FEDERAL EARNED INCOME CREDIT (EIC)
What Amount of EIC May I Claim?
NOTE: Glossary words appear in blue. Click on any glossary word to see its definition.
How much EIC may I claim?
If eligible for the EIC, the benefit amount that you can receive (claim) is based on your earned income and whether you have responsibility for the care of any children. This EIC amount is much more substantial for families than for single adults who do not care for any children.
EIC Estimators
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The Center for Budget and Policy Priorities (CBPP) has an online Earned Income Tax Credit Estimator for tax year 2009. You can use this estimator to calculate your estimated Earned Income Credit based on your income level, filing status, and number of qualifying children.
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The Internal Revenue Service's Earned Income Tax Credit Assistant also includes a tool to estimate your credit amount:
(The estimators will open in a new browser window. To close the window when you are done, click on the "X" in the upper right hand corner of the window.)
To use the Earned Income Credit estimators, you must first do two things:
- Estimate your total earned income (see Rule D2 for an explanation of total earned income); and
- Determine if you are a worker who has no, one, or two or more qualifying children.
Once you know the answers to these questions, you can get an estimate of how much EIC you may qualify for (assuming it is appropriate to use total earned income to calculate your benefit).
Graph showing differences in Earned Income Credit amounts depending on number of qualifying children
The Center on Budget and Policy Priorities has developed a graph that shows how the Earned Income Credit benefit amount you can receive varies quite a bit depending on your total earned income and the number of qualifying children you have:
To view the graph, see:
- The Earned Income Tax Credit in 2009 (scroll down on the page)
(The graph web page will open in a new browser window. To close the window when you are done, click on the "X" in the upper right hand corner of the window.)
Clearly, workers with one or more qualifying children receive substantially more EIC than workers with no qualifying children. The graph indicates that the EIC amount rises for workers who have very limited income. After peaking for workers who have qualifying children with earned income in the $12,000-$18,000 range, the EIC amount gradually lowers as earned income increases until it disappears at the various income limits. For workers with no qualifying children, the EIC peaks at an income around $5,000 and disappears above about $12,000 in earned income.
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