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Deductions & credits
@Derikmcled wrote:
Oh okay, thank you that was helpful. On my maine state return i’m able to deduct work boots for unreimbursed deduction, I wasn’t sure since my home is one of our depots, because of federal motor carrier guidelines says there needs to be an address associated with the start and end points of daily operations for a truck. It’s my home purely for the convenience of my employer, due to parking shortage
Some states allow work-related deductions under the old federal rules, although the 2% limit usually means most people that list such costs don't actually benefit.
The problem with plowing your own home is that you get a personal benefit as well as a business benefit, and that makes it more complicated. If you qualified for a home office deduction, then you can deduct the same percentage of plowing costs as your business use percentage. (For example, if your home is 15% business based on the square footage, you can deduct 15% of plowing as a business expense.) If you don't qualify for a home office deduction, then I don't see an argument to deduct anything, since you would have to plow to get to work regardless of whether you were driving a company vehicle or a personal vehicle. Perhaps there is some interaction between tax rules and motor carrier rules that would change that, but if so, I am not aware of it.
On top of that, any deduction would only be your actual cost, you can't deduct anything for the value of your time. Using your personal truck for plowing, you could use the actual expense method (which is based on your work mileage as a percentage of the total) or the standard mileage rate. But I don't imagine that plowing your own driveway amounts to very many miles. So even if the plowing costs were fully deductible, it might be 50 cents a day or less.