Thanks rjs and VolvoGirl - I really appreciate the quick and helpful replies!
VolvoGirl - to your point, I don't want to go into too much detail about our specific financial situation, but you are correct in that for all previous years, it was to our advantage to file jointly, whereas this year, when I worked out our returns both ways (joint and separate) in TurboTax desktop, I found (to my surprise) that our total tax bill is significantly lower if we file separately this year. Since I have never previously filed separately, and it seems to be somewhat more complicated than filing jointly, I wanted to make sure I'm doing it correctly, hence the questions I've been posting:
https://ttlc.intuit.com/community/taxes/discussion/handling-dividends-and-interest-when-married-fili...
https://ttlc.intuit.com/community/taxes/discussion/when-married-filing-separately-do-both-spouses-ne...
Thanks again to both of you for your helpful responses!
