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

Post by skeletal88 » Wed, Apr 10, 2019, 8:19 AM UTC

knubie wrote: post #59

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?

The question I have is whether a government provided automatic filing would actually be cheaper (or more effective) than say, Turbotax. I see a couple of ways in which it might not be as favorable: 1. It costs more than $100 per tax payer per year to implement (about the cost of Turbotax). However the flat $100 or so that most people pay to Turbotax can be seen as a kind of regressive tax. 2. It is less effective at…

Post by dnautics » Wed, Apr 10, 2019, 8:47 AM UTC

vernie wrote: post #367

randysavage wrote: post #355

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Forcing everyone to make quarterly estimated payments would lead to riots in the streets.

Nah, no quarterly estimated payments. You just get your whole salary up front and you're completely fucked in April.

Post by benj111 » Wed, Apr 10, 2019, 8:54 AM UTC

rattlesnakedave wrote: post #377

adjkant wrote: post #366

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Interesting in theory but in practice most Americans do not have the financial literacy to budget properly to meet taxes. What happens when you don't have the cash to pay? Do we then see a whole new sector of predatory loans? Imprisonment? Increasing unpayable fines? None of those are good ideas, yet when things like this happen, our system has already fallen into these pitfalls. Witholding is an essential idea. What…

This is actually how things were done pre WW2. If people were able to budget for it then, why not now? The current system makes filing taxes and getting refunded seem like a reward, it should probably be a bit painful to do your taxes. Without the painful transparency, it becomes too easy for the government to nearly invisibly turn up the tax rate on individuals to pay for whatever boondoggle or foreign war they see…

Post by benj111 » Wed, Apr 10, 2019, 9:00 AM UTC

u801e wrote: post #421

rattlesnakedave wrote: post #349

Earlier quoted context omitted.

A better way to do 2 would be to do away with withholding. After a year of that we’d see a radically different tax system.

I've always thought it would be better to replace the income tax with a national sales tax. Then, for those who earn less and have to spend a greater proportion of their income on essential expenses, the government would credit them through their employer's paycheck (essentially the opposite of what federal withholding is now). For those who earn more, they would receive less credit or won't receive any credit.

Post by lagadu » Wed, Apr 10, 2019, 9:18 AM UTC

jacobolus wrote: post #411

rayiner wrote: post #387

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is not true. There are tons of bread-and-butter deductions for the middle class. If you do a cross country comparison of taxes, the biggest difference between the US and Europe is not the rich. It’s the folks making $40-100k, where our low brackets plus tons of deductions (mortgage interest, child care, child credits, etc.) drive the effective tax rate way down

Folks in Europe comparable to the ones you are talking about here (i.e. the 50th–85th percentile) are generally much more financially stable/comfortable than in the USA. Varies a lot from country to country, but in general they have e.g. more-or-less functional healthcare systems, better parental leave, more vacations, easier access to childcare, stronger worker protections, ....