Cynthia and Jerry Grey have two children, Kirk, age 8, and Susanne, age 6. The children lived with Cynthia and Jerry for all of 2012. Cynthia earned wages of $15,000 and Jerry had wages of $10,000. The Greys received $525 in interest on their savings account. They had no other income in 2012.

Cynthia and Jerry have the 2012 Form 1040A and instructions. They want to see if they qualify for the EIC, so they follow the steps in the instructions for lines 38a and 38b.

The amount Cynthia and Jerry entered on Form 1040A, line 22, was $25,525. They both have valid social security numbers (SSNs). They will file a joint return. Neither Cynthia nor Jerry is a nonresident alien. Therefore, the answers they give to the questions in Step 1 allow them to proceed to Step 2.

The only investment income the Greys have is their $525 interest income. That amount is not more than $3,200, so they answer "No" to the second question in Step 2 and go to Step 3.

Their children, Kirk and Susanne, meet the relationship, age, residency, and joint return tests to be Cynthia and Jerry's qualifying children, so Cynthia and Jerry answer "Yes" to the first question in Step 3. Kirk and Susanne are not qualifying children of anyone else. Both children have valid SSNs. Cynthia and Jerry are not qualifying children of anyone else, so they answer "No" to the second question in Step 3. This means they can skip Step 4 and go to Step 5.

Cynthia and Jerry figure their earned income to be $25,000, the amount of their combined wages. This is less than $47,162, so they go to Step 6 to figure their credit.

Cynthia and Jerry want to figure their EIC themselves, so they complete the EIC Worksheet in the Form 1040A instructions (shown later).

Cynthia and Jerry complete their worksheet as follows.

1. Cynthia and Jerry enter their total earned income ($25,000) on line 1.
2. To find their credit, they go to the EIC Table (in the Appendix of this publication). The part of the EIC Table they use is included as part of this example. They find their earned income of $25,000 in the range of $25,000 to $25,050. They follow this line across to the column Two children under Married filing jointly and find $4,662. They enter $4,662 on line 2.
3. They enter on line 3 their AGI ($25,525) and see that it is different from the amount on line 1.
4. They look up $25,525 in the EIC Table and enter the amount of $4,557 on line 5.
5. They enter $4,557 on line 6. This is the smaller of the line 2 amount ($4,662) and the line 5 amount ($4,557).
6. The Greys enter $4,557 on line 38a of their Form 1040A. They will now complete Schedule EIC (shown later) and attach it to their return. They will keep the EIC Worksheet for their records.