We're not officially homeschooling just yet, so I'm not frothingly mad just yet, but doing next year's taxes might put me over the edge. Because I happened to notice in the un-fine print of our adoptive state's tax instructions that the "Tuition and Textbook Credit" cannot be taken for "textbooks or other items for home schooling, tutoring, or schooling outside an accredited school."
But the credit can be taken, if the dependents in question are attending an "accredited school," for "...extracurricular activities: sporting events, speech activities, music or dramatic events, driver's education (if paid to a school), awards banquets, homecoming, prom (clothing does not qualify), and other school related social events, etc."
For a tax-related governmental publication, this seems unusually clear: Homer and Shakespeare, if taught at home, do not qualify for an educational tax credit, whereas prom does. Prom. Freakin' prom.
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8 comments:
That bites. We're starting homeschooling next year too. I'll have to tell Spouse to look at Misery's--I mean, Missouri's laws.
Wow. Just wow.
There are no tax credits of that sort in Indiana, so we don't have to worry about it.
ROAR.
Take comfort: you'll still be coming out even with Leviathan State since they are giving folks a credit for paying money to State Schools for State books. You'll be buying your books on the free market for much cheaper, plus if you buy them online across state lines, you won't be paying them sales tax either (at least until congress destroys the internet). So actually, I think you are still going to be money ahead of the Government School folks.
+HRC
LOL. Stick it to them: use the government library for all your textbook needs.
Aren't fashionably overpriced garments the only real prom expense out there? Sounds like a bait and switch, to me. ;)
My favorite homeschooling question: "Aren't you worried about their social life?"
My favorite answer: "Yes. Which is why we homeschool."
Clever, Gauntlets. I shall use that reponse myself in the future. We are quite pleased with the Lutheran school here, but $4,000 hurts. No break for pastors. No break for anyone, unless you're a member of that congregation.
I believe your firstborn and I share a birthday this Friday.
Yes, well, good thing I'm not counting on the government for any help whatsoever in the education of my children, right? :P.
Gauntlets: Do they blink hard when you say that? I'm going to start rehearsing. :)
Perhaps a lesson is to be learned from a school that does not allow students to accept ANY government money.
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