<prompt> Human: So Im a little confused, this has been my 1st year having 2 jobs. When I added my 1st W2 I was relieving a 1200 federal refund and 100 state refund. Once I added my 2nd W2 in it dropped my federal refund to 500 and owe state 400. WHY?!? I have 0 exemptions and no dependants. Ive never had such a small refund before let alone paying state. My total income is 30,000  <response>: Theres no magic to taxes.When you start working somewhere you submit a W-4 and indicate what your withholding allowances should be. Your employer then withholds money from each paycheck for taxes.At the end of the year when you file, you calculate your tax liability based off your income and other factors all those questions the tax software asks. Once your tax liability is calculated, the amount you had withheld is subtracted from that. If you had more withheld than what you owe you get a refund. If you had less withheld than what you owe you have to pay.Keep in mind that if you have two jobs there is no way for them to know about the other. So lets say you filled out a W-4 for each job and indicated you were single with no dependents. But each job paid only 9k. They may each withhold nothing, because your estimated tax liability from each jobs perspective would be 0.However, when you file you actually made 18k, so you would have some tax liability.Its your job to estimate what your taxes will actually be and to fill out the W-4 for each job accordingly.So the answer to your question, you didnt have enough state taxes withheld from the second W-2.To make sure this doesnt happen again, use the IRS withholding calculator and submit new W-4 forms to each employer. 