Income – Unemployment Compensation

Time Requirement: 15 minutes

Purpose

Students will learn how to assist taxpayers who received unemployment compensation payments.

Objectives

• Identify unemployment compensation income
• Determine how to report unemployment compensation on the tax return

Teaching the Lesson

Refer to the Lesson Plan for helpful instructor notes, visual aids, TaxSlayer demos, and Internet links. Prompt students to share what they know about Income.

Refer students who may want to work independently to Publication 4491, Unemployment Income.

Key References

This lesson refers to the following publications and forms:

• Form 13614-C, Page 2, Part III
• Form 1099-G, Certain Government Payments
• Pub 4012, Income tab
• Pub 17, Chapter 12, Other Income

All references to materials can be found by clicking the Job Aids and Media buttons. There are also links to helpful tools that can be found on the irs.gov public portal. For this lesson, students can link to the following sites for additional help:

• Tax Map – Pub 505, Taxpayers may choose to have income tax withheld from unemployment compensation
• Tax Map - Pub 525, Types of unemployment benefits and compensation

TaxSlayer® Demos and Tutorials

It is recommended to go to the Practice Lab and access the latest TaxSlayer tutorial for this lesson. The TaxSlayer tutorials can be found by going to the Practice Lab and clicking the link for TaxSlayer IRS training.

Publication 4012, Income tab, includes instructions on how to report unemployment income and expenses in TaxSlayer.