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Would You Let the I.R.S. Prepare Your Taxes? (2015)

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Re: Would You Let the I.R.S. Prepare Your Taxes? (2015)

#91

Post by koolba »

ritchiea wrote: post #39
rndmize wrote: post #9

13 million in lobbying over five years to prevent more efficient tax filing for an entire nation and protect your business model. Sounds like an amazing deal for a company with 5 billion in revenue. I'm consistently amazed at just how little money it takes to buy off the government effectively.

It's not just that, anti-tax zealot Grover Norquist has outsized interest on the right and he gets republicans to sign a pledge to not raise taxes, and if they violate the pledge Norquist raises money and campaigns against them. The problem is, the pledge also requires signees also do not support legislation to make paying taxes easier. The radical anti-tax groups are so anti-tax that they see making it easier to pay…

Filing your own taxes is already trivial for the vast majority of people. The only reason people don’t fill out their own 1040-EZ is brainwashing that “taxes are hard”.

Re: Would You Let the I.R.S. Prepare Your Taxes? (2015)

#92

Post by Coding_Cat »

volkk wrote: post #56
stephengillie wrote: post #3

I'm annoyed that there is no simple system for the IRS to tell me what I owe, and let me pay or dispute. Instead, we play this game where the IRS provides a bunch of complicated documents, I guess which ones to fill out and submit, then wait 3 years to see if I was randomly chosen to see if I was correct. So it's very easy to make a mistake for dozens of years, then suddenly be penalized at random. It's the worst kin…

> It's the worst kind of selective enforcement - random enforcement. Very similar to the way police behave w/ regards to speeding tickets. Set extremely low speeds that don't make sense on highways. Allow most people to go 10-15 above. But then also sometimes choose random people to screw over when it's the end of the month and they need to hit their quotas.

>Set extremely low speeds that don't make sense on highways. Allow most people to go 10-15 above.

I doubt people really speed because the limits have been set too low and the people know better what is an ideal speed limit.

I think people_think_ they know better what the speed limit is, and/or reason "well if 60mph is okay, 75 mph can't be that bad, I'm barely speeding and I'm in a rush". At least, that's the attitude I've seen with people who regularly speed.

If you were to raise the speed limit to 75mph, people would just use the same logic to drive 90mph instead.

Re: Would You Let the I.R.S. Prepare Your Taxes? (2015)

#93

Post by dudul »

madengr wrote: post #48

I'd rather end all payroll deductions, then everyone must write the IRS a check N times a year. That way people know exactly what they are paying.

Interestingly this is pretty much how it used to work in France up until this year. No deductions from your paycheck, and on year N+1 you pay your income taxes for year N. People need to be careful to set aside enough money to be able to pay these deferred taxes. However, now they are moving to payroll deductions :)

Re: Would You Let the I.R.S. Prepare Your Taxes? (2015)

#94

Post by kevin_thibedeau »

ghaff wrote: post #30
clarkevans wrote: post #12

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Everyone else is, what 10% of filers? If you're in the 10% you'll know it and you'll do private preparation.

About 2/3rds of people do file a 1040 rather than a 1040A or 1040-EZ which at least suggests that most people do have taxes that are more complex than just just a W2 and a standard deduction.

Most people are using tax prep services that will default to 1040 since their software doesn't care about which form is going to be used and it's simpler to code for just the general case.

Re: Would You Let the I.R.S. Prepare Your Taxes? (2015)

#95

Post by filleokus »

I'm torn on this issue. On the one hand, in Sweden, taxes are extremely simple to file, and I love it for practical reasons. All work income (even from multiple part time jobs which someone said would be an issue) is declared by the employer, almost all saving/stocks/bonds/other stuff resulting in financial gains are reported by the broker/bank. I think many people don't change any of the data, almost 1 million (out of a 10 million population) just send a text message saying basically "Okay!" [0].

On the other hand, this also irks me in some way. It is good that it's so simple to file it, but at least when just texting an okay it probably hides just how much people pay in taxes. It's almost the same thing as the fact that most employers in Sweden just show the taxes they withheld from the salary, i.e not the significant payroll taxes the company had to pay (which could just as easily have been shown for/"payed" by the employee).

Regardless of ones opinion on how high taxes should be, and wether one believe they get good value for their money, I think everyone ought to know roughly how much they pay. I guess this is the reason why Grover Norquist of the Norquist pledge [1] tries to stop measures like this [2].

I imagine, if there was interest, it could be done in a way that actually _raises_ the awareness of how much tax is payed/withheld from people's income.

[0]: https://www.skatteverket.se/omoss/press/pressmeddelanden/201... [1]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Grover_Norquist#Taxpayer_Prote... [2]: https://www.npr.org/templates/transcript/transcript.php?stor...

Re: Would You Let the I.R.S. Prepare Your Taxes? (2015)

#96

Post by baddox »

ritchiea wrote: post #39
rndmize wrote: post #9

13 million in lobbying over five years to prevent more efficient tax filing for an entire nation and protect your business model. Sounds like an amazing deal for a company with 5 billion in revenue. I'm consistently amazed at just how little money it takes to buy off the government effectively.

It's not just that, anti-tax zealot Grover Norquist has outsized interest on the right and he gets republicans to sign a pledge to not raise taxes, and if they violate the pledge Norquist raises money and campaigns against them. The problem is, the pledge also requires signees also do not support legislation to make paying taxes easier. The radical anti-tax groups are so anti-tax that they see making it easier to pay…

> The radical anti-tax groups are so anti-tax that they see making it easier to pay taxes as support for taxes. So they want it to be difficult to pay taxes to make it easier for them to argue against taxes entirely.

I don't know if getting rid of taxes entirely is really a goal for many of these people, but what you describe doesn't sound that unreasonable. Making paying taxes easier does sound like support for taxes, right? For example, if we didn't have payroll deduction, surely there would be more popular support for tax cuts.

Re: Would You Let the I.R.S. Prepare Your Taxes? (2015)

#97

Post by gruez »

xsmasher wrote: post #75
phonon wrote: post #60

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Where do you see that? https://s3.amazonaws.com/atrfiles/files/files/Federal%20Pled... EDIT: OK, found this https://www.atr.org/taxpayer-advocates-issue-joint-free-file... https://reason.org/wp-content/uploads/files/ba148cd5babdda39... https://s3.amazonaws.com/atrfiles/files/files/041111lt-wycoa...

Presumably in the "reduction or elimination of deductions and credits" - simplifying the tax code would require those kinds of changes.

>oppose any net reduction or elimination of deductions and credits, unless matched dollar for dollar by further reducing tax rates

seems reasonable to me. otherwise you could "raise" taxes by eliminating deductions.

Re: Would You Let the I.R.S. Prepare Your Taxes? (2015)

#98

Post by gamblor956 »

stephengillie wrote: post #3

I'm annoyed that there is no simple system for the IRS to tell me what I owe, and let me pay or dispute. Instead, we play this game where the IRS provides a bunch of complicated documents, I guess which ones to fill out and submit, then wait 3 years to see if I was randomly chosen to see if I was correct. So it's very easy to make a mistake for dozens of years, then suddenly be penalized at random. It's the worst kin…

The IRS has actually run trials like this in the past. Very successful, at least for simply W2-based returns, since most people's taxable transactions get reported by companies anyway (i.e., mortgages/interest, other income, etc.) and most people use the standardized deduction.

Inuit and Quicken subsequently lobbied to end those programs and even bar the IRS from running similar programs...

Re: Would You Let the I.R.S. Prepare Your Taxes? (2015)

#99

Post by ptaffs »

sologoub wrote: post #2

Colleagues from the EU countries who relocate to the US generally tend to have a two-fold reaction - excitement at the lower tax rates and dismay at the filing complexities. Would be amazing to have the cake and eat it too - lower taxes and a simple filing system!

then dismay over medical costs, lack of government services and, many little things like cell-phone and cable fees and taxes.

Re: Would You Let the I.R.S. Prepare Your Taxes? (2015)

#100

Post by jonnycomputer »

jklein11 wrote: post #55
jonnycomputer wrote: post #41

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In 2017 the minimum employment income required to file was $10,400 for an individual under 65. No laws need necessarily have been broken.

Can you show me the source for this? My understanding was that the $10,400 was the minimum taxable amount of income, not the minimum required to file. Edit: looks like I was wrong. That number matches what turbo tax is saying[1] 1. https://turbotax.intuit.com/tax-tips/irs-tax-return/does-eve...

thanks.
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