I did freelance work for a charity. Can I give a tax deductible donation of cash to that charity?

[rdzn]

Freelance work from this charity was my main income for the year. I can't deduct time, but can I give a donation to the charity in cash that is tax deductible, even though I received income from them?

[xmasbaby0]

In order to get a tax deduction for a charitable donation, you need enough itemized deductions to exceed your standard deduction.  Do you have other itemized deductions to enter?

[rdzn]

yes, not a problem.

[VolvoGirl]

And unless you got a W2 from them you need to report all the income as self employment income.  But the donation only gets deducted on schedule A if you Itemize your personal deductions.  Not on schedule C against your self employment income.  So it won't reduce the self employment tax.

[rdzn]

That's very helpful guidance I couldn't glean from the IRS documents. Thank you!

[VolvoGirl]

See schedule C instructions page C-15 Other Expenses....Do not include charitable contributions
<a rel="nofollow" target="_blank" href="https://www.irs.gov/pub/irs-pdf/i1040sc.pdf">https://www.irs.gov/pub/irs-pdf/i1040sc.pdf</a>

Do you need help reporting the freelance income?  
You need to report all your income even if you don't get a 1099Misc. You use your own records.  You are considered self employed and have to fill out a schedule C for business income.   You use your own name, address and ssn or business name and EIN if you have one.   You should say you use the Cash Accounting Method and all income is At Risk.   

After it asks if you received any 1099Misc it will ask if you had any income not reported on a 1099Misc. You should be keeping your own records.  Just go through the interview and answer the questions.   Then you will enter your expenses.

Self Employment tax (Scheduled SE) is automatically generated if a person has $400 or more of net profit from self-employment.  You pay 15.3% SE tax on 92.35% of your Net Profit greater than $400.  The 15.3% self employed SE Tax is to pay both the employer part and employee part of Social Security and Medicare.  So you get social security credit for it when you retire.  You do get to take off the 50% ER portion of the SE tax as an adjustment on line 27 of the 1040.  The SE tax is already included in your tax due or reduced your refund.  It is on the 1040 line 57.  The SE tax is in addition to your regular income tax on the net profit.

Here is some IRS reading material……

IRS information on Self Employment
<a rel="nofollow" target="_blank" href="http://www.irs.gov/Businesses/Small-Businesses-&-Self-Employed/Self-Employed-Individuals-Tax-Center"...>

Pulication 334, Tax Guide for Small Business
<a rel="nofollow" target="_blank" href="http://www.irs.gov/pub/irs-pdf/p334.pdf">http://www.irs.gov/pub/irs-pdf/p334.pdf</a>

Publication 535 Business Expenses
<a rel="nofollow" target="_blank" href="http://www.irs.gov/pub/irs-pdf/p535.pdf">http://www.irs.gov/pub/irs-pdf/p535.pdf</a>

[rdzn]

thank you very much!

[VolvoGirl · Accepted solution]

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