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

Post by onefuncman » Wed, Apr 10, 2019, 12:58 PM UTC

onetimemanytime wrote: post #501

Calloggs wrote: post #298

Planet Money covered tax filing a few years ago and visited it again recently: https://www.npr.org/templates/transcript/transcript.php?stor... My understanding is that the main opposition appears to be (1) the tax preparation lobby to protect their business interests and (2) anti-tax activists that believe that making people calculate their own taxes will make them more aware of how much they are paying in taxes. The…

Conspiracy theory: what if IRS (the Govt) when designing the free software with all the options--thousands and thousands of pages https://www.politifact.com/missouri/statements/2017/oct/17/r... --lean on the side of the government when in doubt? Intuit, HR Block etc have some sort of guarantee and incentive to save users, IRS not so much. Doesn't even have to be a conspiracy theory ("We need the money so let's make t…

Post by u801e » Wed, Apr 10, 2019, 12:59 PM UTC

benj111 wrote: post #498

u801e wrote: post #421

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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.

Wouldn't that be regressive, in the sense that richer people spend a lower proportion of their income? Plus they have the means to spend their earnings abroad. But a fixed credit could offset some of those concerns.

Post by projektfu » Wed, Apr 10, 2019, 1:01 PM UTC

adjkant wrote: post #389

rattlesnakedave wrote: post #377

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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…

> If people were able to budget for it then, why not now? A failing public education system and increasingly consumerist culture that encourages bad spending habits using psychological advertising tricks, to start. Go look at how little savings Americans have currently as well, which has been covered ad nauseam by most news outlets in the past few years. > Without the painful transparency, it becomes too easy for the…

Post by projektfu » Wed, Apr 10, 2019, 1:03 PM UTC

rattlesnakedave wrote: post #349

Calloggs wrote: post #298

Planet Money covered tax filing a few years ago and visited it again recently: https://www.npr.org/templates/transcript/transcript.php?stor... My understanding is that the main opposition appears to be (1) the tax preparation lobby to protect their business interests and (2) anti-tax activists that believe that making people calculate their own taxes will make them more aware of how much they are paying in taxes. The…

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.

Post by kurtisc » Wed, Apr 10, 2019, 1:04 PM UTC

dsfyu404ed wrote: post #537

benj111 wrote: post #496

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"becomes too easy for the government to nearly invisibly turn up the tax rate" Or not. Source. I live in a country where the vast majority have income taxes handled by their employer. It would still be front page news if income tax rates increased or decreased. Painful transparency is just pain.

It would be front page news for a day then people would forget and you'd never hear about it again. Do it in the US and it's front page news on the day and then it's on the second and third pages January through April the following year.