Why Make My State Income Tax Refund Taxable?

[Anonymous]

While answering the questions to determine whether my state income tax refund is taxable there is a button I could click that says "Make My State Refund Taxable," (or similar wording.)  If Turbotax determines that a state income tax refund is not taxable what reason would someone choose to make it taxable?

[KarenM90]

Your State Refund is Taxable if you deducted it as an itemized deduction in a previous year.

Here is an article with more details:  When are my State Tax Refunds Taxable?

[Anonymous]

Thanks to DMarkM1, bananasplitz, KrisD15, DianeC958, LinaJ2020, ReginaM, and KarenM90 who have all tried to answer my question about why TurboTax made my state income tax not taxable.  However, none of the reasons given applied to my situation as I described initially and in subsequent replies.  Given that even the TT Live CPA assistant could not, (or would not,) explain why; another tax software program said it was taxable; and my own research and manual calculation concluded the same (I was also a CPA), I distrust TT and, in good conscience, not use it.

[ThomasM125]

The reason you have an option to make it taxable is so that you won't have to go through the questions to determine if it is taxable if you don't want to bother with that. 

It can be a complicated process to determine if your refund is taxable. Different tax products may interpret information differently and when you enter information in two different programs, there is always an opportunity to not enter the same information in the same places. So, it is not uncommon to have different results when preparing your tax return with different software products.

Without comparing the entries and calculations in both products, it is not possible to conclude which one is correct.

[Anonymous]

I'm still searching for an answer.  One of the questions Turbotax asks is "How much of your refund did you use to pay 2019 estimated tax?"  Why is that asked unless it has a bearing on whether it is taxable.   Is a state tax refund from 2018 not taxable if it is used to pay 2019 estimated tax?