> Now, this confuses me. This year, Darien and I were eligible to file separately or jointly, since we got married during the year. I figured it out both ways, and we got much *more* money back by filing jointly.
>
> Also, the front of my 1040A instruction booklet says very specifically that in almost all cases, filing as "married filing jointly" will give you a bigger refund or make you owe less tax.
>
> Maybe they spring this penalty on you after a couple years. Or maybe we're just already so poor we didn't notice. :-}

My dad is a CPA, and he does our taxes for us every year. The first year we were married, he told us that sometimes you get more by filing singly, and vice versa, so he did our taxes both ways to see which would get us more back. We ended up filing jointly.

Gri"have a kid and that'll help too"shny