earned income tax credit

Last month, I wrote about the Earned Income Tax Credit, or EITC. It's a federal program that helps low- and moderate-income taxpayers keep more of what they earned, no matter where in the United States they live. Staff at all of Oregon's and Washington's free tax assistance preparation sites are making an effort to educate taxpayers about their rights to this credit.

It’s true that if you didn't earn much money in 2011, you may be exempt from filing a tax return. While not filing does save time and energy, failure to file could result in missing out on receiving refundable credits. Probably the most common credit that working families and individuals forego, not realizing they are entitled to it, is the Earned Income Tax Credit, or EITC. The EITC is a tax credit that goes to people who worked during the tax year but didn’t have a significant amount of income.