ROTH income and SS provisional income

Submitted by Geoffrey Kasher on Mon, 2020-02-17 22:22

Thanks in advance for any help.

Does income from ROTH IRA get added to the provisional income calculation on SS taxation

Non-spouse ROTH beneficiary: son inherits ROTH from dad. Does the income from ROTH get added to provisional income for SS taxation?

Thanks

Permalink Submitted by Alan - IRA critic on Mon, 2020-02-17 23:21

No, the non taxable portion of a Roth distribution is not counted as provisional income like tax exempt interest is.
While any taxable portion of a distribution does count Roth distributions are usually tax free since the Roth is either qualified, or if not the Roth distributions are not nearly large enough to tap into the earnings in the Roth. By the time a Roth is inherited it has usually been held for over 5 years, and if not the time held by the beneficiary is added to the time the owner held it, so the 5 years needed for full qualification is even more likely for a beneficiary than the owner. Therefore, any beneficiary not needing a full distribution can avoid any increase in taxable income, and the owner can avoid taxable distributions that would increase the amount of SS benefits included in income. Accordingly, unless other income is already high enough to result in taxation of 85% of SS benefits, Roth distributions are that much more beneficial than TIRA distributions.

Permalink Submitted by Geoffrey Kasher on Mon, 2020-02-17 23:26

thanks. I can always count on you for excellent answers.