Retirement & Taxes
Long-term financial planning, retirement accounts, government benefits, tax law, and IRS rules. Covers the intersection of policy and personal finance that affects how people save, invest, and plan ahead.
Latest in Retirement & Taxes
Microsoft offers 1st-ever U.S. retirement buyouts to thousands
For the first time in its 51-year history, Microsoft is offering voluntary retirement packages to thousands of U.S. employees, asking roughly 8,750 workers to decide...
An attorney went viral on TikTok for refusing to pay her $8,800 tax bill as a political protest — millions watched, and the IRS hasn’t responded
Rachel Cohen filed her 2025 federal tax return. She calculated what she owed. Then she decided not to pay it. The Chicago attorney posted a...
House Republicans want to cut IRS funding by $1 billion next year — right after the IRS processed a record $202 billion in refunds
The IRS just finished delivering more than $202 billion in tax refunds through March 20, capping what the agency called one of its smoothest filing...
Medigap premiums are jumping 12% to 26% this year — and unlike Part B, there’s no COLA to help absorb it
A retiree collecting the average Social Security benefit of roughly $1,976 per month got about $55 more in 2026 thanks to the 2.8% cost-of-living adjustment....
The new $6,000 senior tax deduction could eliminate federal taxes on Social Security for millions — but most retirees don’t know about it yet
A retired postal worker in Ohio earning $32,000 a year from Social Security used to owe roughly $800 in federal taxes on those benefits. This...
Average tax refund hits $3,400 this season — up 11% — but the real increase is $350, not the $1,000+ the White House projected
Millions of Americans were told to expect a tax refund roughly $1,000 fatter than last year’s. The checks have landed, and the actual increase is...
No, updating your W-4 isn’t free money — here’s how a withholding mistake today becomes a tax bill in April 2027
Imagine opening your paycheck in June 2026 and finding an extra $200. You didn’t get a raise. You just filed a new W-4 with your...
Medicare Part B premium hike swallows nearly half of Social Security’s 2.8% COLA — retirees net just $38/month more
The Social Security Administration announced a 2.8% cost-of-living adjustment for 2026 last October, promising the average retired worker roughly $50 more per month starting in...
The IRS enforcement workforce is about to shrink below 30,000 — fewer than in Trump’s first term — even as AI audits expand
The IRS processed roughly 163 million individual tax returns in fiscal year 2024. By the end of 2026, the number of enforcement employees responsible for...
No, your tax refund wasn’t supposed to be $1,000 bigger: here’s what actually happened with the OBBB tax breaks
Millions of gig and hourly workers filed their 2025 tax returns this spring expecting a windfall. Social media had promised refund bumps of $1,000 or...
The IRS spent $680 million tracking Americans’ foreign bank accounts — and barely penalized anyone
The IRS knows where Americans keep their offshore money. It has known for years. Since the Foreign Account Tax Compliance Act took effect in 2014,...
53 million Americans used Trump’s new tax breaks this season — here’s how much the average refund jumped
Maria Gonzalez, a hotel housekeeper in Las Vegas, had never itemized anything beyond the standard deduction. This April, her tax preparer told her she qualified...
The IRS just launched a new whistleblower alert — and you could earn up to 30% of what tax fraudsters owe
The IRS wants you to snitch on tax cheats, and it is putting real money on the table. The agency’s Whistleblower Office has launched a...
The post-Tax Day W-4 checklist: 5 things to update before your next paycheck
You just filed your 2025 tax return. If the result was a four-figure bill you didn’t see coming, or a refund so large it felt...
Senate Finance probes $370M tax break Trump IRS gave Cheniere Energy for classifying LNG tankers as “motorboats”
A liquefied natural gas (LNG) tanker stretches roughly 1,000 feet from bow to stern. For context, under federal shipping regulations, a motorboat stretches about 65...
2027 Social Security COLA projections are split — will the “Trump Bump” from war inflation boost your check?
If you collect Social Security, the difference between a quiet year for inflation and a turbulent one could mean an extra $30 or an extra...
IRS launches anonymous Tax Debt Help tool, no Social Security number required
The IRS wants you to explore your tax debt options before you hand over a single piece of personal information. A web-based feature called Tax...
Average tax refund hits $3,462, up 11% — the biggest jump in years
Tens of millions of Americans are finding noticeably fatter deposits in their bank accounts this spring. Through the week ending March 20, 2026, the average...
IRS now runs 129 AI use cases — up from 10 in 2022 — as workforce shrinks 27%
If your tax refund hits a snag this spring, good luck reaching a person at the IRS. The agency that opened the 2025 filing season...
2027 COLA projected at 2.8% again: senior group warns it’s not enough
A retiree collecting the average Social Security benefit of roughly $1,976 a month saw about $55 added from the 2026 cost-of-living adjustment (COLA). If the...