Wednesday, April 13, 2011

A Little Extra Time for Taxes

Let's hope you're not still rushing to get your taxes done before April 15th arrives at the end of this week. But even if you are, you've got a little extra time. Even though April 15th falls on a weekday, federal income taxes aren't due until April 18th this year.

Why is that? Because April 16th is a local holiday in Washington, D.C., called Emancipation Day. It was on April 16th, 1862, that Abraham Lincoln signed the Emancipation Act, freeing the slaves in the District of Columbia. Since April 16th is on a Saturday this year, the official Emancipation Day holiday will be celebrated on Friday, April 15th.

Now, Emancipation Day is not really much of a holiday. Federal workers, including people at the I.R.S., don't get to take the day off. But according to federal law, the I.R.S. has to treat local holidays the same as it treats federal holidays, which means it can't require people to pay their taxes on the Emancipation Day holiday. Ergo, the filing deadline gets moved to the next business day, which in the case of 2011 is Monday, April 18th.

No comments:

Post a Comment