91–100 of 454 posts
slightly off topic, but... you can file for free using any number of tax prep software if you make less than ~64k a year: https://www.irs.gov/uac/free-file-do-your-federal-taxes-for-...
You forgot to mention the waterfall of caveats and trip hazards associated with any of those supposed free offerings.
If you ask me, the correct answer is for the government to either give some one-off compensation to Intuit (or buy the company from its existing shareholders), and then shut it down, and reform the system.
Why should the government pay money to a private corporation or shareholders? Because they created this mess ("opportunity") in the first place with a ridiculous tax code. It's just the actual, realized, dollar-value cost of the mess that was created, instead of externalizing the cost onto taxpayers. Once that cost has been paid, the system can be fixed.
The standard of security is, make the target more expensive to breach than it's worth to the attacker. How much would it be worth to have access to the tax returns of large swaths of the population?
I don't know the answer, but I'm guessing it's easily worth billions of dollars. Foreign intelligence services would very much like that information, as well as sophisticated criminals.
I am very doubtful that Intuit or H&R Block, for example, invest in security sufficient to protect themselves against that level of attack.
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Or use Credit Karma Tax. Completely free software assistance at any income level. ( https://www.creditkarma.com/tax ) Disclaimer: I work there.
I gave Credit Karma Tax a try this year. I mostly liked it, but did find one serious deficiency compared to others I've used. It did not handle the deduction for state income tax nearly as well. The IRS allows deducting either the actual sales taxes you have paid, or you can use a standard amount based on your AGI and your state and local tax rates. Most other software I've used knows about this. If you enter your ac…
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That's what the 1040EZ is. Seriously, take a look at it, it's a single page, only half of which is calculations: https://www.irs.gov/pub/irs-prior/f1040ez--2016.pdf If you object that this isn't sufficient for you or someone else, I'll be happy to argue that whatever behavior would make you 1040EZ-ineligible should either not be permitted in a free society (because it's a tax-avoidance scheme for certain types of ric…
One thing that is not 1040EZ is charity donations. I mean we could kill all charity deductions but not sure NGOs would be happy about it.
Also, charitable donations have weird constraints. My church would like to end deportations of undocumented immigrants based on our reading of Leviticus 19:34, and the most effective way to do that would have been to campaign against certain presidential candidates. We couldn't do that. Another church wanted to end civil recognition of same-sex marriage based on their reading of Leviticus 18:22, but that involved campaigning for a ballot initiative, and they were allowed to do that to the tune of millions of dollars.
I'm obviously not inclined to say "Please start taxing my church," but the fact that we can participate essentially by chance in some political activities and not others doesn't seem like it would exist in a "free society".
I also get donations rebates, this is a one page form that lists all my charitable donations. Very easy very quick.
All my details are available to me online. All transactions are there and it's very transparent.
Why would anyone oppose a simple system like this?
I have a better idea. Simplify the tax code so anyone can do theirs on an index card. There is absolutely no reason for the gargantuan tax code in a free society.
>Simplify the tax code so anyone can do theirs on an index card. Aim higher. In the UK, your employer informs the government about your wages and HMRC figures out how much you paid and whether it's the correct amount. And if you want you can check the numbers. In other countries it's basically the same but you have to log into the e-government portal to click 'yes, the values you have are correct'. Obviously if your…
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For a W-2 employee taking the standard deduction, perhaps. The IRS cannot correctly calculate what the typical small business owner owes, what the typical real estate investor owes, what the typical upper middle class family owes, because they don't have all the information available to them.
What's your point? They can help all the typical cases. If you need additional help, then you can find an accountant to help.
In 2012 (the last year for which I have a breakdown: https://www.irs.gov/pub/irs-soi/12rswinbulreturnfilings.pdf ), of the 239 million returns filed, about 143 million are individual returns. Of the 143 million individual returns, about 13% or 18.6 million use 1040EZ ( http://www.freeby50.com/2012/12/what-percent-of-people-file-... ).
The IRS probably has enough information to file 1040EZs for most people, but certainly not enough for 1040A, 1040, or most business returns.
So, of the 293 million returns filed, about 18.6 million or 6.3% of them could be auto-filed by the IRS. About 1 in 16 total returns and about 1 in 8 personal returns.
To me, 6.3% (or even 13%) is a far cry from "all the typical cases". They can mostly handle one particular case; that might be the case that you personally have; I have no objection to them offering that as a service. Just don't be confused and think that that that's all the typical cases.
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Same old same old: show me a doctor who doesn't want you to be sick. Show me a lawyer who doesn't want you to get in trouble with law. Show me a priest who doesn't want you to sin. It just blows my mind up to what degree TurboTax will go with this!
I've never met a doctor who wants people to be sick. I'm sure they're out there, but the great majority wants to help people, and would gladly be put out of business.
i don't think this is meant in an interpersonal, malicious sense.