How come my federal is only 1555 when I have 2 dependents

aaronleemwilson — Wed, 28 Jan 2026 06:45:39 GMT

Re: How come my federal is only 1555 when I have 2 dependents

MinhT1 — Mon, 27 Jan 2025 22:52:41 GMT

Your tax refund is not at all proportional to your income. It depends on your income, your deductions and other tax credits, your tax liability and the amount of tax withheld.

Assuming that your form W-4 was filled out correctly and included your dependents, the tax withholding tables are designed so that you pay enough tax as you earn so that your refund or your tax due is as close to 0 as possible. In fact, if you have a large refund at tax time, this means that too much has been withheld from your paychecks during the year.

Additionally, many events may reduce your refund. Please read this TurboTax Help article.

You can also review your entries in TurboTax to make sure that they are correct.

Re: How come my federal is only 1555 when I have 2 dependents

xmasbaby0 — Mon, 27 Jan 2025 22:58:12 GMT

Have you entered income from working? The child-related credits like earned income credit and additional child tax credit are directly related to the amount of income you earned from working. If you only earned a small amount by working, then your credits will be low.

Make sure you have entered your child as a dependent in My Info, and that you have entered the child's Social Security number. Careful— do not say that your child’s SSN is not valid for employment. If your child was born in 2024 make sure you said he lived with you the whole year. There is an oddly worded question that asks if the child paid over half their own support. Say NO to that question.

Have you entered income from working in 2024? If not, you will not receive an income tax refund based on having dependent children.

The maximum amount of the child tax credit is now $2000 per child; the refundable “additional child tax credit” amount is $1700. In order to get that credit, you have to have income from working. The credit is calculated based on the amount you earned above $2500 multiplied by 15%, up to the full $1700 per child. If the amount you earned was too low, you will not get the full $1700.

If your child is older than 16 at the end of 2024, you do not get the CTC. But you may still get the non-refundable $500 credit for other dependents instead.

https://ttlc.intuit.com/turbotax-support/en-us/help-article/taxation/child-tax-credit/L2lNhfGDl_US_en_US?uid=m68dfq2u

https://ttlc.intuit.com/turbotax-support/en-us/help-article/taxation/additional-child-tax-credit/L6xFeMFEf_US_en_US?uid=lqnuygah

https://www.irs.gov/help/ita/does-my-childdependent-qualify-for-the-child-tax-credit-or-the-credit-for-other-dependents

And for the Earned Income Credit—-

https://ttlc.intuit.com/turbotax-support/en-us/help-article/tax-credits-deductions/qualifications-earned-income-credit-eic-eitc/L7w4BFP32_US_en_US?uid=m62rmz09

https://www.irs.gov/credits-deductions/individuals/earned-income-tax-credit/use-the-eitc-assistant

Look at your 2024 Form 1040 to see the child-related credits you received

PREVIEW 1040

https://ttlc.intuit.com/turbotax-support/en-us/help-article/tax-return/preview-turbotax-online-return-filing/L77WCkvnu_US_en_US?uid=m681fkhr

Child Tax Credit line 19

Credit for Other Dependents line 19

Earned Income Credit line 27

Additional Child Tax Credit line 28

AND….If you have children but had little or no income, it raises the question of how you and the children were supported. There may be another tax-paying adult who can claim you and/or the children as dependents.

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How come my federal is only 1555 when I have 2 dependents

Re: How come my federal is only 1555 when I have 2 dependents

Re: How come my federal is only 1555 when I have 2 dependents