No one can tell you why exactly except your own tax adviser. The most likely reason for the lower refund with higher income is your tax bracket changed. The more money you make the higher your tax bracket in most cases unless you have new qualifying deductions. You can read some of this information on the IRS website. A very informative publication is Business Insider. I am not a tax adviser. I have however been filing my taxes for the past 31 years without one and took several college classes specifically in accounting and I can tell you that as my income went up or deductions changed, by refunds changed with them. Your specific question, barring no change in your deductions, lends to the answer that you are now in a higher tax bracket than last year. This is a good thing, it means you made more money. YAY! And now pay more in taxes. One other notable reason I see is our income tax deductions are lower from our paychecks. This lowered our taxes, increased our take home pay and in turn lowered our refunds. This occurred in the previous tax year not this tax year.
