Welcome to English as a Second Language podcast number 364, Filing Taxes.
This is ESL podcast episode 364.
I'm your host, Dr Jeff McQuillan wwweslpodcom.
The learning guides are designed to help you improve your English even faster.
They include all of the vocabulary definitions, new sample sentences so you can test your comprehension by reading them.
We also have comprehension questions, additional explanations of words that we talk about here on the podcast.
You'll find cultural notes and a complete transcript of everything we say.
This episode is called Filing Taxes.
To file here means to send in your information to the government and to pay the taxes that you must pay your state and national government here in the US anyway.
Let's get started.
Are you done with your taxes yet?
No, not yet.
Can I help?
That would be great.
I think I'm almost done, but it'd be great if you could look it over.
This is the first year I haven't been exempt or filed an EZ tax return.
What are brothers for?
Okay.
You've entered your earnings, including your salary and dividends.
You have no dependents.
I just hope I pick the right number of withholdings.
I'd like to get a tax refund rather than have to pay.
Well, you can take the standard deduction here.
But I suggest itemizing your medical expenses and your charitable contributions.
It may make a big difference in the calculations.
Thanks.
I'll crunch the numbers to find out.
So, what do I owe you for all of this help?
That depends on the size of your refund check.
Our dialogue between Ricky and Sean begins by Ricky saying, aren't you done with your taxes yet?
Aren't you finished with your taxes yet?
Taxes payments, money that you have to give the government for some reason.
Here in the United States, we have different kinds of taxes.
We have an income tax.
Income is the money you get for your job or other investments.
Income taxes are, in the US, paid by everyone who makes a certain amount of money.
And the more money you make, the more taxes you're supposed to pay, although it does not always happen that way.
Everyone who lives in the US or is a US citizen and makes a certain amount of money must file their taxes every year to the federal government and most state governments.
Ricky is asking if Sean is done or finished with preparing her taxes.
We sometimes say to prepare your tax return.
The return is the actual form that you fill out your information on to send to the government.
Sean says, no, not yet.
Ricky says, can I help?
Sean says, that would be great.
I think I'm almost done.
But it'd be great if you could look it over.
To look over something is a phrasal verb meaning to review something, to read something and check to make sure it is correct and accurate.
Sean says this is the first year...
I haven't been exempt or filed an easy tax return.
To be exempt from something means that you are not required to do something.
In this case, not required to pay something.
If you make very little money in the U.S., you are usually exempt from paying taxes.
You don't have to pay taxes.
Sean says that in the past, she's filed an EZ tax return.
An EZ, which is spelled the capital letter E and the capital letter Z, obviously standing for the word EASY is a tax return that the US government started a few years ago to make it easier for people who don't make a lot of money to fill out their tax return.
In the United States.
Your tax returns must be filed or sent to the government by April 15th every year.
Ricky offers to help Sean.
He says, what are brothers for?
This is an expression we use to mean that's what I'm here for.
That is what being a brother in this case means.
You could say, what are sisters for?
You're saying, I'm happy to help.
That's why I'm here.
Ricky says, okay, you've entered your earnings here. including your salary and dividends.
Your earnings refers to all of the money that you receive from any source from your job, from investments in the stock market.
Anything that you get is considered your earnings.
Your salary refers S-A-L-A-R-Y is the amount of money you get for working for a company or organization.
Dividends refers to the money you get from your investments.
Sometimes companies who have stock will pay dividends once a year.
They will give you money because you are invested in their company.
Ricky says to Sean, you have no dependents.
A dependent is a person, usually a child, who depends on or relies on another person for their financial support.
Someone gives them food, housing, clothing, and so forth.
In the US tax system, if you are a parent who has children, you don't have to pay as many taxes.
If you have a lot of children, you pay even less.
These are called dependents.
Sometimes dependents could be your older children, father or mother or grandparents, who you have to give money to to support if they rely on you, if they depend on you, then they're considered dependents also and you pay lower taxes because of that.
The word dependent has a couple of different meanings in English, as does the phrasal verb we talked about earlier.
To look something over,
Take a look at the learning guide for some additional explanations of these expressions.
Sean says Withholdings is money that you do not receive in your paycheck as part of your salary, but goes directly to pay your taxes.
For example, if you get paid every two weeks, you will receive some money, but the government will have the company withhold money from you.
To withhold means not to give something to someone directly. that otherwise belongs to them.
So if you make $1,000 every two weeks, you may have to pay $100 or $115 to the government in taxes.
That's because the government is not going to wait until the end of the year or April 15th for you to pay all of your taxes.
You have to pay some of them every time you receive a paycheck.
And that money is called withholdings.
Sean says, I'd like to get a tax refund rather than have to pay.
A tax refund is money the government gives back to you if you withheld too much money.
So you may have told the government to take too much money from your paycheck every week.
Then the government gives you money back.
This is always, of course, a good thing.
A refund when someone returns money to you.
If you didn't withhold enough money, then you have to pay the government the rest of the taxes on April 15th.
Ricky says well, you can take the standard deduction here, but I suggest itemizing your medical expenses and your charitable contributions.
A deduction is something that you take out of something, something you subtract from something else.
To deduct 2 from 10 would give you 8.
The standard deduction is what the government says.
Everyone can take out of their income when they are calculating their taxes.
The reason they do this is because basically they're lowering the taxes on everyone's income.
The government also says that there are certain kinds of expenses that you can deduct from your income, so you don't have to pay taxes on them.
Many people however, don't keep track of or don't write down or keep a record of all of the expenses they make every year.
So they can just take the standard deduction.
The government says okay, it's this much money that you can take out of your income so that you will have lower taxes.
The opposite is to itemize your expenses.
To itemize means to make a detailed list of something.
The expenses of what you have paid in the past year that the government says you can deduct from your income.
For example, if you spend a lot of money on medical care, on going to a doctor.
These medical expenses can be itemized and sometimes deducted from your income.
If you give a lot of money to a charitable organization, a not-for-profit organization, such as a hospital, a school, perhaps a church, These contributions or gifts are also deductible.
They can be part of your itemized deductions.
So charitable contributions or gifts are itemized and therefore deductible.
Ricky says it may make a big difference in the calculations.
Calculations are the numbers that you add subtract, multiply or divide in order to solve a math problem.
Sean says, thanks, I'll crunch the numbers to find out.
To crunch...
The numbers is an informal expression meaning to make or do the calculations, to add subtract, multiply and divide what you need to to find the answer.
It is often used when talking about business or finance or taxes.
We talk about crunching the numbers for our business to find out if we are going to make money this year.
It's just another way of saying to figure out.
Sean asks Ricky what she owes him for all of this help.
What does she have to pay him?
Ricky jokes, that depends on the size of your refund check.
The refund check is the money that the government gives back to you if you've withheld too much money for your taxes.
Ricky is saying, if the government gives you a lot of money back, then you will have to pay me more.
Now let's listen to the dialogue, this time at a normal speed.
Aren't you done with your taxes yet?
No, not yet.
Can I help?
That would be great.
I think I'm almost done, but it'd be great if you could look it over.
This is the first year I haven't been exempt or filed an EZ tax return.
No problem.
What are brothers for?
Okay.
You've entered your earnings, including your salary and dividends.
You have no dependents.
I just hope I pick the right number of withholdings.
I'd like to get a tax refund rather than have to pay.
Well, you can take the standard deduction here, but I suggest itemizing your medical expenses and your charitable contributions.
It may make a big difference in the calculations.
Thanks.
I'll crunch the numbers to find out.
So what do I owe you for all of this help?
That depends on the size of your refund check.
The script for this episode was written by the very charitable Dr. Lucy Say.
Thank you, Lucy.
From Los Angeles, California, I'm Jeff McQuillan.
Thank you for listening.
Come back and listen to us next time on ESL Podcast.
English as a Second Language Podcast is written and produced by Dr Lucy Say, hosted by Dr Jeff McQuillan.
This podcast is copyright 2008.
