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Congress Is About to Ban the US Government from Offering Free Online Tax Filing

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Re: Congress Is About to Ban the US Government from Offering Free Online Tax Filing

#151

Post by shadofx »

ohlookabird wrote: post #81
justtopost wrote: post #66

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Don't feel sorry, we are fine. Still the most free people on earth.

Clearly, it can vary a lot what people consider free. And therefore, this statement isn't true in general. The US does indeed have a lot of things I would consider freedoms, yes. But in Germany, for instance, I feel it is a great freedom to not have to worry about most healthcare issues, regardless of their income. A freedom (in my perspective) I wouldn't have in the US. There are other issues that fall into that cat…

It's easy to achieve such "freedoms" in a small ethnostate. Not so easy to do in the racially, economically diverse US.

Re: Congress Is About to Ban the US Government from Offering Free Online Tax Filing

#152

Post by hundt »

renholder wrote: post #144
rayiner wrote: post #140

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Even though their tax revenue office gets the reports from businesses for how much they were paid and how much taxes they paid, the Americans still need to fill out a tax form - every year - to repeat the same information (it's an added benefit for the prison system, in that mistakes on tax forms can equate to jail time). They get a form from their employer (which their tax office also has), that contains all of th…

> There are no criminal penalties for mistakes on your tax form. Odd, I thought you faced the penalty of perjury[0]? [0] - https://www.forbes.com/sites/robertwood/2017/02/15/fudging-y...

Do you live in the United States? It doesn't sound like it. This is not the way things work.

Re: Congress Is About to Ban the US Government from Offering Free Online Tax Filing

#153

Post by npo_ »

yardie wrote: post #115
moftz wrote: post #60

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You can get an emergency radio capable of receiving VHF NOAA weather alerts. There is typically at least one of the frequencies within range where ever you are. You can subscribe to weather alerts through RSS on their site as well. https://alerts.weather.gov/ You can even pass lat/long points to the forecast page and it will pull up the closest weather station, even points in the ocean work. https://forecast.weather.…

> You can get an emergency radio capable of receiving VHF NOAA weather alerts. Apparently this was grandfathered in a long time ago. NOAA is only allowed to send weather reports by radio and on specific frequencies. Doing the same with the internet, why that would be communism!

And for the record, NOAA Weather Radio is pretty cool -- I like to get my weather from it when I'm at home.

I'm right in Boston, and I can pickup transmissions from the Blue Hill Observatory with my cheap Baofeng.

Re: Congress Is About to Ban the US Government from Offering Free Online Tax Filing

#154

Post by chadash »

pnutjam wrote: post #130
chadash wrote: post #48

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The problem is that the system requires constant maintenance every time some tax law changes in any state, and great maintenance is something that only the most well funded OSS projects get. And you need participation from lawyers and accountants, not just software developers. As the article notes, there are already free solutions for people with basic income situations (W-2, some bank interest, no stock sales) makin…

Let the irs handle federal and let the states worry about their own.

The problem is that these two interact. You get a deduction on your federal return for your state taxes. There are those who want to eliminate this (and the 2018 changes significantly reduced this deduction), but doing so is--IMHO--unfair to those living in high tax states.

Re: Congress Is About to Ban the US Government from Offering Free Online Tax Filing

#155

Post by otikik »

germinalphrase wrote: post #133
malvosenior wrote: post #107

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Freedom doesn't mean the same thing as "convenient for me". In fact freedom can often be difficult. Each item listed has an opposition position, most notably freedom to own a gun. Germany also has some of the most draconian anti-free speech laws of all first world nations, so I really don't think they're a good example to use as a pillar of freedom.

The elimination of medical bankruptcy is a “convenience”?

I think no one has a problem with "elimination of medical bankruptcy for them". The problem seems to be that it also eliminates it for others. With "my money", which "the corrupt and inept government is going to misspend anyway".

I know I am exaggerating and misrepresenting a lot of people with this characterization.

To me the solution seems obvious: you don't need private companies to do the job of the government. You need a less corrupt government, capable of doing its job. With the middlemen you just move the corruption around.

Re: Congress Is About to Ban the US Government from Offering Free Online Tax Filing

#156

Post by rayiner »

renholder wrote: post #144
rayiner wrote: post #140

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Even though their tax revenue office gets the reports from businesses for how much they were paid and how much taxes they paid, the Americans still need to fill out a tax form - every year - to repeat the same information (it's an added benefit for the prison system, in that mistakes on tax forms can equate to jail time). They get a form from their employer (which their tax office also has), that contains all of th…

> There are no criminal penalties for mistakes on your tax form. Odd, I thought you faced the penalty of perjury[0]? [0] - https://www.forbes.com/sites/robertwood/2017/02/15/fudging-y...

Technically, the social security administration gives out social security numbers. But that aside, more than 40% of children don't live with both biological birth parents: https://ifstudies.org/blog/more-than-60-of-u-s-kids-live-wit.... So your automated calculation will get it wrong almost half the time.

> All of those tax credits you mention are given by our respective tax agencies when we become employed and/or we change status with the tax agency and/or we obtain a new job (depending on how you avail of tax credits).

There are many tax credits in the U.S. that aren't tied to changes in job status. Every year, I have to dig up receipts for what we spent on daycare, what we spent out of our HSA accounts, etc. The government doesn't track any of that.

> Odd, I thought you faced the penalty of perjury[0]?

Perjury requires willful (i.e. knowing and purposeful) false statements in your tax return. I guarantee you that if you make false statements using Ireland's online system for claiming tax credits, you're under penalty of perjury as well.

Re: Congress Is About to Ban the US Government from Offering Free Online Tax Filing

#157

Post by 8note »

yardie wrote: post #115
moftz wrote: post #60

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You can get an emergency radio capable of receiving VHF NOAA weather alerts. There is typically at least one of the frequencies within range where ever you are. You can subscribe to weather alerts through RSS on their site as well. https://alerts.weather.gov/ You can even pass lat/long points to the forecast page and it will pull up the closest weather station, even points in the ocean work. https://forecast.weather.…

> You can get an emergency radio capable of receiving VHF NOAA weather alerts. Apparently this was grandfathered in a long time ago. NOAA is only allowed to send weather reports by radio and on specific frequencies. Doing the same with the internet, why that would be communism!

I imagine they'll lose that eventually, so that the radio band can be privatized

Re: Congress Is About to Ban the US Government from Offering Free Online Tax Filing

#158

Post by derekp7 »

toast0 wrote: post #149
maimeowmeow wrote: post #124

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If you have a mortgage, and paid state youd easily be over 2x the standard deductions

Not as of tax year 2018. SALT deduction is capped at $10k, standard deduction for married filing joint is $24k. I don't think you can get $14k worth of deductible mortgage interest, but I guess maybe. If you're filing single with a mortgage, it seems more likely to end up with itemized, still.

Do you think that this change will be a precursor to getting rid of the mortgage interest deduction altogether? By making it so that most people no longer benefit from it, there should be little opposition from throwing it out.

Re: Congress Is About to Ban the US Government from Offering Free Online Tax Filing

#159

Post by blancheneige »

_bxg1 wrote: post #109
fsloth wrote: post #25

Oh man, I've had government provided automatic filings for ages now (Finland). US is really odd how it emphasizes the benefit of the middleman over the benefit of the individual citizen (it seems). Or have I completely misunderstood what's going on here?

It's because historically our society has treated businesses, their leaders, and the free market as churches, priests, and God, respectively. They've brought us much wealth and power, but putting restraints on them or getting in their way at all are cardinal sins in American politics. Politicians can take bribes and then package the resulting deregulation with euphemisms like "small government" and "supporting the fr…

seems like the antithesis of small government to have it explicitly bar itself from providing free services helping its citizens pay for said government. the latter should be as seamless as possible given that failure to comply results in adverse government intervention.

Re: Congress Is About to Ban the US Government from Offering Free Online Tax Filing

#160

Post by derekp7 »

tacomonstrous wrote: post #39
lotsofpulp wrote: post #22

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Free File Fillable Forms are pretty easy to use for anyone, regardless of income. It doesn't hold your hand and walk you through it, but assuming you can read English at a 4th grade level, I feel like you should be able to do it. Not that I think it should be even this complicated to do taxes, but it's not a terrible option. https://www.irs.gov/filing/free-file-do-your-federal-taxes-f...

It's still maintained by the Free File Alliance. So you're giving your data to a third party that's not the government. I use it, but I would rather I didn't have to share my financial information with third parties to do so.

No matter what, you will always be using software and systems controlled by other entities. From you web browser, to the operating system, the data transport links, routers and switches in between, and when the data gets to the destination the software is typically written and maintained by commercial contractors hired by the government.
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