<prompt> Human: I am 23 years old and I live with my dad while I work part-time. I havent saved any money because I buy my own groceries, do my own laundry, gas, pet food, all my expenses. I am not attending any schooling, and I do not pay any rent. However If I had I would be in debt very fast. I am starting to finally save some money but now it feels like its going away with this tax return. Is there anything I can do to avoid paying this money I barely have?  <response>: When you are a dependent, you get to remove 6300 from your income, so your 10000 in wages turns into 3700 in taxable income, and that means 10 federal income tax of 373. The amount in your W-2 box 2 shows how much federal tax you already paid. If you paid 163 in withholding, then youd owe 210 in federal taxes. So it is definitely plausible. You should next determine whether your father can claim you as a dependent. Were you a full-time student at least part of any 5 months in 2015? If not, you couldnt be a qualifying child but might be a qualifying relative. If youre not a qualifying child and earned more than 4000 in 2015, you couldnt be a qualifying relative.If the student status and your earnings arent enough to decide this question, you might have to resort to looking at the Support worksheet 3-1 in the above link, because who pays more than half the cost of your support might play a role in deciding if your father can claim you as a dependent. In that case, know that the lodging your father supplies counts as part of support provided by others. Edit: This support test is unnecessary to calculate -- it sounds like you are not a full-time student and earned more than 4000.If it turns out he cannot claim you as a dependent, then you get to have a personal exemption on your taxes, which takes off a further 4000 before computing income tax. In that case, you would have 0 taxable income and would have 0 income tax, and so youd actually get a refund of the amount you see in W-2 box 2. 