Is there any reason to keep income tax returns dating back to 1999-2000?

According to a tax attorney and other professional preparers, you only have to keep federal returns for 7 years.

There is no statute of limitations for CA state returns, so there might not be any for GA either.

Here’s what I found via Google: “In most cases Georgia only has three years after you file the tax return to audit it, but if Georgia believes an incorrect tax return or tax report was filed with the intent to evade tax, or if you failed to file a tax return or report, Georgia can audit you or assess tax against you at any time.”

Seven years back is all that is required.

So, I just checked mine and they go back to 1992. I can destroy those now!

The shredder will be busy tomorrow…

I keep all of my tax returns.

None after 7 years .

At my husband’s insistence, we usually retain back 10 years before destroying. I think 7 years is the supposed required, but he feels more comfortable with 10 and I don’t argue with him. He takes care of the taxes and he maintains the filing system, so if he’s happy, I’m happy

You should keep the supporting documents for 7 years.

As for the returns, I always recommend keeping them, in a secure place, forever, along with any Form W-2s. Tax returns are a sort of “diary” for a person’s life.

For example, let’s say that someone has a need to provide a complete and accurate employment history (perhaps to apply for a government job or get a security clearance). The person might not remember when past jobs began or ended, but the old tax returns are an excellent record.

As another example, one of my clients recently had a complex property transaction, and we needed information from several years during the 1970s. The data would have been easily obtained from her tax returns. She hadn’t kept the returns, however, so we went through hell (read: high fees for me) recreating the history.

The Federal government can come after you forever if it suspects fraud on the government. My home state was the same.

“For most federal crimes, the statute of limitations is five years. Bank fraud has a statute of limitations of ten years. Immigration violations and arson are also subject to a ten year limit. Kidnapping also has a limit of ten years, or the child’s lifetime, whichever is longer. Art theft has a longer statute of limitations, twenty years. For capital offenses, aka offenses where you can get the death penalty, there is no limit.” Grabel Law dot com

https://www.irs.gov/pub/irs-pdf/p17.pdf

Page 18 has a chart for how long returns and records must be retained.

@Tropical_Willie This thread is about tax document retention, not criminal law.

Scan them or take a phone picture and keep the digital copy. Probably you will have no reason to look at them again. If nothing else, you can look at them and reminisce.