In Iowa, go to prom, get a tax credit

Some of that huge sum your kid shamed you into blowing on prom is eligible for a state tax credit in Iowa, although nobody is quite sure just what you can claim.

If you look as carefully into the Iowa tax code as Joe Kristan, a certified public accountant and creator of the Tax Update Blog, you will find certain prom expenses qualify you for a break under the state’s Tuition and Textbook Credit.

Prom and “other school-related social activities” are counted among extracurricular school activities, a broad and vague subset of an even broader and more vague grouping of fees, books and materials under the simple heading, “textbooks,” meaning “books and other instructional materials used in teaching (those subjects legally and commonly taught in Iowa’s public elementary and secondary schools),” according to the Iowa Department of Revenue.

Prom isn’t just a dance, it’s a textbook-related activity.

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