Some types of income you receive are not taxable. When you total your gross income to determine whether you are required to file a tax return, do not include your nontaxable income. You should keep records of your nontaxable income. Some types of income that generally are not taxable include:

• Child support payments,
• Welfare benefits,
• Life insurance proceeds received because of the death of an individual,
• Interest on certain state or local government obligations,
• Accident and health insurance proceeds, including certain long term care insurance contracts,
• Certain property received as a gift or inheritance,
• Benefits received under any law administered by the Department of Veteran's Affairs,
• Amounts received under a worker's compensation act for an occupational sickness or injury,
• Qualified education IRA distributions; refer to Tax Topic 451 for more information,
• Certain Roth IRA distributions; refer to Tax Topic 428 for more information,
• Certain amounts withdrawn from Medical Savings Accounts (MSA's) to pay medical expenses, and
• Limited amounts of dependent care assistance paid through a dependent care assistance program.

All or a portion of your Social Security or equivalent Railroad Retirement Benefits may be nontaxable. Refer to Tax Topic 423 for more information.

Some scholarship and fellowship grants may be non–taxable. For more information, refer to Tax Topic 421, Scholarship and Fellowship Grants.

Publication 525 (PDF), Taxable and Nontaxable Income, contains additional information on whether specific items of income are taxed.

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