It was, by far, the most beautifully embroidered pillow in the classroom.
And it was made by 11-year-old me, Nicholas “definitely not a homosexual” Wolny from rural Illinois, desperately angling for praise from the home ec teacher, per usual. This time, the lure was to embroider Starry Night in painstaking detail onto a 9-by-9-inch square of linen from Joann Fabrics. (“It’s Van Gogh’s view from his asylum window after cutting off his own ear!” I exclaimed to a grimacing Miss Johnson as I watched her grade my assignment.)
Interestingly, the original intent of home economics class in America wasn’t just so you and I could embroider a gay-ass pillow in seventh grade. It was about learning the homemaking and frugality skills that help you keep your shit together, and for a long time it included money management skills, like budgeting and taxes. Home ec in the 20th century was mainly for women, whom we asked to manage the household’s money but dared not trust to have it for themselves. Women often couldn’t open a bank account on their own until 1974 and in many states, couldn’t get a business loan without a man’s signature until 1988, but they were expected to balance the checkbook and figure out the taxes on the man’s behalf.
As gender roles (rightfully) softened, personal finance literacy drifted out from under the home ec umbrella, and somewhere along the way, we all lost our awareness about how taxes work. If your parents didn’t teach you about money, they definitely didn’t teach you anything about taxes, so many queer Americans navigate a once-a-year ritual of stress and confusion as they try to figure out what they owe Uncle Sam (or just don’t pay, which typically ends in even more taxes and penalties later).
We sometimes accidentally set aside the wrong amount of money throughout the year, then are either devastated by a big tax bill or elated by a refund, and we act as though this uncertainty is the best we can do. But taxes aren’t a game of chance; they’re just arithmetic and some ugly printouts we get in the mail each year. Taxes suck, they know they suck, and they don’t give a shit what you think of them.
They’ve also gotten a lot of work done over the years. The United States tax code is basically 6,800 pages of Swiss cheese, with holes and tunnels all over the place that rich people regularly leverage to avoid paying. Many of them are completely legal. This is why you should go dig up your grandpa’s old headlamp, glue a few rhinestones to it, and cave-dive into a few of these tax tunnels yourself.
Part of financial freedom means feeling unbothered by any money-related adulting that gets thrown your way. Taxes are a perennial money to-do, so understanding how they’re filed will give you peace of mind. More importantly, there are tax-related actions you can be taking all throughout the year to owe less in taxes and grow your investments faster. Knowing your options might shape how you want to save and spend your money in the future.
They’ll Be Here Forever — Just Get Over It
Tax revenue is what funds a lot of the amenities we have in our day-to-day lives. Without taxes, there would be no money for public transportation or government-sponsored benefit programs. Tax money pays for government employees’ salaries, veterans’ benefits, and Social Security, which helps financially support millions of retired workers and people with disabilities so they can live their lives with dignity. Taxes fund education initiatives, defense initiatives, parks, scientific research, and more.
Where taxes encounter endless mudslinging and government lobbying is in the details: who should fund the tax coffers, how much more some citizens should pay than others, and what the funds should and should not be used for. Turn on the evening news right now, and it probably won’t be long before there’s a story about elected officials or lobbyists arguing about something related to taxes.
We can have strong opinions about tax corruption, sure, and it’s important to channel that energy into learning and organizing. But you’re still going to have to file taxes each year.
Tax Mistakes Often Lead to Debt
Surprises are for birthday parties and burlesque shows, not taxes.
What’s tricky about taxes is that you often don’t realize you’re undersaving until the spring, when you go to file your tax return and are suddenly slapped with a bill for hundreds or thousands of dollars. This can be devastating for adults who don’t have much saved up and is another reason people take on debt.
Side-hustle culture has made these tax bombs increasingly common. When you have an employer, your company is withdrawing taxes from your paycheck on your behalf. But this isn’t the case for other forms of income. You need to make sure you’re setting money aside for taxes from any side hustles, gigs, independent contractor work, or sole proprietorships. The same goes for capital gains; if you sell an investment for more than you paid for it, you might owe tax on this difference, so remember not to spend every dollar.
Taxes Are One of Life’s Largest Expenses
Taxes are one of the largest expenses you’ll have throughout your lifetime, but there are small decisions you can make (really small — we’re talkin’ cream-in-your-coffee-level decisions) to whittle down the bill and keep more of the money you earn and invest. A few more percentage points of savings can mean the difference between building wealth and coming up short.
For many people, taxes are perceived as a chore, something our parents were stressed out by in the past, and something that takes a big bite out of our paycheck in the present. So our solution is to ignore them as much as we can.
The problem with this strategy is that we can’t escape taxes unless we leave the country. (And lol, the United States still makes citizens who live abroad file a tax return. So nosy!)
Also, there are lots of tax loopholes, so when you’re already putting in effort to make and save more money, the Swiss cheese of it all becomes much more interesting.
Cheating on Your Taxes Robs Your Peace
People cheat on their taxes because they’re often able to get away with it. The reason cheaters slip through the cracks is that Internal Revenue Service resources have been limited for a long time. About 160 million returns get filed each year, and there are only so many people working at the agency to enforce everything.
The Inflation Reduction Act of 2022 included nearly $80 billion for the IRS to modernize systems (some of its computers were still from the 1960s, y’all), hire more personnel, and otherwise improve operations over a 10-year period. This investment may or may not see its way through because political power shifted in 2025, and rich people who cheat on their taxes really, really don’t want the IRS modernized. One paper from Harvard found that every dollar spent auditing the wealthiest 1 percent returns $4.25 in tax revenue, and each spent auditing the top 10 percent could return up to $12 in tax revenue. Turns out when you try to eat the rich and start chomping on their arm, it really pisses them off.
Integrity aside, cheating on your taxes will just leave you feeling anxious and paranoid. There are cooler, sexier, and more legal ways to save money, and when you understand what you’ll owe, you can be solutions-focused rather than let the confusion get you down.
There Are More Tax Forms Than 90-Day Fiancé Spinoffs
It’s all fun and games until these forms with weird numbers and letters on them start arriving in the mail. Ten-ninety-what? W-2 who? And what’s up with these paper sizes?
Employers and companies are required to send you income documentation forms by January 31 of each year for the year prior. The most common types of forms to look out for are:
W-2: This is a wages statement from an employer. It documents your employment income, taxes withheld, and any other relevant information.
1099: A statement for non-wage income, such as self-employment income, interest income, or investment income.
1098: These are not income forms, but rather documents that show interest paid on either a mortgage or student loan, or money you spent on tuition. You’ll use these for adjustments and deductions to your income when filing your taxes, so keep them in a safe place.
If an organization or employer sent you one of these forms, it also sent a copy of the same form to the IRS to cover their own ass. So if you try to pull an “Oops, I forgot to include it,” the IRS will know, and you’re more likely to be audited. If the audit finds that some of your income wasn’t initially reported, you’ll be asked to pay taxes on that income, plus penalties and interest. Honest mistake, but it happens more often than you might think.
Financially secure people know their way around taxes, and as the kiddos say these days, that’s on periodt (pouts lip and gesticulates pointer finger). They know what income gets taxed, how it gets taxed, and how moving money around increases or decreases the tax burden. Learn your way around the basics of taxes so you can keep more of what you earn and live a great queer life along the way.
Nick Wolny is Out magazine’s finance columnist. He writes Financialicious, a personal finance newsletter tailored toward queer readers, and his first book, Money Proud: The Queer Guide to Generate Wealth, Slay Debt, and Build Good Habits to Secure Your Future, now in bookstores nationwide. nickwolny.com @nickwolny
This article is part of OUT's Mar-Apr 2026 print issue, which hits newsstands March 24. Support queer media and subscribe — or download the issue through Apple News+, Zinio, Nook, or PressReader.
