fb wrote:

- quote -

Well, I think you may want to contact your benefits dept to explain the
annuity pay out. From http://www.rrb.gov/opa/qa/pub_0701.asp it appears
that some is treated just like Social Security, and some as a private
pension. As a couple, you will have $6,800 in 2 exemptions and a
Standard deduction of $10,700, so $17,500 that is not taxed. Depending
on how the annuity is split, there may be little to no tax there. Say
it's 50/50. If $21K is taxable, and offset by that $17k, that's $4,000
taxed at 10%, or $400. The dividend and interest is taxed at 5% then.
Your total tax bill will be about $2000. See
http://www.fairmark.com/refrence/2007reference.htm for the tax rates,
and link above for my source on your annuity.
You have any IRA money? At 10%, you may want to convert to a Roth a bit
at a time to stay in the 10% bracket.

JOE

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Looking ahead to retiring from a railroad employer, wife and I will
have a railroad retirement annuity of about $41000/year and dividend &
interest of about $30,000/year. Would appreciate a ball park estimate
of what our federal tax burden is liable to be. We don't itemize,
generally take the standard deduction.

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<< ------------------------------------------------------- > << The foregoing was not intended or written to be used, > << nor can it used, for the purpose of avoiding penalties > << that may be imposed upon the taxpayer. > << > << The Charter and the Guidelines for submitting posts > << to this newsgroup as well as our anti-spamming policy > << are at www.asktax.org. > << Copyright (2007) - All rights reserved. > << ------------------------------------------------------- >