Quick 1040 question?

Sorry if this has already been covered...I tried looking around but all the tax talk made my head sore 

After I filled out the 2555-EZ form, and got the answer to Total Foreign Earned Income (lets say its 30,000) Exclusion line 18, I put this on line 21 as instructed.

I happen to have zeros for all other lines in the 'Income' section.  Should I also enter 30,000 from the line 18 on 2555-EZ for 'wages, salaries, tips, etc'?

I'm confused, because then I end up with zero on line 22, I think this is what is supposed to happen, but DH is arguing otherwise. 

Please help, I'm a first time filer! Thanks in advance.

Just checked how I filled out my 2005 form.
Wages, salaries and tips would include all wages, salaries and tips, both US and foreign earned income. You would put your foreign earned income on line 21 as a negative number.

So yes, if you earned less than the foreign earned income exclusion and didn't have any other income, then line 22 would be 0.

(Note that I am looking at the 2005 form; assuming it hasn't changed for 2006).

Thanks for your speedy reply--I really appreciate it.

So, in conclusion... if the only sections filled out in the 'Income' sections are line 7. 30.000, and line 21, negative 30,000, then line 22 is zero!

Stupid tax forms......so annoying!

M

ok, and yet another question.  Given this previous example, what in the world does is line 44 and 45 in reference to?  It makes no sense to me.

Line 44 simply says Tax (see page 36) check if any tax if from A) form 8814 or B) From 4972.  So when you look at page 36 they tell you then to look at a tax table on page 67  What's this all about?    I feel like it's given me the run around!! so if there is none of the those forms included then you don't worry about it?

What is Line 45 alternate minimun tax?

sorry for all the questions!!!  I know people are probably pretty sick of tax questions.

If reading the instructions is too confusing, use tax software.  The instructions that come with tax software are clearer than the ones the IRS publishes.  TurboTax is pretty good.

Line 44 simply says Tax (see page 36) check if any tax if from A) form 8814 or B) From 4972.  So when you look at page 36 they tell you then to look at a tax table on page 67  What's this all about?

I completely understand that the instructions seem like a runaround. For the first several years of doing taxes I got a little anxious about spots such as you mention, and kept looking up what all those forms were to see if they applied to me.

What I eventually realized was that almost all of them are "just in case" things and generally represent uncommon situations. Also, the forms I personally had to complete remained more or less the same each year, and I started to know what to watch for. So only in the case of major life changes or something pertinent in the "what's new this year" section do I know I ought to re-evaluate whether I need to look at them again.

The reason you're directed to page 36 is that people who earn over a certain (high) threshold use methods other than the tax tables to figure theirs, so the intervening page is an attempt to direct everyone to the correct method. That kind of thing happens a lot.

All of the forms, by the way, can be downloaded at http://www.irs.gov/formspubs/index.html .

All that said, I nevertheless have to echo Lizzit: a tax prep program has seemed more and more worth it!