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Show HN: ustaxes.org – open-source tax filing webapp

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Re: Show HN: ustaxes.org – open-source tax filing webapp

#161

Post by japhyr »

melomal wrote: post #90
vages wrote: post #15

Related fun (and sad) fact: In Norway, the tax submission forms are online and so user friendly that you don't need a tax filing program like this. Edit: Here is a link to an explanation for the form, in English, which was revamped in 2020: https://www.skatteetaten.no/en/person/taxes/tax-return/tax-r... The submission form is essentially a wizard that asks you questions related to your situation and your past year. D…

> I cannot understand why filling out the submission seems so hard in most countries The fact that schools do not teach makes it crazy too. I imagine it has something to do with the fact that if you make it easy, mistakes cannot be made therefore you cannot exploit the few bucks here and there out of a large number of people who are not tuned to the tax filling process.

> The fact that schools do not teach makes it crazy too.

I'm in the US, and I was a high school math teacher for 20 years. I tried teaching everyone how to do taxes, and people hated it because if you make people do fake taxes it's incredibly boring. Then I developed a "financial literacy" unit where students could choose a focus, such as analyzing investments, analyzing credit card policies, analyzing loans, or doing taxes.

About half the class chose taxes each year; making things like this optional significantly increases engagement, because many people end up recognizing they really would like to understand how to do their own taxes. It was also eye-opening for many who were surprised what impact things like "tax brackets" would have on their income. It cut through so much propaganda that's shouted about taxes in the US.

Re: Show HN: ustaxes.org – open-source tax filing webapp

#163

Post by ketanmaheshwari »

dave333 wrote: post #103

What I hate about the US system is every year I have to convert my brokerage tax statement into a schedule D line by line or the IRS duns me because they only know my stock sales, not my purchases, which is nuts.

This is true only when you move some of your money from brokerage account to your bank account right?

Re: Show HN: ustaxes.org – open-source tax filing webapp

#164

Post by JackFr »

rayiner wrote: post #151
Hamuko wrote: post #39

Earlier quoted context omitted.

A good reason? No. A reason? Lobbying.

It’s interesting to me that people assume it’s lobbying, and not the fact that Americans are the most anti-tax people on the planet, creating a strong constituency for making tax filing difficult to increase public visibility of tax rates. In the 2020 election, pretty much every ballot measure to increase taxes failed, including in blue states like Illinois and Colorado. Other countries have lobbying too. What they d…

> Americans are the most anti-tax people on the planet

Our origin story is literally a tax revolt.

“No taxation without representation” — they weren't looking to get a couple of new members elected to Parliament. Definitely focused on the no taxation part.

Re: Show HN: ustaxes.org – open-source tax filing webapp

#165

Post by osrec »

orblivion wrote: post #153
sunnyam wrote: post #149

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It looks very easy to just build this from source, which is what privacy-concerned users would do anyway

Heh, I'll probably build from source, and then run in a VM (via QubesOS) without Internet access.

Won't you need internet access to submit your taxes?

Re: Show HN: ustaxes.org – open-source tax filing webapp

#166

Post by varjag »

rayiner wrote: post #147
kristopolous wrote: post #57

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The second one is new to me. It's really fascinating how they choose a set of policies and work hard to construct a reality that supports the policy positions. It strikes me as so backwards. It's tinfoil hat, but my only conclusion is the actual reasons for the policy are so incredibly unpopular that they invent these realities to obscure them.

How are they “constructing a reality?” How much taxes you pay is the reality. They’re trying to draw more attention to it, by forcing you to look the numbers in the face once a year. That’s not “constructing reality” it’s drawing attention to it. I love paying my taxes and support higher taxes with more government services. But I agree with Norquist that it’s a useful exercise for people to go through once a year and…

You still get your tax figures in places that do that automagically. You just don't get the suffer it out for conservative agenda experience.

Re: Show HN: ustaxes.org – open-source tax filing webapp

#168

Post by Majromax »

MuffinFlavored wrote: post #59
Hamuko wrote: post #39

Earlier quoted context omitted.

A good reason? No. A reason? Lobbying.

Why are other countries not victim to lobbying in the way America is? Is it just a double-edged sword that we have to thank for making us (one of) the economic powerhouse(s) of the world? At the same time, it feels like it to blame on why we can't have anything nice when compared to European countries. Am I out of line/uneducated on this matter? I very well could be. I hate just chalking the root of problems up to so…

> Why are other countries not victim to lobbying in the way America is?

Among other reasons, America has a uniquely loose political fundraising / election spending system. If all else fails, a company like H&R Block can directly take out election ads -- with business funds -- to campaign against candidates who would support simplified filing measures. This would be somewhere between illegal and heavily curtailed in other countries.

The net effect is to give greater policy weight to issues that give concentrated benefits to (or avoid concentrated costs on) small, well-funded groups at the expense of diffuse costs (or foregone benefits) to the general public.

Re: Show HN: ustaxes.org – open-source tax filing webapp

#169

Post by orblivion »

osrec wrote: post #165
orblivion wrote: post #153

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Heh, I'll probably build from source, and then run in a VM (via QubesOS) without Internet access.

Won't you need internet access to submit your taxes?

I didn't look into how it works yet, but you're likely right. Does the IRS have an open API like that? I was assuming it generated pdfs or something.

Re: Show HN: ustaxes.org – open-source tax filing webapp

#170

Post by tssva »

fooqux wrote: post #137
warent wrote: post #109

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't think this is exactly right is it? My understanding is it's not about testing you, it's just a matter of resource allocation in a severely inefficient system. The IRS does not have the resources to manually verify all of everyone's income, so instead they use a process of flags which trigger audits of varying depth. Flags include things such as certain reported amounts/types of values. Shallow audits review s…

Companies like Intuit have successfully lobbied our government to halt any sort of bill that would make it better. The entire thing could be easily automated; other countries have proved that. But then Turbo tax wouldn't get to rake in all that $$$. Seriously though, I would love (hate) to read what sort of ethical backflips they had to do to make IRS reform a bad thing. I'm presuming they tried to make logical argum…

My state had an online tax system in test for a few years. Over the course of 3 - 4 years it was opened up to a larger group of tax payers with potentialy more complex tax returns. The final year of testing I was one of those selected to use it.

The following year it was going to be rolled out to everyone. The state had invested millions in it. The legislative session before it was to go live Intuit successfully lobbied both the governor and legislature to kill it.

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