I’m so confused. I made around 6-7k in 2016. Got a refund of 263 in 2017.

[renedavis1994]

In 2017 I made 19-20k and this year its saying i’m getting like 163.00 in my return. Why??

[Anita01 · Accepted solution]

The refund you receive depends mostly on the amount of income you had and the amount of tax withheld.  Last year, you probably got back all the tax you had taken out during the year because you made so little you didn't owe tax on it.

A higher income means you owe tax .  If you got a lower refund it's because you made enough to owe tax and had almost exactly the amount you needed to have withheld in order to not have to pay anything with your return.  That's a good thing because it means you got to use all your own money during the year instead of making an interest free loan to the IRS for most of the year and then having to wait to get it back at year-end.

We see people on here all the time who believe that earning more means a bigger refund but the truth is exactly the opposite.