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Section B of the Tax Computation Worksheet, to figure your tax. Spouse died. If your spouse died during the year, you are considered married for the whole year and can choose married filing jointly as your filing status. See Spouse died during the year, under Married persons, earlier. If your spouse died in 2015 before filing a 2014 return, you can choose married filing jointly as your filing status on your 2014 return. Divorced persons. If you are divorced under a final decree by the last day of the year, you are considered unmarried for the whole year and you cannot choose married filing jointly as your filing status. Filing a Joint Return Both you and your spouse must include all of your income, exemptions, and deductions on your joint return. Accounting period. Both of you must use the same accounting period, but you can use differ ent accounting methods. Joint responsibility. Both of you may be held responsible, jointly and individually, for the tax and any interest or penalty due on your joint re turn. This means that if one spouse does not pay the tax due, the other may have to. Or, if one spouse does not report the correct tax, both spouses may be responsible for any addi tional taxes assessed by the IRS. One spouse may be held responsible for all the tax due even if all the income was earned by the other spouse. You may want to file separately if: You believe your spouse is not reporting all of his or her income, or You do not want to be responsible for any taxes due if your spouse does not have enough tax withheld or does not pay enough estimated tax. Divorced taxpayer. You may be held jointly and individually responsible for any tax, interest, and penalties due on a joint return filed before your divorce. This responsibility may ap ply even if your divorce decree states that your former spouse will be responsible for any amounts due on previously filed joint returns. Relief from joint responsibility. In some cases, one spouse may be relieved of joint re sponsibility for tax, interest, and penalties on a joint return for items of the other spouse that were incorrectly reported on the joint return. You can ask for relief no matter how small the liability. There are three types of relief available. 1. Innocent spouse relief. 2. Separation of liability (available only to joint filers who are divorced, widowed, le gally separated, or who have not lived to gether for the 12 months ending on the date the election for this relief is filed). 3. Equitable relief. You must file Form 8857, Request for Inno cent Spouse Relief, to request relief from joint responsibility. Publication 971, Innocent Spouse Relief, explains the kinds of relief and who may qualify for them. Signing a joint return. For a return to be con sidered a joint return, both spouses generally must sign the return. Spouse died before signing. If your spouse died before signing the return, the exec utor or administrator must sign the return for your spouse. If neither you nor anyone else has been appointed as executor or administrator, you can sign the return for your spouse and en ter “Filing as surviving spouse” in the area where you sign the return. Spouse away from home. If your spouse is away from home, you should prepare the re turn, sign it, and send it to your spouse to sign so it can be filed on time. Injury or disease prevents signing. If your spouse cannot sign because of injury or disease and tells you to sign for him or her, you can sign your spouse's name in the proper space on the return followed by the words “By (your name), Husband (or Wife).” Be sure to also sign in the space provided for your signa ture. Attach a dated statement, signed by you, to the return. The statement should include the form number of the return you are filing, the tax year, and the reason your spouse cannot sign, and should state that your spouse has agreed to your signing for him or her. Signing as guardian of spouse. If you are the guardian of your spouse who is mentally in competent, you can sign the return for your spouse as guardian. Spouse in combat zone. You can sign a joint return for your spouse if your spouse can not sign because he or she is serving in a com bat zone (such as the Persian Gulf area, Serbia, Montenegro, Albania, or Afghanistan), even if you do not have a power of attorney or other statement. Attach a signed statement to your return explaining that your spouse is serving in a combat zone. For more information on special tax rules for persons who are serving in a com bat zone, or who are in missing status as a re sult of serving in a combat zone, see Publica tion 3, Armed Forces' Tax Guide. Other reasons spouse cannot sign. If your spouse cannot sign the joint return for any other reason, you can sign for your spouse only if you are given a valid power of attorney (a le gal document giving you permission to act for your spouse). Attach the power of attorney (or a copy of it) to your tax return. You can use Form 2848. Nonresident alien or dual-status alien. Gen erally, a married couple cannot file a joint return if either one is a nonresident alien at any time during the tax year. However, if one spouse was a nonresident alien or dualstatus alien who was married to a U.S. citizen or resident alien at the end of the year, the spouses can choose to file a joint return. If you do file a joint return, you and your spouse are both treated as U.S. residents for the entire tax year. See chap ter 1 of Publication 519. Married Filing Separately You can choose married filing separately as your filing status if you are married. This filing status may benefit you if you want to be respon sible only for your own tax or if it results in less tax than filing a joint return. If you and your spouse do not agree to file a joint return, you must use this filing status un less you qualify for head of household status, discussed later. You may be able to choose head of house hold filing status if you are considered unmar ried because you live apart from your spouse and meet certain tests (explained later, under Head of Household). This can apply to you even if you are not divorced or legally separa ted. If you qualify to file as head of household, instead of as married filing separately, your tax may be lower, you may be able to claim the earned income credit and certain other credits, and your standard deduction will be higher. The head of household filing status allows you to choose the standard deduction even if your spouse chooses to itemize deductions. See Head of Household, later, for more information. You will generally pay more combined tax on separate returns than you would on a joint return for the reasons listed under Special Rules, later. However, un- less you are required to file separately, you should figure your tax both ways (on a joint re- turn and on separate returns). This way you can make sure you are using the filing status that re- sults in the lowest combined tax. When figuring the combined tax of a married couple, you may want to consider state taxes as well as federal taxes. How to file. If you file a separate return, you generally report only your own income, exemp tions, credits, and deductions. You can claim an exemption for your spouse only if your spouse had no gross income, is not filing a return, and was not the dependent of another person. You can file Form 1040. If your taxable in come is less than $100,000, you may be able to file Form 1040A. Select this filing status by checking the box on line 3 of either form. Enter your spouse's full name and SSN or ITIN in the spaces provided. If your spouse does not have and is not required to have an SSN or ITIN, en ter “NRA” in the space for your spouse's SSN. Use the Married filing separately column of the Tax Table or Section C of the Tax Computation Worksheet to figure your tax. Special Rules If you choose married filing separately as your filing status, the following special rules apply. Because of these special rules, you usually pay more tax on a separate return than if you use another filing status you qualify for. 1. Your tax rate generally is higher than on a joint return. 2. Your exemption amount for figuring the al ternative minimum tax is half that allowed on a joint return. TIP Publication 501 (2014) Page 7