The federal government has made public all the changes it plans to make to money in the coming year. After a long wait, Social Security finally released its cost-of-living adjustment. At the same time, the Internal Revenue Service (IRS) changed the tax brackets and other payments it makes.

IRS changes to tax income brackets

The changes made by the IRS are not major overhauls of the system. For example, the top tax rate of 37% will stay the same. This rate applies to single people making more than $626,350 a year and married couples making more than $751,600 a year. There will be the same number of these as there were in 2024.

But, as News10 reported, there have been some changes to the tax brackets to account for the falling value of money and the rising cost of living:

When a married couple files jointly or when a spouse dies,

For Unmarried Individuals

Using these formulas on a real-life example, the median household income in New York in 2022 was $81,386. If we use that as the taxable income for a couple filing jointly, they would have to pay $9,289 in federal taxes.

This is because the formula for figuring out your federal income tax gives you different rates for different parts of your taxable income. Not all income is taxed; people can deduct certain amounts of their income (either in a standard or itemized way). The taxable income is the amount that is left over after the deductions are taken out.

This year, the standard deduction for single people and married people filing separately will go up to $15,000, which is $400 more than the previous year. For married couples filing jointly, the standard deduction will go up by $800, to $30,000.

The Earned Income Tax Credit is another thing that the IRS has changed. Based on information the agency gave, the credit will be given in the way shown below:

In 2025, the Alternative Minimum Tax (AMT) exemptions will also grow. Single filers will get an exemption of $88,100, and married couples filing jointly will get $137,000. These exemptions will start to go away at $626,350 for single filers and $1,252,700 for married couples filing jointly.

One last change: the annual gift limit is going up to $19,000, and the most you can get in adoption credits is $17,280. The $130,000 limit on foreign-earned income will be raised, and the $13.9 million limit on estate taxes will also be raised.

The changes to Social Security

Most of these changes are caused by the 2.5 percent rise in the cost of living that was announced in October based on inflation data from the third trimester of the year. This percentage will be added to benefits like Social Security, Supplemental Security Income (SSI), Disability payments, and more.

But there are some changes that this number won’t tell you about. The highest amount of money that is taxed for Social Security will go up by $7,500, to $176,100. The earnings limit for people under full retirement age will go up to $23,400, and for people who reach full retirement age in 2025, it will go up from $59,520 to $62,160.

Another thing that won’t change is the amount of taxes taken out of employees’ paychecks for Social Security. It will stay at 7.65% and 15.3% for self-employed people.

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