While the punditocracy dives into the details and debates the vices and virtues of Mitt Romney‘s and Newt Gingrich‘s 2010 tax returns, we decided to see if we could glean any ideas that might help you with your taxes … and maybe even save you some money.
We found a gold mine for ordinary folks who’ll never need a Swiss bank account or have to file forms like the Form 926 “Return by a U.S. Transferor of Property to a Foreign Corporation” or Schedule M of Form 5471 “Transactions Between Controlled Foreign Corporation and Shareholders or Other Related Persons” that were attached to Romney‘s return.
Tax-free Interest
If you think Romney and Gingrich disagree about undocumented immigrants, their tax returns suggest that they’re polar opposites when it comes to investing in municipal bonds to earn tax-free interest.
The former speaker’s 2010 return shows he earned $10,754 of tax-free interest, compared to $26,655 of the taxable variety. Romney’s forms show just $557 of tax-free interest and $3,295,727 of taxable interest income.
Remember, to figure the taxable-equivalent yield of a tax-free bond, divide the tax-free yield by 1 minus your marginal tax rate. Since Gingrich’s marginal rate is 35%, a 3.5%
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