Ethical Dilemma

I don't normally do my own taxes. To me paying a nominal fee to H&R block to do it for me and then another small fee to "handle everything in case i get audited" is worth the small amount to have it done.

Here's my problem: I am a Catholic Youth Minister at my church. I give into the collection basket every mass and i also participate in the service appeals. I also participate in Lenten practices.
For those not familiar with the proceedure in Lent: Catholic people meditate over the suffering of Christ through a three part process. 1) Prayer and meditation (nuff said). 2) Fasting - ie giving up certain things as a sacrfice for the 40 days. The "no meat fridays" is one common practice. Some people give up more/less but the concept is that everytime you feel the pangs of hunger or "wanting" of whatever you gave up, you think of Christ and his sacrifice furthering your meditation. 3) Charitable Contribution (money to the poor, etc).

So here's the deal: I am notoriously apathetic to responsibility. I get these things in the mail every year from people i contributed to, or the church, or whomever. This year the slips said in bold letters "PRESENT TO YOUR TAX PREPERATION SPECIALIST" or some malarky. Since it was fresh on my mind, I grabbed it and brought it. Now, a week or two later i get a call from H&R stating that i need to fill out some additional paperwork. They neglected the charitable contributions (while i was oblivious to what it was even for) and now they need me to come sign some paperwork. Apparently, i get additional deductions for the donations i make.

Isn't it kind of dishonest to donate knowing I'm getting a portion back? Should i feel guilty for getting a portion back next year? Call me crazy but I was kind of awestruck that i was getting almost 50% of my contribution back. Granted it's screwing Uncle Sam who's been pounding me for years, but won't he just take it from another Joe Taxpayer somewhere down the line?

If I were to donate money, I wouldn't accept anything back aside from the fuzzy feelings I get.

hahahahahahaha

ethics

on a semi-serious note

charitable contributions are one of the best known and most socially acceptable tax deductions out there

i'd say accepting your tax deduction is perfectly ethical

though i can't imagine losing sleep either way

if you really really want to get into the lenten spirit i suppose you could always redonate the money you get back so your church gets extra money, you feel better and everyone wins

It's the way the system is setup to work. You are in no way abusing or taking advantage of anyone by claiming your donations.

If you are having a hard time with it ethically you can either donate again back to your church or I will gladly PM you my bank account number.

when you get taxed they take X amount of dollars from ya.
a tax deduction is when they deduct how much they take from ya because you did something to incite a deduction.
If you really find it to be a moral dilemna just take the money you get extra from the deductions and donate that OP.

Get money back -> use money for another good thing.

You've made it clear that you aren't donating the money because of the deductions. So if you were to ask yourself if you would still participate in the same way, you can honestly say yes.

Donating to charity isn't really a way to make or save money, either. With a lot of work, research, paying someone to figure it out, and luck, it might be financially better to donate X dollars if you are close to a different tax bracket. Might.

What the taxes deductions based on the donations are are nothing more than pretending that you never had that money - so you "save" whatever tax you would have payed had you not donated. It's not that you get all that back. It's really just the government's way of letting citizens feel like they have a say in public works, and, it means they don't have to do the work to get the money from point A to point B.

If you still feel bad, or unsure, here's something you can do: Ask H&R Block to run your taxes really quick without the charitable contributions. (They will likely do it for free since they're just taking out some info and pressing enter.) If you get a refund, take your actual refund and subtract the refund you would have received had you not donated any money. Make a special donation in that amount. I think this would ease your mind, and would get more money to your charity(ies) of choice.

Good luck!

Edit:


Yeah, this - the not all wordy and stupid sounding version of what I was trying to say!! :D

easy solution... dont say you donated anything

Terminus and Sev both made really good points. You shouldn't feel bad, you made those donations because you genuinely wanted to.

Whatever you decide to do with the additional deduction money is up to you, but I'd say it's just good karma coming back to you.

>.>

I'm not a religious man...I just believe in good and bad actions coming back to you in one way or another lol. >.>

Since you're the one who ultimately has to 'live with' the decision, then you alone should make it..

However, "Granted it's screwing Uncle Sam who's been pounding me for years, but won't he just take it from another Joe Taxpayer somewhere down the line?" shouldn't really factor into it, whether you take the deduction or not, that same person who could potentially get screwed over by you taking this deduction, is going to get screwed over whether or not you take the deduction.

If you want that money to serve for good purposes i really don't think you should leave it in the hands of the U.S. government. Like others said, get it back and donate it again.

Tax deductions don't mean they are giving you free money, it means that they are reducing your tax burden ie you are not taxed for the money you earned that you donated. Correct me if I'm wrong, I've never bothered to fill these things out as my donations to charity are generally small amounts anyway.

Shouldn't feel bad about it since the only people loosing money on the whole thing is the government and if you leave it in their hands they will just blow it on HELP I AM TRAPPED IN 2006 PLEASE SEND A TIME MACHINE ***.

If somehow you are getting money back from this, which I doubt but I suppose is possible, then just give that money to charity too, then you get to give twice.

Get the money back and donate it to me ^^

You can't spend gratitude. Just sayin.

Okay there is no way you're getting almost half back... the most you could be getting back is 38% and given your occupation I doubt very highly that you're in a tax bracket where you have a 38% marginal tax rate. Moreover, it's quite likely that the whole point is moot because there is a good chance that your itemized deductions do not exceed your standard deduction amount and even if they do the entirety of the charitable contribution may not be a factor but rather only the amount that puts your itemized deductions over your standard. (I do taxes in case you can't tell)

That aside. Should giving be about hurting you or helping somebody else? Ideally you would be able to provide those you want to help everything and sacrifice nothing. They're no worse off for your having taken a tax deduction.

Lastly the idea that you are "getting" anything from a tax refund is (in most cases) utter nonsense. The government assumed none of the risk nor shouldered any of the burden in any of your endeavors and yet forcibly took a portion of the proceeds for itself all the same. Now the government is going to give some of that back? How gracious and heartwarming...

oh and one more thing to a couple of the posters here. The idea that you can be (financially) better off by donating and thus moving into a different tax bracket is 100% wrong. I'm not sure why that misconception is so prevalent but that isn't how the tax code works. Now you know, and knowing is half the battle!

Not exclusively of course. But the can be (And are) used to swing things in favor of large businesses a lot, nothing an individual would have to think about though.

My 2 cents is from a logical point of view. Charitable donations are tax deductible, otherwise rich people, big business, etc. would probably not donate nearly as much as they do. They know it makes them look good and at the end of the year they claim it on their taxes.

It's usually not a 100% return on what you donate, so you are still donating in sense.

I'm surprised you did not know this, I thought this was common knowledge. That is why business donate to causes.

I couldnt even pass the first line without going "wtf is this guy on?!"

Ethics + Politics = "Are you STOOPID?!"

FYI: This also applies to not only money, but things like cars, computers, furniture, etc.

I don't know how I could be any clearer here... net of tax breaks donating ALWAYS leaves you worse off financially in America's progressive tax structure. If YOU happen to be a CPA and you want to advance an argument for why this is not the case go ahead and link me to the federal tax code and I'll take a look at it.
If you're interested the reason this doesn't work is that even if you manage to lower your marginal tax rate by donations your effective/average tax rate is NEVER equal to the marginal rate to begin with and thus all the dollars from lower brackets are taxed the same as they ever were and thus the money you get back in the form of lower taxes is only the marginal tax rate on the dollar.

and on top of that the Government got a interest free loan.



I always wonder were people get the idea that when they get a tax refund that the Government is giving them money when all they did was overpay the IRS.

i've over paid the IRS since i've been employed.

i am curious about the side story of the italicized text.

volunteer position. My job is different XD

Thanks for all the feedback guys. I think I'll just put it right back in like several people noted.
Cuz this isn't a religion thread as well.

Thank you all also for the mostly positive feedback. It's nice to be able to see this discussion without de-railing.

Broke people do make more money from taxes than they pay in... But they are getting it from people who ARE over paying.

Taxes are theft and the proceeds are largely pissed away in corruption or used to murder and/or enslave brown people. (For "freedom", of course.) Paying as little in taxes as possible helps to make the world a better place.

A little "current events" example: The recent news reporting out of Egypt seems to ignore that the US gov't has been providing billions of dollars to screw over regular Egyptians for decades.