(The Epoch Times)—The U.S. Internal Revenue Service (IRS) is recommending taxpayers prepare for the 2025 tax filing season by taking certain key steps to make filing easier and help safeguard their tax information.
“There are a number of things taxpayers can do to get ready as the end of 2024 nears and the start of the 2025 tax season approaches,” said a Dec. 19 statement from the agency. The latest reminder is part of the “Get Ready” series in which the IRS publishes key updates as the start of the 2025 tax season approaches.
The IRS encouraged taxpayers to sign up for an IRS Online Account. The account helps individuals view key information from their recent returns, make and cancel payments, get electronic notices from the agency, set up payment plans, and sign forms like powers of attorney, among other things.
Besides the account, the IRS recommended getting an Identity Protection Personal Identification Number, or IP PIN. “An IP PIN is a six-digit number that prevents someone else from filing a federal tax return using an individual’s Social Security number or Individual Taxpayer Identification Number.”
“It’s a vital tool for ensuring the safety of taxpayers’ personal and financial information,” the agency said.
For the 2025 filing season, the IRS has made an update regarding dependents on tax forms.
Taxpayers claim dependents during filing returns to receive certain deductions and credits like the Child Tax Credit, Earned Income Tax Credit, medical expense deduction, and education credits.
Sometimes, multiple people claim the same individuals as dependents on tax forms, like for instance, former spouses.
The IRS processes tax returns in the order they receive. As such, if the agency had already processed a return with certain dependents, another return seeking to claim the same individuals gets rejected.
However, starting from the 2025 filing season, returns claiming same dependents shall be accepted by the agency, provided the taxpayer includes a valid IP PIN.
The IRS says the new update “will reduce the time for the agency to receive the tax return and accelerate the issuance of tax refunds for those with duplicate dependent returns.”
“The best way to sign up for an IP PIN is through the IRS Online Account,” the agency said. However, “if an individual is unable to create an Online Account, alternative methods are available, such as in-person authentication at a Taxpayer Assistance Center.”
The IRS also highlighted the upcoming estimated tax payment due date.
“Taxpayers with non-wage income—such as unemployment benefits, self-employment income, annuity payments or earnings from digital assets—may need to make estimated or additional tax payments,” said the agency.
The deadline to make these payments for the September–December quarter of 2024 is Jan. 15.
1099-K Reporting, Digital Assets
Taxpayers who sold goods or services and collected over $5,000 in receipts via payment apps or online marketplaces in 2024 “should expect to receive a Form 1099-K,” the IRS said.
The form details payments received by taxpayers engaged in such transactions. Taxpayers must now account for these incomes when filing returns.
When previously the form was issued if the total transaction value in a year exceeded $20,000, currently the threshold is set at $5,000. This reduction is part of a plan to eventually reduce the limit to $600.
Coffee the Christian way: Promised Grounds
The IRS clarified that “taxpayers must report all income on their tax return unless it’s excluded by law, whether they receive a Form 1099-K or not.”
“The law doesn’t allow taxpayers to avoid taxes on income earned just because they didn’t get a form reporting the payments received.”
Form 1099-K income threshold reduction has come under criticism from lawmakers.
Rep. Carol Miller (R-W.Va.) introduced the “Saving Gig Economy Taxpayers Act” which seeks to revert it back to $20,000. She called the reduction “a tax hike on Americans and gig workers who use online payment platforms.”
Meanwhile, the IRS also reminded taxpayers to report all income related to digital assets like cryptocurrencies when filing the 2024 returns.
“If a taxpayer had digital asset transactions last year, they should be sure to keep records that prove their purchase, receipt, sale, exchange or any other disposition of the digital assets,” the IRS said. This includes the fair market value of such assets measured in U.S. dollars.
The IRS received around $5.1 trillion in tax revenues in the latest fiscal year 2024, roughly $400 billion more than in the previous year.
Independent Journalism Is Dying
Ever since President Trump’s miraculous victory, we’ve heard an incessant drumbeat about how legacy media is dying. This is true. The people have awakened to the reality that they’re being lied to by the self-proclaimed “Arbiters of Truth” for the sake of political expediency, corporate self-protection, and globalist ambitions.
But even as independent journalism rises to fill the void left by legacy media, there is still a huge challenge. Those at the top of independent media like Joe Rogan, Dan Bongino, and Tucker Carlson are thriving and rightly so. They have earned their audience and the financial rewards that come from it. They’ve taken risks and worked hard to get to where they are.
For “the rest of us,” legacy media and their proxies are making it exceptionally difficult to survive, let alone thrive. They still have a stranglehold over the “fact checkers” who have a dramatic impact on readership and viewership. YouTube, Facebook, and Google still stifle us. The freer speech platforms like Rumble and 𝕏 can only reward so many of their popular content creators. For independent journalists on the outside looking in, our only recourse is to rely on affiliates and sponsors.
But even as it seems nearly impossible to make a living, there are blessings that should not be disregarded. By highlighting strong sponsors who share our America First worldview, we have been able to make lifelong connections and even a bit of revenue to help us along. This is why we enjoy symbiotic relationships with companies like MyPillow, Jase Medical, and Promised Grounds. We help them with our recommendations and they reward us with money when our audience buys from them.
The same can be said about our preparedness sponsor, Prepper All-Naturals. Their long-term storage beef has a 25-year shelf life and is made with one ingredient: All-American Beef.
Even our faith-driven precious metals sponsor helps us tremendously while also helping Americans protect their life’s savings. We are blessed to work with them.
Independent media is the future. In many ways, that future is already here. While the phrase, “the more the merrier,” does not apply to this business because there are still some bad actors in the independent media field, there are many great ones that do not get nearly enough attention. We hope to change that one content creator at a time.
Thank you and God Bless,
JD Rucker
