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Is it better to apply for Foreign tax credit with the 1116 or to have Foreign income exclusion without any tax burden because the income is under the annual amount (103K)

 
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1 Reply
jtax
Level 10

Is it better to apply for Foreign tax credit with the 1116 or to have Foreign income exclusion without any tax burden because the income is under the annual amount (103K)

Hard to know. Unfortunately I would recommend doing it both ways and using the method that gives you the lowest liability. Look at 1040 line 16 not the refund box.

 

Why? Because although the FEIC does reduce income, your tax bracket is bumped up as if you had received that income. So your other income is taxed more. (If you had no other income it doesn't matter).

 

The FTC on the other hand will typically reduce your the tax on your foreign income to zero because US rates are much lower than foreign rates. But you AGI (adjusted gross income) will be higher and that might result in various phase outs kicking in. Also the % of US tax you can get credited is limited to the % of your income from foreign sources (e.g. foreign income / wordwide income). If most of your income is from foreign sources that won't matter, but if you have significant US-source income (investments, rental property, business, etc.) that can less the allowed FTC.

 

So the bottom line is that you should try it both ways and see which is better.

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