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Intuit Will Sell Off Quicken

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Re: Intuit Will Sell Off Quicken

#11

Post by x5n1 »

tptacek wrote: post #10
x5n1 wrote: post #9

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Mostly because no one has done it yet, and congressmen are much more open to corporate lobbying and serving elite and business interests than they are interested in serving the people, mostly because the government wants taxes. Taxes come from business, and business often comes from making things that should be easier harder. In a world of perfect competition everything would cost next to nothing and profits would be…

It is certainly not the case that conservatives, who make up roughly half the government and who apparently constitute the bulk of opposition to return-free filing, want more taxes. The belief that Americans are over-taxed defines almost half of American conservative ideology.

There is wanting taxes, and then there is wanting taxes. One is the tax rate, and other is how much business is done. The logic goes that if the government generates more jobs through lower business tax then they can get more revenue from the income tax. I guess I should restate and say that the government wants more revenue, whichever way it comes in and is more amenable to policies that produces more revenue for itself and for business in the country.

Re: Intuit Will Sell Off Quicken

#12

Post by tptacek »

x5n1 wrote: post #11
tptacek wrote: post #10

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It is certainly not the case that conservatives, who make up roughly half the government and who apparently constitute the bulk of opposition to return-free filing, want more taxes. The belief that Americans are over-taxed defines almost half of American conservative ideology.

There is wanting taxes, and then there is wanting taxes. One is the tax rate, and other is how much business is done. The logic goes that if the government generates more jobs through lower business tax then they can get more revenue from the income tax. I guess I should restate and say that the government wants more revenue, whichever way it comes in and is more amenable to policies that produces more revenue for it…

Ok, I'm being repetitive but also trying to simplify:

Conservatives make up the core opposition to return-free filing.

Conservatives definitionally do not want more taxation, or complicated taxation.

So I'm not sure the notion that Intuit's lobbying has killed return-free filing holds up.

Re: Intuit Will Sell Off Quicken

#14

Post by makomk »

tptacek wrote: post #12
x5n1 wrote: post #11

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There is wanting taxes, and then there is wanting taxes. One is the tax rate, and other is how much business is done. The logic goes that if the government generates more jobs through lower business tax then they can get more revenue from the income tax. I guess I should restate and say that the government wants more revenue, whichever way it comes in and is more amenable to policies that produces more revenue for it…

Ok, I'm being repetitive but also trying to simplify: Conservatives make up the core opposition to return-free filing. Conservatives definitionally do not want more taxation, or complicated taxation. So I'm not sure the notion that Intuit's lobbying has killed return-free filing holds up.

Conservatives want lower tax rates. One common conservative argument is that if you tax less, businesses will expand more and you may even make more in taxes overall.

Re: Intuit Will Sell Off Quicken

#15

Post by monkeybad »

weinzierl wrote: post #4
femto113 wrote: post #3

Doesn't say in the article but I assume they are keeping Mint? Desktop apps like Quicken (and the similar Microsoft Money) were dead to me the minute that came on the scene (almost 9 years ago at this point).

I'm a happy user of many web-based services, but why would anyone give all their personal financial data to single company? Ok, the success of Mint proves me wrong, I just don't get it. It's not only that they can use your data to build and sell a profile, there is a realistic chance that the data gets leaked.

Because it's extremely convenient, and they provide a useful service? The trade-off between someone else doing work for you, so you can do something else you want to do, is never going away.

Re: Intuit Will Sell Off Quicken

#16

Post by VLM »

weinzierl wrote: post #4
femto113 wrote: post #3

Doesn't say in the article but I assume they are keeping Mint? Desktop apps like Quicken (and the similar Microsoft Money) were dead to me the minute that came on the scene (almost 9 years ago at this point).

I'm a happy user of many web-based services, but why would anyone give all their personal financial data to single company? Ok, the success of Mint proves me wrong, I just don't get it. It's not only that they can use your data to build and sell a profile, there is a realistic chance that the data gets leaked.

The other response cover the WTF WRT specifically web based company, I propose the general response of people aspire to getting actionable analysis. Companies don't actually have to provide actionable measurable quantitative analysis results, they just have to promise it could happen.

My personal experience with Quicken and Mint is I never got any actionable measurable results from the effort. Yes I saw all the ads about how I'd get special offers to save $5 on my car insurance or it would make me save for retirement or whatever, but over many years of Quicken and a couple years of Mint it never amounted to anything valuable. Then it becomes an insurance and sunk cost game, well, I've tossed away all this time and effort to organize unnecessary data, I guess I need to keep going to "save" my sunk cost. Eventually I chucked them both. The minimal time to maintain adds up over time and cuts into actual analytical analysis (not to mention recreational time) and in return, as mentioned, I got nothing out of it. Not all aspirational products are worthless to all people, I'm sure there exists someone who got something measurably important out of their mint or quicken experience. Just not me or anyone I know.

It is kind of the diet industry is a good analogy to the personal budgeting industry. The dieting industry makes people feel they're doing something important when they pick up a book or try to live off nothing but grapefruit juice for three days; all that really happens in the end is the provider makes money.

Re: Intuit Will Sell Off Quicken

#17

Post by tptacek »

makomk wrote: post #14
tptacek wrote: post #12

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Ok, I'm being repetitive but also trying to simplify: Conservatives make up the core opposition to return-free filing. Conservatives definitionally do not want more taxation, or complicated taxation. So I'm not sure the notion that Intuit's lobbying has killed return-free filing holds up.

Conservatives want lower tax rates . One common conservative argument is that if you tax less, businesses will expand more and you may even make more in taxes overall.

That's valid, but the nuance I left out of my comment was the common conservative belief that the government is simply too big, and that by cutting taxes, we can starve it back to an appropriate size. Many conservatives would not be happy with a more efficient mechanism to generate the same revenue we get today.

Re: Intuit Will Sell Off Quicken

#18

Post by michaelt »

tptacek wrote: post #7
sschueller wrote: post #2

Looks like they are not worried about taxes ever becoming simpler. Intuit has spent about $11.5 million on federal lobbying in the past few years to kill bills that would have simplified taxes. [1] [1] http://www.propublica.org/article/how-the-maker-of-turbotax-...

If $2.3MM/yr over 5 years is enough to reshape the trajectory of fundamental laws in this country, why aren't people just Kickstarter-ing cannabis decriminalization, marriage equality, and copyright law changes? My point is: that's not a lot of money. Not that I think you can get important changes done for $2.3MM. There is real conservative opposition to return-free filing. For instance, conservatives in general thin…

  why aren't people just Kickstarter-ing cannabis
  decriminalization, marriage equality, and
  copyright law changes?
I would imagine it's a lot cheaper to bribe a politician when:

1. The bribe doesn't get any publicity/press coverage/cause any embarrassment. Campaign donations from big corporations are "business as usual" and the politicians don't look corrupt in the press - but do the same way in a public, attention-grabbing way and the guy looks bad if he accepts.

2. The vote you want to affect is low key and doesn't contradict the politician's public position on major issues. Changing a politician's opinion on the Concrete Masonry Products Research Education and Promotion Act of 2015 would be much cheaper than changing their opinion on overturning Roe vs Wade

3. You want to maintain the status quo. Creating new legislation and getting it through the system is a bunch of work - compared to turning up on the vote day and saying 'no'.

4. There are future votes and future bribes to look forward to. If I give a politician $200,000 to vote a certain way, he might take the donation then vote a different way - and if I ask him to vote that way and promise him the money afterwards, I might refuse to pay after he votes. But if there are 10 votes and I donate $20,000 before each one if he voted how I wanted in the last vote? Then neither of us can screw the other over too badly because we know we'll be making the same deal next year.

5. There's aren't other well-funded lobbyists bidding against you. Because if there are you'll need to get into a bidding war and they might have a lot of money to throw around. If people who vote against copyright extension get $20,000 from me but people who vote for it get $50,000 from Disney I'm going to need to up my game - and Disney probably has pretty deep pockets.

TLDR: I'd expect cannabis decriminalisation or copyright law reform to cost a lot more than blocking tax code simplification.

With that said, if someone would like to organise an attempt I certainly think it would be interesting to see if a kickstarter-like approach would work.

Re: Intuit Will Sell Off Quicken

#19

Post by patio11 »

tptacek wrote: post #7
sschueller wrote: post #2

Looks like they are not worried about taxes ever becoming simpler. Intuit has spent about $11.5 million on federal lobbying in the past few years to kill bills that would have simplified taxes. [1] [1] http://www.propublica.org/article/how-the-maker-of-turbotax-...

If $2.3MM/yr over 5 years is enough to reshape the trajectory of fundamental laws in this country, why aren't people just Kickstarter-ing cannabis decriminalization, marriage equality, and copyright law changes? My point is: that's not a lot of money. Not that I think you can get important changes done for $2.3MM. There is real conservative opposition to return-free filing. For instance, conservatives in general thin…

If I can elaborate on that concern a bit: if government is allowed to be loud about transfer payments and quiet about taxes then it can successfully bribe the middle class with their own money.

It is entirely possible to run a tax system without W-2 employees having to do a return at all. Many nations do it. American conservatives strongly prefer a government which is not sized like the government of those nations.

Re: Intuit Will Sell Off Quicken

#20

Post by crdoconnor »

tptacek wrote: post #7
sschueller wrote: post #2

Looks like they are not worried about taxes ever becoming simpler. Intuit has spent about $11.5 million on federal lobbying in the past few years to kill bills that would have simplified taxes. [1] [1] http://www.propublica.org/article/how-the-maker-of-turbotax-...

If $2.3MM/yr over 5 years is enough to reshape the trajectory of fundamental laws in this country, why aren't people just Kickstarter-ing cannabis decriminalization, marriage equality, and copyright law changes? My point is: that's not a lot of money. Not that I think you can get important changes done for $2.3MM. There is real conservative opposition to return-free filing. For instance, conservatives in general thin…

>If $2.3MM/yr over 5 years is enough to reshape the trajectory of fundamental laws in this country, why aren't people just Kickstarter-ing cannabis decriminalization, marriage equality, and copyright law changes?

Not all political battles are equal.

1) There are lobbies dedicated to keeping cannabis illegal and marriage unequal. There aren't any lobbies dedicated to keeping taxes simple.

2) It's easier to kill proposed legislation than it is to propose new legislation and get it passed.

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