Am I supposed to be doing something about taxes on my babysitting money?

Question

I've been babysitting quite a bit. Sometimes if I'm on an off month I'll just make like $150 or so in the month, but I usually get about $300 a month on babysitting and two piano lessons that I teach per week. Oh, and also, do you have to pay taxes on gift money. I got about $1000 graduation money for high school graduation in May and I just wanted to make sure I'm not cheating the government out of anything.

Answer 1

Francis is incorrect. You may have to file a tax return. It depends upon your age, income and filing status. Check page 6 of the Form 1040 instructions at:

http://www.irs.gov/pub/irs-pdf/i1040.pdf

This explains it very clearly.

Answer 2

Keep accurate records of what you make, and any associated expenses. You are required to file a tax return showing the babysitting money and the money from the piano lessons. You don't report the gifts you got for graduation though.

You aren't likely to owe any income tax on the amount you make, but will owe self-employment tax (for social security and medicare) - that will be about 15% of your income.

To file you'll use a form 1040, a schedule C-EZ and a schedule SE.

Answer 3

At $300 a month, you aren't going to owe any taxes. I don't know if you would be required to file a return or not, but I wouldn't bother.

The graduation gift is not taxable or reportable.

Answer 4

students dont pay taxes...dont even have to file anything, so dont worry....Its not worth it to file anyways because you wont recieve anything from social security anyways..They take money out, but you wont get anything back unless you make $4000 dollars or more....