may effect whether we have more take out of our monthly checks vs. how much we get back from the federal government at tax time, but it all evens out, right? Right?
I'm also keeping everything very basic, since we don't have complicated taxes.