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TurboTax’s 20-Year Fight to Stop Americans from Filing Taxes for Free

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Re: TurboTax’s 20-Year Fight to Stop Americans from Filing Taxes for Free

#381

Post by shurane »

isbwkisbakadqv wrote: post #254
r0m4n0 wrote: post #158

A few weeks ago I started an LLC in New York. I followed all the simple instructions online and the process was actually very straightforward and easy. I had an official digital copy of proof my LLC existed within an hour. I went to sleep with and thought that there is hope for our government. Within a few days I received a letter from a private company informing me that unless I pay them $1000 to publish the name of…

Every episode of “Nathan for You” is amazing. The episode about this phenomenon is no exception. “The Diarrhea Times”...lol

Link to a preview of the episode: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LU1U2Eyep_4

Re: TurboTax’s 20-Year Fight to Stop Americans from Filing Taxes for Free

#382

Post by vharuck »

vonmoltke wrote: post #345
snuxoll wrote: post #210

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I’m not sure if the IRS even knows how many kids you have for the child tax credit. How would they? You have to report the SSN of your dependents on your tax return, still open to fraud but it’s not like you just fill in a number. This was actually a huge issue for the IRS before they co-opted the SSN as a tax identifier, and pretty much the only reason people get one assigned at birth instead of when they begin wo…

> You have to report the SSN of your dependents on your tax return The point is that the IRS does not have this information available to pre-fill your form with.

They'll have it from the previous year. So, for each dependent, you'll likely only send a correction to the IRS twice: the year you gain the dependent, and the year they stop being a dependent.

Re: TurboTax’s 20-Year Fight to Stop Americans from Filing Taxes for Free

#383

Post by ronaru »

balabaster wrote: post #319
rockinghigh wrote: post #284

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Lobbyists often threaten to fund whoever will campaign against the elected official at the next election. They say "we will allocate $1M to a PAC benefiting your opponent if you advocate for free tax filing".

It never ceases to astound me how this is allowed and accepted in the U.S. America is the first to complain about corruption in other countries around the world... yet here we are.

Corruption is legalized here. Changing these laws is hard!

Re: TurboTax’s 20-Year Fight to Stop Americans from Filing Taxes for Free

#384

Post by grecy »

Akinato wrote: post #308
grecy wrote: post #237

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Americans are starting to wake up to the fact they live in what is by far the richest country, but that the systems in place just make the rich richer, while nothing is done to improve the lives of the middle and lower classes. In this particular case, the rich are actively using the system to stop an improvement to the quality of life of regular people. What's the point in living in the richest country in the world…

I would argue that there are few, if any, countries in the world that this description would not apply to. However, I agree with the point that you're making wholeheartedly. There's a very serious amount of wealth disparity around the world, and the rich have gotten so rich that they can't even feasibly spend all of their money if they had to.

You need to spend more time in better countries.

The lives of middle and lower class people in Australia, Canada, Scandinavia, etc. are much, much, much better than Americans, and improving all the time.

Re: TurboTax’s 20-Year Fight to Stop Americans from Filing Taxes for Free

#385

Post by consp »

cesarb wrote: post #46
gjvnq wrote: post #9

Just for comparison: in Brazil the _Receita Federal_ (IRS equivalent) provides a free multi-platform* Java desktop app for filing your taxes. The UI isn't great* and if you do complex stock trading it can be a pain to add the necessary information, but for the vast majority of people it works just fine. It also shows if it is better to use the standard deduction or the itemized deductions for your particular case and…

> Brazil the _Receita Federal_ (IRS equivalent) provides a free multi-platform Java desktop app for filing your taxes. Other fun stuff about that desktop app... * Originally, it was a DOS-only program (yes, it's that old). Then for a while, it was Windows-only, then for some time (probably due to the Linux users complaining) there was both the Windows-only version and the Java multi-platform version, and later the Wi…

Short recap from somewhere else:

In the Netherlands we had (for a very short while at least as far as I remember) a DOS program as well on diskette. I never used it but my dad did when internet explorer was not yet evil and msn was a network. You could send it in via modem (9k6 baud yay!) and it would work ... sometimes or hand it in via the diskette. Once the internet got going you could send it more easily as you could send the created files directly instead of relying on the modem dial-in via dos.

For myself I never filed on paper (2002 first one). After the introduction of windows programs they ported it to linux the next year (filed the first one on windows only on a library pc, program might have existed earlier) and have now switched to web based. If you had a company which did their taxes on time everything was (and is) filled out mostly correct. You check it and sign off. As a student it took a while to fill in all the deductibles but if you just have to pay you are done in minutes.

Is/was it perfect? Far from. Does it work for most people? Yes.

Re: TurboTax’s 20-Year Fight to Stop Americans from Filing Taxes for Free

#386

Post by taco_emoji »

JoeAltmaier wrote: post #361
toomuchtodo wrote: post #313

Earlier quoted context omitted.

USPS requires Congressional approval to set rates (as well as pension funding requirements). Your complaint is with your representatives, not USPS itself.

My complaint is with 'government-run businesses', which will always have such issues. It stems from not being responsible for efficiency or profitability.

Why is profitability important for a government-run entity?

Re: TurboTax’s 20-Year Fight to Stop Americans from Filing Taxes for Free

#387

Post by excerionsforte »

mars4rp wrote: post #193

I am the developer in charge of CalFile, the free filing software that everyone asks for here for state of California. https://www.ftb.ca.gov/file/ways-to-file/online/calfile/inde... I am pushing so hard to make it better and more useful to more people, like being able to add capital gain that is not currently supported. these are the push backs that I am getting: 1. Last time they tried to do what all of you ask, a…

Posted it on Twitter. I encourage others to do so too. #freepromotion

Re: TurboTax’s 20-Year Fight to Stop Americans from Filing Taxes for Free

#388

Post by andrekandre »

JoeAltmaier wrote: post #297
toomuchtodo wrote: post #294

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It seems to be working fine in every other country mentioned in this thread where government is free to provide free tax filing services. We do not need bullshit jobs at rent seeking companies that are glorified PDF generators. This is a government feature, not a product.

So maybe this one should be allowed. Other government competition with private enterprise is not so clear. Paving roads? Providing medicine? Delivering packages? Its been a rocky road.

but if private enterprise is more efficient than govt, what do they have to fear?

Re: TurboTax’s 20-Year Fight to Stop Americans from Filing Taxes for Free

#389

Post by Eugr »

rubicon33 wrote: post #283
xivzgrev wrote: post #213

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Dude I salute you. There are so many edge cases to support. For number 2 can you import fed return with calfile? IRS free returns going down too so you are not alone: https://taxpayeradvocate.irs.gov/Free_File_Program_Is_Failin... This is a large reason why Prorepublica keeps digging at this - it’s fucking crazy actual free filing is going down while these paid shenanigan products are holding strong with their ginorm…

Is it really as simple as that? Budget trumps all? With all due respect to the OP, most state run software operations are complete, utter, garbage. I'd happily pay money to avoid some of the clunky, poor UI/UX, and downright broken web tools that the state of California produces. TurboTax on the other hand, is a relatively nice experience.

TurboTax is getting worse and worse every year.

One example where it worked well before and became a complicated mess now: for some deductions you need answer a lot of questions just for it to tell you that you are not eligible because of your income. Why not to check this in the very beginning?

Re: TurboTax’s 20-Year Fight to Stop Americans from Filing Taxes for Free

#390

Post by mars4rp »

JoeAltmaier wrote: post #292
toomuchtodo wrote: post #288

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I am tired of for-profit companies hamstringing government using bribes to representatives and funding lobbyists from delivering inexpensive or free services to citizens. If someone wants to pay TurboTax, that is fine. If someone wants to continue to support their efforts to stymie government from delivering said services for free, they should be tarred and feathered. Intuit's tax products are regulatory capture, pla…

Hm that's been a big issue for maybe 200 years. Should the government start its own companies? What happened to the free market? How does a 'free' government company respond to competition (since they have no pressure to be profitable)?

Government is forcing people to pay their taxes, so Government needs to provide a free and easy way for people to pay their taxes.
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