Herb and Alice are married and file a joint return. Herb is 74 years old and Alice is 70. Neither are blind. Both Herb and Alice are retired. Herb works part time as a greeter. Herb earned $15,000 in wages. They also received Social Security benefits of $44,000. They received no other income in 2022. Both Herb and Alice are U.S. citizens, lived in the United States all year, and have valid Social Security numbers. They do not have any qualifying children, and no one else lives with them. 

2. How much of Herb and Alice’s Social Security is taxable?

Answer rating: 100% (QA)

To determine how much of Herb and Alices Social Security benefits are taxable we need to compute their provisional income first Provisional income is the sum of adjusted gross income AGI taxexempt interest income and onehalf of Social Security benefits In this case Herb and Alice have an AGI of 15000 and they have no taxexempt interest income To compute their taxable Social Security benefits we need to compute onehalf of their Social Security benefits first Onehalf of their Social Security benefits is 22000 44000 2 Their provisional income is therefore Provisional income AGI taxexempt interest income 12 of Social Security benefits Provisional income 15000 0 22000 Provisional income 37000 Next we need to compare their provisional income to the base amount for their filing status For married couples filing jointly the base amount is 32000 If their provisional income exceeds the base amount a portion of their Social Security benefits will be taxable In this case their provisional income is greater than the base amount so a portion of their Social Security benefits will be taxable To compute the ... View the full answer