Tax time is here! Are you deducting what you spend on being a DJ from your taxable income? If you ain’t you ought to be! Why give Uncle Sam, or your nation’s equivalent, any more of your money than you are required to give?

Since we’re DJs and not accountants, maybe some people reading this don’t know what you can and can’t do in terms of adjusting your taxable income if you are being paid for DJ work. I am writing today mostly for my American audience, but would love to hear in comments about tax laws outside the US, and if any of what I’ve written applies to your own country.

The main thing I’ll address today are write-offs. Those are expenses you incur that you can subtract from your taxable income. What does that mean? In simple terms, if you are paid $100 to DJ, and spend $10 on music that you play in your set, you only have to pay tax on $90. Your income of $100 has been adjusted down to $90. Make sense?

Be sure to save receipts for any and every expense you incur. Audits aren’t common, but if you do get audited, you will need to prove to the penny to the IRS that you really did spend what you said you spent, on what you said you spent it on. So SAVE THOSE RECEIPTS!

Music is the obvious write-off that comes to mind for DJs. What else can a DJ write off? Lots of things! Any money spent on equipment— controllers, cables, microphones, headphones, etc.— can be deducted. Sometimes, for expensive items you may want to write them off over time, which is called depreciation, but that’s uncommon for DJs, and something to discuss with an accountant if you think you may want to go that route.

What are some other things you may be able to write off?

1. A Home Office

If you work from home, sending emails or making calls to potential clients, and if you store your gear at home, you can write off a percentage of your rent or mortgage interest.

2. Phone Bills

You can write off part of your phone bill if you use the phone for business.

3. Internet

Same with the phone bill, if you are using your internet at home to conduct business, you can write off a portion of that bill.

4. Auto

Track each mile you drive for business and you can write off some income for that, too.

5. Subscriptions

Are you living in the stone age, and buying, or subscribing to, print magazines about music and/or DJ’ing? Are you paying any monthly memberships to DJ sites, DJ pools, etc.? You can write off the money you spend on such things.

6. Business Insurance

You are insured, aren’t you? You’d better be. And write off what you are spending on insurance.

7. A lot more!

Rather than provide a list of 50 things you can write off, realize that anything spent in the name of business may be fair game for a write off. Gear rentals, advertising expenses, a meal for your roadie, flowers sent to a client, money donated to a charity… any time you gave away money in exchange for some positive business-wise, be it tangible or not, you should track and write off the expense.