The IRS Is Holding $1.5 Billion in Unclaimed Tax Refunds, but You Need to Act Quickly to Get Your Share
In the U.S., taxes work on a pay-as-you-go basis, and it's not a perfect system. If you're a salaried worker, you claim allowances on your W-4 withholding form each year, and based on that information, your employer holds back a certain portion of your income for tax purposes that gets paid to the IRS.
Most tax-filers don't just break even at the end of the year, though. The majority of people who file a tax return are owed some amount from the IRS, while others wind up owing the IRS money. Rarely do things work out perfectly, and it's because there are factors outside of your salary that dictate what your tax burden looks like (for example, what your outside income and deductible expenses entail).
Of course, the IRS isn't in the business of just giving out refund money. Rather, you have to ask for it, and you do so by filing a tax return each year. And if you don't file a tax return for a year you're owed money, you risk forfeiting your refund.
Source Fool.com
