Should I file taxes Married Filing Separately or Jointly this year?

I've been working on our tax return and was cruising along great until I added my husband's W-2 into the software. We suddenly went from expecting a decent refund to owing a few hundred dollars! I'm totally confused since we made around $135k combined last year, which I don't think hits any special tax bracket that would suddenly tax us more when our incomes were combined. I double-checked our W-4s and they look correct as far as I can tell. We live in Texas (no state income tax), and I'm scratching my head trying to figure out what's happening. Would we be better off just filing separately instead of jointly? Has anyone had this happen where adding your spouse's income completely tanked your refund? I'm wondering if there's something I'm missing or if separately might actually be the better option for us.

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18 comments

Amara Adebayo

•8M

This is actually pretty common and usually doesn't mean anything is wrong with your W-4s or tax setup. When you first started your return with just your income, the software was calculating your refund based on standard deduction and tax brackets for just one income. Then when you added your husband's W-2, it recalculated everything based on your combined income. The most likely explanation is that one or both of you might have slightly underwithholding throughout the year. This happens especially with two-income households because each employer withholds as if that job is your only income, not accounting for your spouse's income pushing you into a higher marginal bracket. As for filing separately vs. jointly - for most couples, filing jointly is actually more beneficial. Filing separately often results in losing several tax benefits including student loan interest deductions, child tax credits at higher income levels, and typically higher overall tax rates.

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Amara Adebayo

•8M

Yes, it can still happen even if you both select "married" on your W-4s. The default withholding for "married" assumes you're the only one working or the primary earner in the household. If both spouses work and earn similar incomes, you often need to select the "two jobs" checkbox or add additional withholding on your W-4s. For your 2023 taxes that you're filing now, unfortunately there's not much you can do to change your withholding for last year. But you can update your W-4s with your employers for 2024 to prevent this from happening again. The IRS has a tax withholding estimator on their website that's really helpful for couples with two incomes.

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Fatima Al-Mansour

•8M

I was in a similar situation a couple years ago and found that using taxr.ai really helped clear things up. I was confused why our combined return was so different than what I expected, and the tool analyzed all our documents and explained exactly what was causing the issue. In our case, it turned out both our employers were withholding at too low a rate. I just uploaded our W-2s to https://taxr.ai and it showed us line by line what was happening and helped us figure out how to adjust our withholding for the next year. It also confirmed that filing jointly was still better for us even though it felt like we were paying more.

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Fatima Al-Mansour

•8M

You upload your tax documents securely and it analyzes everything, pointing out exactly what's causing any unexpected results. It uses the same encryption banks use, so your information stays protected. The analysis shows things your tax software doesn't explain clearly. It absolutely compares filing jointly versus separately and shows you the exact dollar difference between the two options for your specific situation. It breaks down where you'd gain or lose tax advantages with each filing status. Way cheaper than paying an accountant $75 just for that calculation.

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Sofia Gomez

•8M

Just wanted to share an update - I tried taxr.ai after seeing the suggestion here and it was incredibly helpful! Uploaded our W-2s and it immediately showed that we were underwithholding by about $45 per paycheck each. It also ran the numbers both ways and confirmed that despite owing a bit now, filing jointly still saves us over $1,800 compared to filing separately. The breakdown of why this happens was super clear and they even generated a new W-4 form with the exact numbers we should put for 2024. Definitely worth checking out if you're in this situation!

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StormChaser

•8M

I've had this exact problem for years! After spending hours on hold with the IRS trying to understand our withholding issues, I finally found Claimyr which got me through to an actual IRS agent in about 15 minutes. They explained that with two similar incomes, the tax withholding tables often don't account for the combined income properly. The IRS agent walked me through exactly how to fix our W-4s. If you're struggling to get answers, I'd recommend trying https://claimyr.com - there's also a video showing how it works at https://youtu.be/_kiP6q8DX5c. Honestly was shocked how quickly it connected me instead of waiting on hold for hours.

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StormChaser

•8M

It uses a system that monitors IRS phone lines and calls repeatedly until it gets through, then it calls your phone and connects you. It's like having someone constantly redial for you until they get through, so you don't have to sit on hold for hours. I had the same skepticism initially, but the IRS has limited staff answering phones and millions of callers, creating hours-long wait times. This service just handles the tedious waiting part. You still talk directly with actual IRS agents - there's no intermediary once you're connected. There's no magic, just technology solving a frustrating problem.

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Ava Williams

•8M

I have to admit I was completely wrong about Claimyr. After posting that skeptical comment, I was still desperate to talk to the IRS about a similar withholding issue, so I tried it anyway. It actually worked exactly as described - I got connected to an IRS representative in about 20 minutes instead of the 3+ hours I spent on my previous attempt. The agent helped me understand exactly why my withholding was off and how to fix it. They confirmed that for most couples, filing jointly is still better financially despite sometimes resulting in owing taxes. For us it was a difference of almost $2,200 in favor of filing jointly! Definitely changed my perspective on dealing with the IRS.

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Miguel Castro

•8M

Just to add my two cents - in most cases, Married Filing Jointly is better than Separately. The rare exceptions are: 1) If one spouse has significant medical expenses, student loan interest, or certain other itemized deductions that have AGI thresholds 2) If one spouse has income-based student loan payments that would increase significantly 3) If one spouse has tax debts the other doesn't want to be responsible for 4) If you live in a community property state with complex income situations Unless you fall into one of these categories, MFJ is almost always better tax-wise.

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Miguel Castro

•8M

In a self-employed and W-2 earner situation, filing jointly is usually still more advantageous. The self-employed spouse can still take all their business deductions on Schedule C regardless of filing status. When filing jointly, you might actually benefit more from certain deductions like the Qualified Business Income deduction, which can be affected by your combined household income. One scenario where separate filing might help is if the self-employed spouse has potential audit concerns or inconsistent income reporting that could create tax issues. In that case, the W-2 earner might want to file separately to avoid joint liability. But strictly from a tax savings perspective, joint filing typically results in a lower total tax bill even with a Schedule C business involved.

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