@Notch352
The top of the federal 22% tax bracket for 2022 for married filing jointly is $178,150 of taxable income. Taxable income is your gross income minus your standard deduction or your itemized deduction. The standard deduction for married filing jointly for 2022 is $25,900. That means that as long as your total federal taxable income is less than $204,000, it will not be taxed any higher than 22%.
Of course, it is important to realize that only income above the tax bracket threshold is taxed at a higher rate. That means that if you had $210,000 in federal taxable income, only the top $6000 would be taxed at the next higher rate, which is 24%. All of the income under the threshold is still only taxed at 22% or less. Crossing a tax bracket does not subject all your income to the new higher rate, just the amount over the threshold.
although I have not analyzed your situation independently, I tend to agree with the other experts that the jumps in taxation may be due to something more than just income tax. If you withdraw the entire IRA amount, you may be reaching a situation where your high income results in a phase out of some other credit that you have been benefitting from. The only way to get a clear picture is to sit down with a tax expert and review your situation personally.
I also agree that you will pay lower taxes over the life of the IRA if you are able to withdraw smaller amounts over several years instead of a lump sum this year. I also agree that due to the uncertainty in the tax rates, you may want to withdraw all of the money by the end of 2025. That gives you the opportunity to spread the withdrawal out over 4 tax years.
