Level 0 · Orientation
Every paycheck you have ever gotten had money pulled out of it before you saw it. Filing a tax return is how you and the government settle up: you show your real income, figure your real tax, and compare it to what was already withheld. Too much withheld → refund. Too little → you write a check.
You'll roll a random income scenario — you don't get to choose it, the same way nobody chooses their own tax year. Then you'll dig the numbers out of the forms that landed in your mailbox and fill out a real (simplified) Form 1040, line by line. The math is add and subtract. The skill is reading the forms.
Every check is worth 100 points on the first try, 60 on the second, 30 after that. Form 1040 lines are worth 50 / 30 / 15. Finish the return for a +150 bonus. Wrong answers cost you nothing but points: you can always try again, and after 3 misses the game just tells you the answer so you can move on. Badges are yours to collect. 🏅
Round everything to whole dollars. The real 1040 lets you drop the cents on every line, so this game does too. $1,721.70 becomes $1,722. Don't lose points over pennies.
Level 1 · Whose return is this?
Fifteen people, fifteen very different tax situations, one identical form. You don't get to pick — nobody picks their own tax year. Roll, and file whatever lands. You get one roll. No rerolling into an easier return.
Level 2 · The W-2
Every January your employer mails you a Form W-2. It's the receipt for your whole year: what they paid you, and what they already sent to the government on your behalf. It has a dozen boxes on it. Exactly two of them end up on a basic tax return. Your job is to find them, because nobody highlights them for you in real life.
Stuck? Flip the form over and read what each box means. Looking it up is the skill.
Level 3 · Status & deduction
Before the government taxes you, it hands back a chunk of your income tax-free. That chunk is the standard deduction. Pick your filing status to see how big yours is.
Level 4 · The return
This is the real thing, trimmed to the lines a first-time filer actually uses — same line numbers as the paper form. Work top to bottom. Every line is one small step: copy a number, add two, or subtract two. Check each line as you go.
Level 5 · The verdict
You now have two numbers that decide everything. Line 24 is the tax you actually owe for the year. Line 33 is what your employer already paid in for you. Whichever is bigger decides which way the money moves.
Level 6 · The W-4 lab
Your tax for the year is settled — the brackets decided it and you can't argue. But Box 2 wasn't decided by the government. It was decided by the W-4 you handed payroll on day one. Drag the slider and watch what it moves.
Use the slider to hunt for it if you want. That's what it's for.
1. Your friend says "I want the biggest refund possible." Using the slider above, explain whether a big refund is actually a win — and what it costs them every single paycheck to get one.
2. You're starting a job Monday and payroll hands you a W-4. Based on this lab, what will you aim for, and why?
Level 7 · Turn it in
This is what you hand in. Print it, or copy the grade summary line.