this article is reprinted by permission from nextavenueorg it may be months before you need to file your 2022 taxes the deadline is tuesday april 18 2023 but this is exactly the right time to make smart moves to lower your 2022 taxes if you wait beyond dec 31 it’ll generally be too late while this has been a pretty miserable year for the stock and bond markets and inflation it’s a good one for yearend tax cutting a report by wolters kluwer the international publishing and professional services company found that “the tax world has largely stabilized since the passage of the tax cuts and jobs act in 2017 this has made yearend planning more predictable” as my friends talk money podcast cohost pam krueger said in our recent episode on yearend tax tips “yearend is just a natural time to pause and just assess and review everything taxes included” here are suggestions to trim your 2022 tax bill before making any of these moves consult with your tax adviser you’ll want to first estimate your tax bracket for 2022 and 2023 so you can see which year it’ll likely be higher and then make tax moves accordingly for example if you expect to be in a higher tax bracket in 2023 you may want to try pushing anticipated 2023 income into 2022 and postpone making some taxdeductible expenses until next year when they’ll be more valuable to you conversely if you think you’ll be in a lower tax bracket next year you may want to do the reverse push anticipated 2022 income into 2023 and pay taxdeductible expenses this year when they’ll be worth more to you keep in mind though that because inflation has been so high the internal revenue service announced a 7 inflation adjustment to the 2023 income tax thresholds consider this one of only two good things due to high inflation the other is the 87 social security costofliving adjustment in 2023 see should i file for social security in 2022 to get the cola for 2023 in other words if your income will be the same in 2023 as in 2022 you may be in a lower tax bracket next year because of the inflation adjustment for example a married couple with 85000 in income will be in the 22 tax bracket this year but just the 12 bracket next year before looking for lastminute deductible expenses for 2022 determine whether you’ll be able to itemize deductions on your tax return if your deductions wouldn’t exceed 12000 and you’re single or 25900 and you’re married they’d be too low to claim but if you will be able to itemize look into prepaying 2023 property taxes and state and local income taxes which have a 10000 limit you could look into paying unreimbursed medical expenses for a writeoff too though they’re only deductible after exceeding 75 of your income you can also try grabbing tax credits they have no threshold for itemizing one example is the 2500 to 7500 tax credit for buying certain new electric vehicles from manufacturers such as audi chrysler ford f  jeep nissan nsany and volvo vlvly  there’s also the lifelong learning tax credit for educational expenses maximum credit 2000 if your income is under 90000 and you’re single or below 180000 and you’re married also see while stocks and bonds plunge sales of these ‘safe’ investments are booming if your employer offers a taxsheltered retirement plan like a 401k you still have time to stuff money into it for 2022 and lower your taxable income the maximum contribution for 2022 is 20500 or 27000 if you’re 50 or older you have until tax day 2023 to make ira contributions for 2022 but you must have opened the ira account this year or earlier many investors lost money in stocks bonds mutual funds and etfs this year if you sold holdings for a loss you could offset the loss against capital gains on investments you sold at a profit up to 3000 in losses exceeding gains can be claimed to lower your 2022 income this is the time of the year when some mutual funds and etfs have capitalgains distributions taxes owed on profits taken you can find the date of planned distributions on a fund’s website or for big fund companies such as fidelity t rowe price trow and vanguard or on the morningstar morn site “don’t buy a fund the week before it issues a capitalgains distribution because then you’re going to be taxed on the distribution” advised terry savage the author of several books on personal finance if you plan to make a gift to a child or grandchild before year’s end remember that you’re allowed to give up to 16000 per person in 2022 32000 for couples without owing gift taxes putting money into a child’s 529 college savings plan will lower your state taxes if you live in one of these 30 states since it’s so hard to have enough deductions to itemize if you want to write off charitable contributions you may want to try bunching them see 7 ways to make your charitable donations count even in a down market that means doubling up this year the amount of donations you’d otherwise make in 2022 and 2023 combined so their total in ’22 will exceed the standard deduction and qualify for an itemized deduction richard eisenberg is the former senior web editor of the money  security and work  purpose channels of next avenue and former managing editor for the site he is the author of “how to avoid a midlife financial crisis” and has been a personal finance editor at money yahoo good housekeeping and cbs moneywatch this article is reprinted by permission from nextavenueorg © 2022 twin cities public television inc all rights reserved more from next avenue   tax help for the selfemployed   tax tips for entrepreneurs with new small businesses   how to use a taxsaving health savings account in retirement