<prompt> Human: I am a 20 year old living in Colorado. I just filed my taxes with Turbo Tax and it says I am getting a 99 federal tax return paid 2644.05 and a 8 state return paid 936. I made 30,444.36 in taxable wages this year, I have no dependents, nothing extra. I made 21,193.71 in taxable wages on last years return with the return being in the ballpark of 1300 for federal and 300 for state. I am not sure what I did wrong. Advice would be appreciated.Assistant: Why did my tax return drop so significantly?Because you did a better job of matching your withholding to your actual tax liability. Congratulations! That is what this sub generally advises people to do!Human: A buddy of mine who worked with me made 28,000, paid the same taxes I did, and is getting a refund of 1700 combined for federal and state. I am really struggling to see what happened.  <response>: If he had withheld the same exact dollar amount of federal and state income taxes as you but made 2,500 less than part of that refund will be because he made less than you. The rest could be from either deductions andor credits he claimed.A refund is only caused by paying MORE in withholding than you needed to. It is not free money. It is your money that you gave to the government to hold for you for a few months for no reason whatsoever. Seriously, getting a very low refund is what you want to aim for, since it means you have more money in your paycheck every week. 