Backup Withholding

  

Income tax withholding is money withheld from your income and paid to the government to be applied against your annual income tax bill. That's withholding, right?

So then what is backup withholding? Is it extra money withheld in case the other money withheld wasn't enough? Nope. If a taxpayer didn't provide the correct Tax Identification Number, or did not report dividend, interest, or patronage dividend income to the IRS, they may be subject to backup withholding. Things like rents, royalty payments, profits, commissions, fees, and other payment for work as an independent contractor may also trigger backup withholding.

"May be subject to" implies the taxpayer did it once, the IRS noticed it, and they requested a correction so the taxpayer is on double-secret probation.

FYI, a "patronage dividend" is essentially a refund issued to those who purchase goods or services from a cooperative. Example: Farmer's Co-op's are big in the midwest.

Related or Semi-related Video

Finance: What is a tax haven?1 Views

00:00

Finance allah shmoop What is a tax haven Well it's

00:07

this kindly loving wonderful place just past the gates of

00:10

st peter you know maybe that's attacks heaven If you

00:13

tilt your telescope at just the right angle you'll see

00:16

the cayman islands of the bahamas You might see somalia

00:20

although it always seems to be storming therein And lately

00:23

you'll see ireland Yeah another tax haven Well how on

00:26

earth are all these countries linked Well they all offer

00:30

special tax incentives for corporations doing profitable business there such

00:35

that those corporations more or less pay little tax if

00:39

any Why was this even a thing Well in america

00:42

at least before trump became president there was a severe

00:45

hit against corporations who had divisions outside of the united

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states selling printers or search links or purple leather handbags

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for nine hundred ninety nine dollars each such that those

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corporations were taxed once by the country in which they

01:00

did business Think france that was ah high tax rate

01:03

And then if those companies wanted to bring their cash

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back to america to be held in an american bank

01:09

well then those companies were taxed again turning a dollar

01:13

Of profit into something like an thirty or forty cents

01:16

since it made no sense for companies to lose so

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much hard earned profits so quickly to tax dollars Well

01:22

a mini industry in tax havens grew up all around

01:26

those unfair government dealings Well some of the schemes behind

01:29

these processes included something called a dutch sandwich and no

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not the one with the raw hearing No in this

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one the product is deemed as having been shipped by

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an irish company but then booked or accounted for through

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a shell or quays I fake company or holding company

01:49

in the netherlands sometimes remaining profits or then shipped to

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the caymans or bermuda otherwise known as the bermuda black

01:55

hole Which leads the way for us to make a

01:57

joke here But we won't I say we do ever

02:00

strength There are three basic types of tax havens in

02:03

a dutch sandwich Primary tax havens Yeah those are the

02:07

ones with the shell corpse Then he have semi tax

02:10

havens where a country will produce goods for sale primarily

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outside of their boundaries and have flexible regulations to encourage

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you No job growth for themselves and third kind is

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a conduit tax haven where income from sales mainly sales

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made elsewhere is collected and then distributed back inside the

02:27

country Well over time the legal structure of tax havens

02:30

has shifted But in the new post obama era which

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actively lowered corporate tax rates and defended american companies rights

02:38

to bring american cash back home to america While the

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need for tax havens feels like it is slowly fading 00:02:43.803 --> [endTime] away But there's still more popular than tax heaven

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