@Swarley2 wrote:
"you need to take the RMD from your IRA"
This has nothing to do with a RMD. I just had room under the 2021 Standard Deduction that I could have withdrawn some IRA funds tax free. But one has to make a wild-ass guess what their tax liability will be months before the tax laws are finalized.
Why hasn't someone asked this before?
Turbotax is released in draft form in November. Most IRS forms and instructions are also published before December 31, if you want to do a test return on paper. Many companies including Turbotax have tax estimation software or web sites. And most years, the tax laws don't change too much, so the prior year software can usually make a pretty close estimate. The bottom line is that there are no retroactive withdrawals. You need to make your best guess from the available information and tools and make any withdrawals before December 31.
