How to Report Spouse’s Foreign Self-Employment Income in MFJ

[kruthika]

I am a U.S. resident alien filing as Married Filing Jointly (MFJ) with my husband, who is a self-employed sole proprietor in India. He lives in India, his business is based there, and he has no U.S. income or clients. He doesn't even have SSN and I'm applying ITIN for him so I'm paper filing my tax. I want to correctly report his income in TurboTax. I have no doubts related to my income reporting but his I have some doubt as this is my first time. 

He pays GST in India can that be deducted as expenses in Schedule C from his business income?

[RobertB4444]

Yes, you can deduct the taxes he paid in India from his income on schedule C.  But it may be a better deduction to enter the taxes he paid as foreign taxes in the deductions and credits section of your federal return so that the tax is reduced dollar for dollar based on what he paid.  You should try it both ways and see which way is a better deduction.

@kruthika