How to Get the IRS to Pay You for Holiday Travel
If you're one of the many Americans who travel during the holidays to visit friends and family, you'll probably be thrilled to hear that you may be able to get a tax deduction for part of your travel costs. However, doing so requires you to spend at least some of your trip doing something job-related. If you can swing that, you'll be able to get a tax break based on your expenses.
In order to qualify as business travel in the IRS's eyes, your trip must take you outside the general area of your "tax home." The tax home is the city or geographical area where your main workplace is. For example, if you work in San Francisco, then San Francisco would be your tax home, and you'd have to travel outside the city for it to qualify as "travel" by IRS standards. If you work in more than one location, then the place where you spend the majority of your time working is considered your tax home. You also have to be gone for longer than an ordinary day's work -- i.e., long enough that you need to sleep or rest away from your home.
Business travel, not surprisingly, must also somehow be related to your job. Going to a convention counts if the convention is related to, or somehow benefits, your work. For example, a dentist wouldn't be able to deduct the expenses of attending a scuba-diving convention, but a scuba instructor could get away with it. You can also deduct expenses for travel spent looking for a new job, as long as it's in the same line of work as your current job.
Source: Fool.com
