Apply District of Columbia, Georgia and Idaho rules for a filer who can be claimed as a dependent

[MaxGhenis]

Summary

Outside the federal filing exception, a return on which the filer, or on a joint return either spouse, can be claimed as a dependent on another return has no dependents (IRC 152(b)(1); Publication 501, Dependent Taxpayer Test), and a childless filer who can be claimed gets no EITC (IRC 32(c)(1)(A)(ii)(III)). The District of Columbia, Georgia and Idaho also have their own claimable-filer rules. Georgia's HB 162 rebate and low-income credit read claimed_as_dependent_on_another_return; other dependency gates use claimability and the federal filing-exception helpers as described below.

Originally stacked on federal claimable-filer PR #10087 (claimable-filer-federal, head 35a2cbc, itself stacked on #10024). Those changes are now on main, this PR targets main, and the landing dependency on #10051 remains. The rules read the federal branch's inputs by the law's wording: "no dependents" (IRC 152(b)(1)) and the childless EITC bar read head_or_spouse_is_dependent_elsewhere_without_filing_exception (the Publication 501 exception restores the dependents); "was claimed" reads claimed_as_dependent_on_another_return (Georgia HB 162); "can claim you" reads claimable_as_dependent_on_another_return (Idaho's food credit); Georgia's low income credit reads both claimability and actual claim because its exclusion covers either; DC's "was a dependent" reads is_dependent_elsewhere_without_filing_exception. A companion PR applies the same rules in Colorado, Connecticut, Illinois and Indiana: #10049. The federal branch left Georgia's low income credit and 2026 child credit unchanged for this PR to decide; both are decided below.

Formula	Rule now	Source
dc_ptc (Schedule H)	Needs a filer who was not a dependent, or is 65 or older, to be the claimant; on a joint return the other spouse can be	D.C. Code 47-1806.06(k): "No credit shall be allowed ... for any year during which the person claiming the credit was a dependent ... unless ... 65 years of age or older"; (b)(4): one claimant per tax filing unit. New parameter ptc/dependent_claimant_min_age (65), distinct from the age-70 elderly rate, and new variable dc_ptc_has_eligible_claimant.
dc_eitc_without_qualifying_child	No childless credit when either filer can be claimed outside the filing exception	47-1806.04(f) keeps the IRC 32 framework; 2025 D-40 booklet, p.24
dc_kccatc	No child on such a return	47-1806.15(a)(3), (d)(1): the child must be claimed "as a dependent on the taxpayer's federal and District income tax returns"
dc_ctc_eligible_child	No child on such a return	47-1806.17(a): a child "for which the taxpayer is allowed a deduction under section 151"
ga_exemptions	No dependent exemption on such a return; the 2021-2023 personal exemption stays	2025 IT-511, p.16: "Georgia follows the Federal rules for qualified dependents"; DOR: a filer claimed by a parent should "claim one exemption for yourself" (FAQ)
ga_low_income_credit_potential	Needs a filer who cannot be claimed; a joint return keeps both spouse units; no child units on such a return	O.C.G.A. 48-7A-3(a): "each resident taxpayer ... who is not claimed or is not otherwise eligible to be claimed as a dependent ... may claim", and "A husband and wife filing a joint return shall each be deemed a dependent for purposes of such joint return" (HB 1069 (2010) sec. 5, printed p.1172); 2025 IT-511, p.17; see reading 1
ga_surplus_tax_rebate (HB 162, 2021 returns)	A filer actually claimed for 2021 qualifies only with own 2021 earned income (reads the claim input, so a filer who can be claimed but was not keeps it); a joint return gets the joint amount while either spouse qualifies	O.C.G.A. 48-7-20.2(a)(1)(B), (a)(2) (signed HB 162, p.1-2): excludes an "Individual who was claimed as a dependent", restored "provided that such individual had earned income"; see reading 2
id_grocery_credit	Leaves out each filer who can be claimed; the other spouse keeps theirs; dependent children are excluded unless the filing exception restores them	Idaho Code 63-3024A(1), (4): a credit for "the taxpayer, the taxpayer's spouse, and each dependent", never twice for the same personal exemption; 2025 instructions, p.13-14: "You can't claim this credit if someone else, such as a parent, can claim you as a dependent", and the worksheet counts yourself, spouse and dependents separately; see reading 3
id_household_and_dependent_care_expense_deduction	Needs an IRC 21(b)(1) qualifying individual in the household and qualifying care expenses (so none for a child under 13 on such a return; a disabled dependent still counts)	Idaho Code 63-3022D: for "an individual who maintains a household that includes as a member one (1) or more qualifying individuals, as defined in section 21(b)(1)". The $12,000 cap (2023+) let the deduction run with no qualifying individual at all; that also changes households with nobody claimed (see the microsimulation). Expenses now use the qualifying-childcare helper plus adult care, excluding child-only care even when an adult keeps the qualifying-individual gate open (IRC 21(b)(2); Idaho worksheet, PDF p.44).
id_2022_rebate_floor (2022 rebate on 2020 returns)	$75 per taxpayer, including one who can be claimed; dependents only when no filer can be claimed	Idaho Code 63-3024B(3): "seventy-five dollars ($75.00) per taxpayer and each dependent"

Three contributed reforms replace changed formulas and now keep the same rule, with regression cases: Georgia's dependent exemption reform (at its defaults it matches the baseline), DC's property tax credit reform (both branches keep the Schedule H claimant bar), and the DC KCCATC reform's inactive fallback.

Rows from the audit that need no change here:

• Already zero through the federal branch: DC's and Georgia's child care credits (they match the federal credit) and Idaho's 2021-2025 child tax credit (it reads the federal child test, and the worksheet requires a dependent child). YAML cases here confirm all three.
• Georgia 2026 child tax credit: no added dependency bar, with the inherited IRC 24(h)(7) SSN gate retained. O.C.G.A. 48-7-29.27 (HB 136, p.3) incorporates IRC 24(c) and supplies its own one-claimant and custodial-waiver rules. This PR keeps the federal branch's dependency choice, which remains unsettled, and separately keeps the identification helper implementing IRC 24(h)(7). The $250 claim-pattern cases use an SSN-eligible child; an otherwise qualifying ITIN child receives $0. Reading 4 presents both choices separately.
• Georgia's itemizer credit (O.C.G.A. 48-7-27.1, "$300.00 per taxpayer") and DC's 2025+ standard deduction have no claimable-filer rule.

Not modeled (no new programs here): Georgia's HB 1302, HB 112 and HB 1000 surplus refunds (actual-claim exclusions for 2020, 2023 and 2024), Idaho's Parental Choice credit and actual-food-tax option, Idaho's 2021 rebate, and DC's Schedule L.

Readings for Max (queue via the US + core hub)

1. Georgia low income credit, one claimable spouse. This PR follows 48-7A-3(a)'s per-taxpayer eligibility and its joint-spouse deeming: $52 in the test household (two $26 units). Alternatives: $26 (only the qualifying spouse's unit) or $0 (the joint return as one claimant). A household with both spouses claimable, or a claimable single filer, gets $0 either way.
2. Georgia HB 162 refund, one claimed spouse without earnings. Per qualified taxpayer: $500 (the joint cap once). Alternatives: $0 (both spouses must qualify) or $250 (no textual basis for halving).
3. Idaho food tax credit, one claimable spouse. Per person, following the statute and the per-person worksheet: $155 in 2025 without a restored dependent. Alternative: Form 40's line 12(c) instruction to enter zero on the credit line read as barring the whole joint return: $0. That instruction has no express single/separate-only restriction. A claimable filer with the federal filing exception can restore a dependent child; with an independent spouse, the selected per-person rule then gives $310.
4. Georgia 2026 child tax credit: two separate readings. Dependency: the selected reading adds no dependency bar to the IRC 24(c) child test, giving an SSN-eligible child $250 even on a return with a claimable filer. Alternative: require an allowable dependent, giving $0 on that return; the implications of IRC 24(c)(2) remain unsettled. ITIN children: the code separately retains the inherited IRC 24(h)(7) SSN gate, giving an otherwise qualifying resident child under six with an ITIN $0. Alternative: apply 24(c) only and give $250. HB 136, p.3 incorporates 24(c); 24(h)(7) supplies the separate SSN restriction. Both choices are queued for Max; this revision changes disclosure, not either code selection.
5. DC Schedule H. 47-1806.06 bars a claimant who "was a dependent"; this PR reads that as claimable and lets either eligible joint spouse be the claimant. Alternatives: the instructions' actual-claim reading (so a claimable but unclaimed filer keeps the credit), or barring the whole joint return. The code also extends the federal Publication 501 filing exception to Schedule H; that extension remains unconfirmed. Separately, the model pools rent and property tax across a joint filing unit, while subsection (b)(8) defines rent by the claimant's payments. With $10,000 rent split evenly and one excluded spouse, pooling gives $1,425; using only the eligible claimant's $5,000 gives $700. Pooling excluded spouses' payments also remains unconfirmed. The existing tests put rent on the eligible spouse and do not settle that choice.
6. DC childless EITC on a joint return. Barred when either spouse can be claimed without the filing exception, as Make rules for a filer claimed elsewhere independent of which spouse is labelled head #10024 does federally. The D-40 worksheet asks only unmarried filers and married filers "not filing with your spouse"; that omission is real, but 47-1806.04 incorporates the federal framework supporting the either-spouse bar. The review did not establish a separate substantive statutory choice from the worksheet omission.
7. DC 2026 child tax credit amount. Separate from this PR's dependency rule and unchanged amount parameters: D.C. Law 26-89 states $1,000 for 2026 and a 225-day duration. Its operative applicability for 2026 remains unresolved. The prior research lane proposed provisional $0 pending permanent enactment, but the review did not verify $0 as a settled legal alternative.
8. Georgia HB 162 earnings netting. The code requires combined wages and self-employment income to be positive after netting losses. For an actually claimed filer with $1,000 wages, a $1,000 business loss and enough liability, the selected reading gives $0. Alternative: any wages satisfy the earnings condition, giving $250. HB 162, p.2 restores an otherwise excluded filer with earned income but does not expressly resolve this netting question; no HB 162-specific authority resolving it was found. Code unchanged.

Invariants

1. Swap invariance. Exchanging the two adults' head/spouse labels leaves every changed output unchanged. Generated populations vary claimability, actual claim and the federal filing exception independently within their consistency constraints: an actual claim requires claimability and precludes the filing exception.
2. Monotonicity. In the legacy fallback population (claimability follows actual claim, no filing exception), marking another filer as claimed never raises a changed output, except the Georgia HB 162 refund and Idaho 2022 rebate, which are capped by or scale with a state liability that losing dependent exemptions can raise.
3. Identities. When head_or_spouse_is_dependent_elsewhere_without_filing_exception is true, a return has no DC keep child care affordable credit or child tax credit and at most one filer's Idaho food tax credit. The federal filing exception can restore dependent children, so the DC zero identities and Idaho one-person ceiling do not apply when that helper is false; explicit cases cover both head/spouse labellings, including Idaho's $310 spouse-plus-child credit. A return on which every filer can be claimed has no Georgia low income credit.
4. Unchanged when nobody is claimed, except Idaho's care deduction, which now also needs a qualifying individual.

Tests

• YAML: variable-named cases for every changed formula: a single claimable filer, a joint return with one claimable spouse under both head/spouse labellings, both spouses claimable, and nobody claimable, plus counterexamples (a claimable filer aged 65 keeps Schedule H; care for a disabled dependent stays deductible; a claimed filer with earnings keeps the HB 162 refund; a two-return household). Four existing Idaho care-deduction cases gained count_cdcc_eligible: 1, since the statute needs a qualifying individual; no expected value changed. All 233 cases in the 17 changed YAML files pass; counts are recorded below.
• Property test policyengine_us/tests/core/test_claimable_filer_dc_ga_id_invariants.py reuses check_swap/check_monotone from the federal invariants test in DC, Georgia and Idaho for 2021, 2023, 2025 and 2026: Hypothesis batches vary claimability, actual claim and the filing exception independently while checking invariants 1 and 3; a seeded population checks 1-3. Explicit filing-exception cases cover both adult labellings. It caught a person/tax-unit broadcast in dc_kccatc that one-return YAML cases cannot. All 7 cases pass; the original 5-case baseline and added-case resource measurements are recorded below.

Microsimulation impact

Not run in review r1; microsimulation remains with the US + core hub.

Follow-ups

• ga_itemizer_credit_potential cites O.C.G.A. 48-7-29.23, which is the teacher recruitment credit; the itemizer credit is 48-7-27.1 (citation only; the formula matches it).
• Idaho's child tax credit ended after 2025 and Colorado's family affordability credit is paused for 2026: Pause Colorado's family affordability credit in 2026 and leave Idaho's expired child tax credit out of 2026 totals #10051.

axiom: TheAxiomFoundation/rulespec-us#1701 queued (DC1: Schedule H claimant, childless EITC, KCCATC, child tax credit child) | TheAxiomFoundation/rulespec-us#1702 queued (GA1: dependent exemption, low income credit, IRC 24(c) 2026 child credit) | TheAxiomFoundation/rulespec-us#1703 queued (ID1: food tax credit, household and dependent care deduction) | GA HB 162 refund n/a: expired and unencoded | ID 2022 rebate n/a: expired and unencoded; none encoded-correct

Merge with main after #10087

Merged main after #10087's squash merge, preserving this PR's District of Columbia, Georgia and Idaho changes.

• Took main unchanged for inherited federal conflicts in ca_cdcc_relevant_expenses.yaml, nm_medical_expense_credit.py, nm_medical_expense_credit.yaml, va_low_income_tax_credit_eligible.py, va_low_income_tax_credit_eligible.yaml, and policy/contrib/states/hi/dependent_exemption_reform_test.yaml; these files were unchanged by this PR against its federal base.
• Kept this PR's ga_ctc_eligible_child.py, ga_low_income_credit_potential.py, and ga_ctc.yaml; main matched the federal base in these files.
• Combined main's 2021 care corrections/regressions with all this PR's claimable-filer cases and fixtures in dc_cdcc.yaml, ga_cdcc.yaml, and id_household_and_dependent_care_expense_deduction.yaml, including main's corrected Idaho $14,000 expectation and ARPA cases.
• Retained main's deletion of the inherited claimable-filer-federal.fixed.md and head-dependent-elsewhere-swap.fixed.md changelog fragments.

That merge retained the original 35 changed paths. For review r1, merged main again at f9b55fc4dd05f1bed921a4dd06cb8c81f6ceb2c7 without conflicts; the Idaho correction and review changes remain within those paths.

Review r1: responses

Review finding	Response
Idaho mixed care expenses	Use cdcc_qualifying_childcare_expenses plus adult-care expenses. The new student-filer case has $20,000 earnings, a five-year-old child, a qualifying disabled adult, $10,000 child-only daycare and $1,000 adult care; its deduction is $1,000.
Property identities omit filing exception	Qualify the DC zero-credit identities and Idaho ceiling on head_or_spouse_is_dependent_elsewhere_without_filing_exception; vary claimability, actual claim and the exception independently, and pin restored-dependent cases under both adult labels.
Georgia CTC SSN gate omitted from methodology	Retain the code and disclose the inherited 24(h)(7) restriction separately from dependency. Reading 4 now offers the ITIN-child $0/$250 choice as well as the dependency choice, citing HB 136 p.3.
Opening input claim	Correct the statement: Georgia's rebate and low-income formulas read actual claim.
Georgia asymmetric rebate fixture	Add the swapped both-claimed case with earnings only on the head, preserving $500.
Duplicate HB 162 citation	Remove the duplicate formula reference.
HB 162 net earnings reading absent	Add reading 8: $1,000 wages offset by a $1,000 business loss gives $0 under the retained net-income test, versus $250 under an any-wages reading. Code unchanged.
Reading qualifications	Remove the unsupported Idaho single/separate-only layout claim; distinguish the DC worksheet omission from a statutory choice; identify Schedule H's filing-exception extension and payment pooling as unconfirmed; keep the DC 2026 amount applicability unresolved.

REVIEW_R1_TEST_All 233 cases in the 17 changed YAML files pass; counts are recorded below.

This PR remains a draft.

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