OT. Charity Ratings

[gfretwell]

The government encourages the standard deduction. They don't want to have to look at a bunch of little expenses any more than you do and limiting SALT goes a long way towards that aim. I haven't itemized for the last 30 years. That was even true when I had my business. You can file a schedule C (business expenses) and still take the standard deduction. They do look at your schedule C closer and I did get audited one year (mini audit). I ended up getting more back. The IRS guy was great. I hadn't taken a home office deduction and he gave me a handout that explained exactly how to do it. He also asked me about other deductions I hadn't claimed. My resubmit sailed through and I got another check for some hundreds of dollars.

[Retirednoguilt]

The only time I ever heard from the IRS was after filing an amended return because the DoD finance department had failed to credit my account with the inflation adjusted increase in my VA benefit and didn't issue a corrected tax statement in time for me to file prior to April

15th. After receiving the corrected statement, I filed an amended return to get a refund for the excess VA benefit income they didn't credit me with on the incorrect original tax statement. The IRS later contacted me, telling me that I had miscalculated the amount of refund I was entitled to. They said I was entitled to more and refunded a larger amount that I had claimed on my amended return.