To give these folks something they don't deserve (an assumption of good faith, non-cynicism, benefit of the doubt, etc): they think "letting" the IRS do folks' taxes will lead to more taxes and poor, defenseless taxpayers simply won't have the courage to challenge a "bill" from the IRS.
Simple fix: let folks contest whatever final "pay this number and you're done" amount they get invoiced for & sear that into federal law. But you probably won't ever hear Grover and all the other looney tunes ever mention that.
They don't want easy, hassle-free IRS filing. It's an opportunity for people to be pissed (who wants to pay money for the government)
There's also talk about your taxes fitting on a postcard and that, as usual from the scumbags nominally in charge of our country, is bullshit too because it just conceals a ton of paperwork (source: https://www.accountingtoday.com/opinion/the-postcard-tax-ret...)
IIRC: In Norway, the government computes your taxes for you and you can approve of their work by text messaging.
In the US, taxes are complexified to hide welfare for the rich[0] and put a burden on the non-rich people that they must fill out complicated tax forms correctly "or else." 0: This isn't idle rhetoric: That's what campaign financing buys: favorable treatment and tax law chicanery. Does anyone think it's right billionaires should pay less taxes than their secretaries?
The IRS is working off of incomplete information about your income and eligibility for deductions. There is no way they can fill out a form under the current tax regime.
I agree with Norquist. You make things too easy, and people will just let it happen.
As someone who owns a business and has to make quarterly tax payments, paying taxes is painful. I know how much it costs me every time I write a check and I am very reticent to vote for any politician that thinks we should raise those taxes.
On the flip side, I have many friends whose taxes are just pulled out every paycheck. And at the end of the year, they get a tax refund. They act like the government is giving them money! Many don't even seem to realize that all they are getting is a repayment for an interest free loan they have been giving to one of the largest and wealthiest organization/government in the world.
I understand and agree that taxes are important, but if we make it too easy, we make people complacent and the next thing you know, we will wake up with a 75% tax rate.
This is the same reason I disagree with adding the tax in on product prices. People in other countries that do this don't realize how much of the price is going towards taxes - and to keep a government in check, information is key.
This is a great example of why the way in which politicians raise money and how they are lobbied is corruptive.
This is a case where quite easily 80% of their constituency would applaud the change. But a minor set of companies with an ability to contribute large sums of money (for or against) is able to influence something like this passing.
Citizens United and similar SCOTUS cases have made it even that much more unlikely that the situation will be improved any time soon.
"You sit down, review a prefilled filing from the government. If it’s accurate, you sign it. If it’s not, you fix it or ignore it altogether and prepare your return yourself. It’s your choice. You might not have to pay for an accountant, or fiddle for hours with complex software. It could all be over in minutes."
This is exactly how it works in Chile...since 2005!
Yes, this is a failing of Democracy as it currently works in the United States, because the money of large corporations has more say that the will of the people.
Unfortunately, it's true of so many aspects of American society right now that are in desperate need of reform or rebuild - education, health, roads, public transport, safety, just to name a few.
There are so many hundreds of billions of private profits tied up in these things they will never be allowed to improve.
If your elected officials refuse to accept corporate PAC money, thank them.
If your elected officials accept corporate PAC money, tell them to cut it out because you'll be supporting a primary challenger who refuses all corporate PAC donations...and then support a primary challenger who refuses all corporate PAC donations.
Having elected officials who reject all corporate PAC money isn't a panacea all on its own, but it's a great start.
I wish this would get a lot more attention. The world could be rather simple, majority of people would just be happy with a straight forward process. What annoys me is not the money I have to spend on filing taxes nor to pay my fair share, but the actual time I waste every year doing so.
The people who know and care most about the issue are the ones familiar with the tax system and who are able to game it to pay less in taxes than others. To me it looks like another case of concentrated benefits and diffuse costs, though the costs/benefits is remarkably high in this case.
This so much. I’m fine with taxes (I benefited a lot from services provided by them, when I needed). But the whole process is made complex for no good reason. I want to show to government all my money, have them tell me what I owe, and if I don’t agree, have an appeal process.
Out of curiosity, did you ever track down the reason of your miscalculation? I agree tax forms have many moving parts, but at the end of the day is math, so you should be able to exactly redo the calculations and see where you or TurboTax screwed up.
Interesting, I am self-employed and use TurboTax self-employed together with QuickBooks Self-Employed. While it does take a lot of time and energy to complete the process, I have not had any problems in terms of underpaying and getting notifications from the IRS.
Turbotax is awesome and I have never had the government come back and say I owe more. If that’s happening to you, you clearly aren’t doing your taxes correctly.
In Germany this year a law passed that while a bit vague mandates all banks by the end of this year provide an external API to at least their current accounts (checking accounts). This is PSD2. Imagine if the same could be done in the states and the reaction of banks: I doubt American banks would like to become dumb pipes to allow fintech firms to build value on top of them. I see these tax preparers no different. And I hope one day a truly simple and free tax return process actually takes hold.
Because of PSD2 some banks in Europe are finally investing in their own apps, analytics etc. to create more value for customer, or invest in third-party apps like Tink.
The article doesn't show evidence that the lobbying was effective. The tax prep industry wanted the Free File Act passed to prohibit the IRS from implementing automatic tax filing. Senator Warren introduced a bill to require the IRS to make automatic tax filing available.
"Neither Warren’s bill [the good act] nor the Free File Act [the evil act] made it out of committee."
I always thought that's the case, because there's absolutely no reason it has to be that complicated, or for them (goverment) not to do what companies like TurboTax do themselves.
The IRS is already doing your taxes in the first place. That is how they know when you didn't include a job etc. They run the numbers to check against. There is no reason that this can't be the default for 95% of citizens. Want to amend the numbers the IRS came up with? Just file your own taxes that year.
There is a lot of evidence from other countries too. In Australia, the Government provides a free web app (used to be a Windows/Mac app) where you can file your taxes. 90% of people can just check that the income figures reported by employers are right, maybe throw in some deductions and click 'file'. You get a refund transferred and a receipt (or bill) by email within the next two weeks.
It basically does everything that an individual could need to do, although you can go to an accountant if you want (if you can't be bothered, or have particularly complex things you need advice on).
FYI, Credit Karma is providing free online tax filing regardless of your income.
In general, I think online tools become worth their cost when you are claiming mutliple deductions and have income from various sources across more than one state. Otherwise, the 1040EZ is where you should start.
Well, it's good that your doing your homework on it first. Because, once you start using one, the cost of switching rises a bit because each year, they have youre last years info which comes in handy quite a bit: they can pre-fill out some of your stuff like addresses, employers, name, ssn, etc. Also, look for one that doesn't raise your rate once you start using it for a few years: some of them do that.
Just fill out form 1040, the IRS provides instruction booklet on how to fill it out. Both the form and the instructions are available on their website. Then use software (I reccomend taxhawk, don't overpay for turbotax) and compare the 1040 they generated with your manual 1040. If they match, great. If not, figure out why.
Have done MA's (now-defunct) free e-file and NY state's paper form.
Don't do it, it's a massive waste of time and energy and the chance for human error is massive. I only did mine because Oracle and ADP issued me a completely incorrect W2 and TurboTax doesn't let you submit it with incorrect wages reported.
Luckily though I got all my money back in like 2 months
Last year I tried out all the major offerings, and TurboTax was the only one that worked without any issues. TaxAct didn't even manage to fix their broken electronic import of broker data until some point in March or April.
Making taxes easier is something both sides of the aisle politically should agree on. Doing taxes, especially being a small business owner is way too complicated. While the Tax Cuts and Jobs Act of 2017 did make improvements, especially for standard W2 employees, my taxes for 2018 are still going to take me days to aggregate, complete, and file.
Like most engineers I'm in favor of automation. Besides the already mentioned open source software for tax filing, are there any tax filing companies that do not lobby the government or contribute money against prefilling our forms? If so I'd love to give them my business.
> Intuit spent more than $2 million lobbying last year, much of it spent on legislation that would permanently bar the government from offering taxpayers prefilled returns. H&R Block spent $3 million, also directing some of their efforts towards the bill.
Not only this is an example of a broken system but also shows how fragile it is. You only need $5m to sabotage the advancement of the system and waste millions of productive man hours.
Other than the fact that it costs time and money to write this software? And as other commenters have mentioned, people have tried to do this in the spirit of “open source”. It’s just that the problem it’s solving is something that can be viewed as an artificial one.
Posts like this come around every year. There is a belief held by some that we should avoid making taxes easier to file. We shouldn't just take the number given to us by our government. Some believe filing a tax return should be an explicit process so we are conscious of government burden.
Also, a more practical reason. The government can't tell you all of the deductions you are entitled to.
The whole reasoning behind not prefilling makes no sense. The government tells you what it knows and you can then amned the return in whatever way you wish, e.g. deductions. There really is nothing negative for the tax payer as far as I can tell.
[+] [-] grovernorquista|7 years ago|reply
It's Grover Norquist: https://www.huffingtonpost.com/grover-norquist/grover-norqui...
To give these folks something they don't deserve (an assumption of good faith, non-cynicism, benefit of the doubt, etc): they think "letting" the IRS do folks' taxes will lead to more taxes and poor, defenseless taxpayers simply won't have the courage to challenge a "bill" from the IRS.
Simple fix: let folks contest whatever final "pay this number and you're done" amount they get invoiced for & sear that into federal law. But you probably won't ever hear Grover and all the other looney tunes ever mention that.
They don't want easy, hassle-free IRS filing. It's an opportunity for people to be pissed (who wants to pay money for the government)
There's also talk about your taxes fitting on a postcard and that, as usual from the scumbags nominally in charge of our country, is bullshit too because it just conceals a ton of paperwork (source: https://www.accountingtoday.com/opinion/the-postcard-tax-ret...)
[+] [-] heyjudy|7 years ago|reply
In the US, taxes are complexified to hide welfare for the rich[0] and put a burden on the non-rich people that they must fill out complicated tax forms correctly "or else." 0: This isn't idle rhetoric: That's what campaign financing buys: favorable treatment and tax law chicanery. Does anyone think it's right billionaires should pay less taxes than their secretaries?
[+] [-] unknown|7 years ago|reply
[deleted]
[+] [-] kevin_thibedeau|7 years ago|reply
[+] [-] jjeaff|7 years ago|reply
As someone who owns a business and has to make quarterly tax payments, paying taxes is painful. I know how much it costs me every time I write a check and I am very reticent to vote for any politician that thinks we should raise those taxes.
On the flip side, I have many friends whose taxes are just pulled out every paycheck. And at the end of the year, they get a tax refund. They act like the government is giving them money! Many don't even seem to realize that all they are getting is a repayment for an interest free loan they have been giving to one of the largest and wealthiest organization/government in the world.
I understand and agree that taxes are important, but if we make it too easy, we make people complacent and the next thing you know, we will wake up with a 75% tax rate.
This is the same reason I disagree with adding the tax in on product prices. People in other countries that do this don't realize how much of the price is going towards taxes - and to keep a government in check, information is key.
[+] [-] bluejekyll|7 years ago|reply
This is a case where quite easily 80% of their constituency would applaud the change. But a minor set of companies with an ability to contribute large sums of money (for or against) is able to influence something like this passing.
Citizens United and similar SCOTUS cases have made it even that much more unlikely that the situation will be improved any time soon.
[+] [-] fmardones|7 years ago|reply
This is exactly how it works in Chile...since 2005!
[+] [-] grecy|7 years ago|reply
Unfortunately, it's true of so many aspects of American society right now that are in desperate need of reform or rebuild - education, health, roads, public transport, safety, just to name a few.
There are so many hundreds of billions of private profits tied up in these things they will never be allowed to improve.
[+] [-] aaronbrethorst|7 years ago|reply
If your elected officials accept corporate PAC money, tell them to cut it out because you'll be supporting a primary challenger who refuses all corporate PAC donations...and then support a primary challenger who refuses all corporate PAC donations.
Having elected officials who reject all corporate PAC money isn't a panacea all on its own, but it's a great start.
[+] [-] kerng|7 years ago|reply
[+] [-] Symmetry|7 years ago|reply
[+] [-] justapassenger|7 years ago|reply
[+] [-] nojvek|7 years ago|reply
How does one even file free taxes in the US? I’d love to do that. I used to do my own taxes in Australia.
I tried to do some googling around to no avail.
[+] [-] omarforgotpwd|7 years ago|reply
[+] [-] dTal|7 years ago|reply
[+] [-] paul7986|7 years ago|reply
Each year either the state or federal come back to me saying I didnt pay what I fully owed them. Now with a pre-filled return from the fed I'd know.
Hopefully more TurboTax customers hear of this and boycott them as well!
[+] [-] deanmoriarty|7 years ago|reply
[+] [-] nodesocket|7 years ago|reply
[+] [-] cristianMD|7 years ago|reply
[+] [-] briandear|7 years ago|reply
[+] [-] gigatexal|7 years ago|reply
[+] [-] dmitriid|7 years ago|reply
But yeah, in the US it would cause an uproar.
[+] [-] icebraining|7 years ago|reply
[+] [-] Meekro|7 years ago|reply
"Neither Warren’s bill [the good act] nor the Free File Act [the evil act] made it out of committee."
Sounds more like the do-nothing Congress at work.
[+] [-] piyush_soni|7 years ago|reply
[+] [-] downrightmike|7 years ago|reply
[+] [-] stephen_g|7 years ago|reply
It basically does everything that an individual could need to do, although you can go to an accountant if you want (if you can't be bothered, or have particularly complex things you need advice on).
[+] [-] datavirtue|7 years ago|reply
[deleted]
[+] [-] elektor|7 years ago|reply
I’ve always relied on family members and want to take a crack at it.
[+] [-] brownbat|7 years ago|reply
http://opentaxsolver.sourceforge.net/
Just noting it, not advising or recommending anything -- whether this is wise or not definitely depends on your own particular situation.
[+] [-] freddie_mercury|7 years ago|reply
[+] [-] Cyph0n|7 years ago|reply
In general, I think online tools become worth their cost when you are claiming mutliple deductions and have income from various sources across more than one state. Otherwise, the 1040EZ is where you should start.
[+] [-] pascalxus|7 years ago|reply
[+] [-] astura|7 years ago|reply
[+] [-] anoncoward111|7 years ago|reply
Don't do it, it's a massive waste of time and energy and the chance for human error is massive. I only did mine because Oracle and ADP issued me a completely incorrect W2 and TurboTax doesn't let you submit it with incorrect wages reported.
Luckily though I got all my money back in like 2 months
[+] [-] sergers|7 years ago|reply
In Canada there are free options to file your taxes, and ability to pull in last year/ current info if signing into your CRA account.
I used to use studiotax, but last year started using simpletax.
Essentially I sign in, and then sign into my cra account, it has all my info prepoluated.
I don't understand why the govt cant just file my taxes for me when they already have the info
[+] [-] unknown|7 years ago|reply
[deleted]
[+] [-] kwhitefoot|7 years ago|reply
Her, Norway, and in the UK, most people never have to fill in anything.
[+] [-] shmerl|7 years ago|reply
[+] [-] gst|7 years ago|reply
Last year I tried out all the major offerings, and TurboTax was the only one that worked without any issues. TaxAct didn't even manage to fix their broken electronic import of broker data until some point in March or April.
[+] [-] nodesocket|7 years ago|reply
[+] [-] aynawn|7 years ago|reply
[+] [-] csomar|7 years ago|reply
Not only this is an example of a broken system but also shows how fragile it is. You only need $5m to sabotage the advancement of the system and waste millions of productive man hours.
[+] [-] anonymous5133|7 years ago|reply
[+] [-] saagarjha|7 years ago|reply
[+] [-] unknown|7 years ago|reply
[deleted]
[+] [-] charliebrownau|7 years ago|reply
[deleted]
[+] [-] crisdux|7 years ago|reply
Also, a more practical reason. The government can't tell you all of the deductions you are entitled to.
[+] [-] maxxxxx|7 years ago|reply
[+] [-] unknown|7 years ago|reply
[deleted]