I'm closing out my retirement and I was wondering how the irs knows you paid the taxes on the amount you withdrew. I do not want to pay twice.

[Opus 17]

Something else you should be aware of is that if you are closing your retirement account because you have terminated your employment and the account is too small for your employer to keep open, you have the option of rolling over the money into an IRA that you can set up with the stock broker of your choice, and keep the money tax-free and allow it to grow until you retire. Once you have the money in a private IRA you can invest it in any instrument of the IRA offers, including stocks, mutual funds, gold, or almost anything else. Roll overs are tax free as long as you have the rollover done directly between the old plan and the new plan.