Filing US tax return when you received German Arbeitlosgeld

14POSTS

5 years ago

Hello, I have a US tax return-related question.
I moved from New York to Germany a couple of years ago and currently married to a German citizen. When I was working here, I filed my US tax return with no problem since I do not have so much complicated properties to report. Then I was unemployed last year and received German unemployment benefit for one year. And I did not have another source of income. I have been looking how I should file my US tax return in this case, but so far I couldn't figure it out. Does anyone have the same experience or know how to do it? I would really appreciate your help.
Thanks in advance!

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BiboBdM Member

2POSTS

5 years ago

Hi, I am doing my taxes through Andrea Luehmann, Ltd, Chicago in addition to a german tax office around here. You could ask them for advice.
tr@luhmann-chicago.com. The front desk lady is Frau Reinartz.
When you do your taxes (for the US) do not forget to add the D/USA 101 Form so you dont double-pay. You will get that at Bundesrentenanstalt Berlin. Hope that helps.

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TominStuttgart Germany Expert

2824POSTS

5 years ago

I'm not sure if benefits are taxed as regular income but I would suspect so. The thing is that it very likely doesn't matter as far as tax obligation to the States.

Few US expats end up owing any tax because they can take either the Foreign Earned Income Exclusion, which is over 100,000 USD or Foreign Tax Credits. So one would have to be a very high earner with a local very low tax rate or lots of unearned income to have tax obligation - although one is still obliged to file. So almost certainly, if you give them the benefit of the doubt and report the benefits as income, you still won't owe anything on it. So it's not worth getting overly stressed about.

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ohphoto Member

14POSTS

5 years ago

Ah ok. That makes sense. Thank you very much for your advise!
Have a good one and stay healthy

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TominStuttgart Germany Expert

2824POSTS

5 years ago

ohphoto wrote:
Ah ok. That makes sense. Thank you very much for your advise!
Have a good one and stay healthy

If you don't already know about the FEIE or Foreign Tax credits you need to inform yourself. Equally important is to file a FBAR about foreign financial assets. This is an additional annual form to a tax return. Best resource is the irs(dot)gov website...