wow, this is great towards fixing the US tax system and the byzantine means most Americans have to go thru to simply file taxes
IRS Reforms Free File Program, Drops Agreement Not to Compete with TurboTax
381–390 of 489 posts
Re: IRS Reforms Free File Program, Drops Agreement Not to Compete with TurboTax
#382Earlier quoted context omitted.
> They know all of your income down to the cent If you have a W-2 job and all your investments are in a bank or brokerage, but they still don't know your filing situation, dependents, other income, or deductions. Not that I'm justifying the current system. It's just that the IRS only knows the big picture for most people. The rest is complicated.
Don't they know that from the W-4? Or does that not go to the IRS
W-4s are not filled with the IRS. Employers are required to maintain them for inspection whenever the IRS wants though.
Re: IRS Reforms Free File Program, Drops Agreement Not to Compete with TurboTax
#383This USA tax thing has always baffled me... it is the exact definition of why we pay taxes: for the government to provide services that are common to the country´s citizens. There´s nothing more common than tax collection: rich, middle class or poor. Why wouldn't citizens demand a public tax filing process? Even in Mexico we have an automagical tax filing process that makes: a) The great majority of the population wh…
It's by design. The GOP wants you to rub your face in the fact that the government runs on tax revenue, in the hope that you'll develop an allergy to taxes.
The thing of it is, the US government hasn’t run on tax revenue for over 20 years. Clinton was president last time the US had a balanced budget.
Re: IRS Reforms Free File Program, Drops Agreement Not to Compete with TurboTax
#384Earlier quoted context omitted.
> But a platform of “we’re going to make taxes painful so the government is afraid to raise taxes” gets a lot of votes. I've never heard anyone promoting the idea of keeping taxes complicated to avoid higher taxes. There's nothing inherent in complicated taxes that stops the government from raising rates. Conservatives have long wanted the flat tax (file taxes on the back of a postcard) and lower taxes, so simpler lo…
Corporate tax policy has no impact on the complexity of individual taxes. It's two completely independent sets of rules. Your theory is wrong.
Tax deductions for retirement, mortgages, etc. are tax code complexity that benefit the financial and real estate industries.
Even if it could be done simpler, TurboTax and other tax prep companies will lobby against it.
You'd be hard pressed to find any government financial policy that isn't tied to business interests. The tax code is no exception.
Re: IRS Reforms Free File Program, Drops Agreement Not to Compete with TurboTax
#385Earlier quoted context omitted.
For people who aren't good at budgeting/saving, it can be a decent way of putting away money for a large purchase or two every year. It's a lot easier to raid a savings/retirement account than to get your IRS refund six months early.
People aren't terrified of plundering their retirement accounts? There are massive and scary tax penalties if you do....
10% isn't that massive or scary for someone facing something like a big unexpected medical bill or whatnot.
"I can take out $2k to fix the flooded basement and it'll cost me $200 in penalties? OK."
Re: IRS Reforms Free File Program, Drops Agreement Not to Compete with TurboTax
#386Good riddance.
Re: IRS Reforms Free File Program, Drops Agreement Not to Compete with TurboTax
#387Excellent news, and congrats to Propublica for in no small part making it happen. This wasn't just a shady operation -- Turbotax openly lied to customers about its free file program, it deliberately suppressed the program from search results, it lied to veterans. It was 100% acting in bad faith during negotiations with the IRS. Sometimes topics like this end up becoming kind of ideological or partisan; but in this ca…
There's a good Planet Money episode that explains how surprisingly it is still a partisan issue. The Republican argument, at least from certain prominent people in the party, is that if paying taxes gets too easy the average American will be less likely to push their representatives to lower taxes or to oppose new taxes that get proposed.
I do get that angle of it, but that partisanship shouldn't extend so far as to excuse lying to people.
I guess what I meant by partisanship is, we could have a higher-level argument about whether or not the IRS should in theory have its own filing program, and that's the way that Turbotax wants to phrase this -- that it's just that Democrats want a government program. But Turbotax was blatantly involved in false advertising, lying to customers, rigging search results to get around their obligations.
Intuit is putting out videos that say, "Probublica just has an agenda", they want to make it a partisan issue. But it's like a gun company selling guns that randomly explode in your hands, and trying to say that it's an attack on the 2nd Amendment when they're forced to issue a safety recall.
When I describe the issue to people, I try not to let them have a partisan debate about taxes in general. When that debate starts to come up, I push back on the simpler issue, which is just that false advertising shouldn't be OK.
Re: IRS Reforms Free File Program, Drops Agreement Not to Compete with TurboTax
#388>Now companies are barred from hiding their free products from search engines such as Google, and a years-old prohibition on the IRS creating its own online filing system has been scrapped. >Under the new rules, participating companies also have to standardize the naming convention of their Free File version as “IRS Free File program delivered by [product name].” Respect to ProPublica for their commitment to this iss…
ProPublica reported that after they published this story, people eligible for free filing contacted TurboTax to get refunds. At first, they were able to get refunds of the fees that they paid but once word got out the customer service reps stonewalled them. So ProPublica invited readers to submit stories of their experiences with TurboTax customer service. Quality journalism.
Not only quality journalism, but a really solid look at what modern data-driven journalism should be like.
Re: IRS Reforms Free File Program, Drops Agreement Not to Compete with TurboTax
#389Earlier quoted context omitted.
Even a lot of the more complex things could be automated. For example, the only slightly complex thing about my taxes are capital gains and interest. It would not be hard to have my brokerages/banks coordinate with the IRS to autopay my taxes on that as well, just like my income taxes are auto paid.
Does the government automatically know what you spent in business expenses? Or what charitable donations you made? Or what property you may have lost during the year?
That's a great example of something most Americans don't have to worry about. They could take advantage of autofile and you wouldn't. Simple as that.
Re: IRS Reforms Free File Program, Drops Agreement Not to Compete with TurboTax
#390What kind of bribe and to whom does private corporation need to make to make IRS sign non compete agreement with them?