Free From Broke

A Personal Finance Blog for Regular Folks

Glen Craig

Marginal Tax Rate VS Effective Tax Rate – Why You Need to Know the Difference

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Pop Quiz – What’s your effective tax rate for 2014? How about your marginal tax rate?

Don’t worry if you’re not sure.

Truth is most of us have no idea what either our marginal or effective income tax rates are.

They only seem to matter at income tax filing time, usually appearing as supplemental numbers in a computer generated income tax return.

One of the reasons we tend not to track these numbers is because they’re calculations, which for the most part, have no immediate relevance to us, but also because of complications in calculating them.

Because we have a progressive income tax system — tax rates rise with income — and because there are multiple taxes, the actual numbers can be difficult to calculate. In addition, each rate can change from one year to the next or from complications in the tax code.

We have two tax rate classifications then, marginal tax rate and effective tax rate.

Keep reading and you’ll learn the difference between the two as well as why it’s important to know the difference between them.

What is the marginal tax rate and the effective tax rate and how and when do they apply?

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6 Alternative Investments Besides Stocks and Bonds to Help You Achieve Financial Freedom

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What do you think of when you think of investing?

If you’re like me the thing that comes to mind are stocks. It’s the standard isn’t it? When you watch the news you hear about the Dow and the S&P 500. These are the stock indexes, or the ‘market’ you hear about.

As you know it’s easier than ever to invest in stocks.

It used to be an investment for the wealthy but today you have low-cost online brokerages where you can buy stocks with virtually no minimums. You can even buy fractional shares (yes, you can buy a part of one share of stock.)

But stocks aren’t the only investments out there. You have an ever-growing choice when it comes to investing your money.

Investing is the most democratic it’s ever been. The ultra-wealthy will always have options that ‘every man’ can’t afford to get into but there are services out there that are helping bring the masses to investments that were once reserved for the wealthy.

These days you can be your own bank, be an angel investor, and even put money into a hedge fund.

Your road to financial freedom is bridged with a number of alternate investments.

Read on as I go into six better known alternate investments…

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H&R Block At Home™ Online Tax Prep Software – Review

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H&R Block Online Tax Prep Review

With more then 55 years in business, H&R Block is one of the most recognized tax preparation companies. Their do-it-yourself tax preparation with their online software, is one of the easiest ways to get your taxes done fast and accurately.

H&R Block online has a variety of support features and guarantees, making doing your taxes yourself worry free and simple.

Features of H&R Block Online Tax Prep Software:

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Shoeboxed Review – Organize Your Receipts for Tax Time and More

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Whether you’re looking to do some cleaning, looking to go green or paperless, or just want to get a little more organized, Shoeboxed.com can help you.

Imagine this…

You’re getting ready to finally do your taxes. Besides all the tax forms you need you also have to put together your receipts. But where are they?

If you’re like most people they are piled up someplace, like a shoebox, waiting to be organized. Or they are spread out all over the place and you hope you can find each and every receipt.

Not fun.

Shoeboxed offers a service where you can send in your papers/receipts that you want a digital copy of, they’ll extract the data for you, and it’s all available in your own account.

They also allow you to scan in receipts yourself so you have one place to keep everything.

Read on in our review and you’ll see what Shoeboxed is all about and how it can help keep you organized for tax time and more!

And make sure you look for the special offer I worked out with Shoeboxed for Free From Broke readers!!

How Shoeboxed Works

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Where Can I Get IRS Tax Forms (or Where Can I File Free)?

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Remember when you used to get a package of small booklets in the mail at the beginning of the year?  

They had those real thin pages, like newspaper and there would be official computer forms included.

Well those packets, your IRS 1040 tax forms for the previous year, haven’t been mailed out since 2011.

According to the IRS, fewer and fewer taxpayers have been receiving tax packages in the mail in recent years. In fact, in 2010 only 8 percent of individuals who files taxes received tax forms in the mail.

Wow, have times changed!
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