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Open Source Tax Software

ctskennerton.github.io

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Re: Open Source Tax Software

#201

Post by zakpatterson »

UncleMeat wrote: post #156
zakpatterson wrote: post #64

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Open source can solve this problem. Any service you choose might be missing your edge case. But if you can see all the code and figure out where to plug in your edge case, then you can contribute it for all users in the future to enjoy. We've already seen people show up and implement features we hadn't researched yet. I encourage you to check it out.

The consequences of botching it are high, so taking commits from external contributors requires detailed and time consuming reviews. Further, people don't know what the edge cases actually are at scale. If I go do my taxes and it doesn't account for some weird thing, I simply don't know that this weird thing even exists in the first place to justify a PR to the tax service.

Can you elaborate about consequences?

You might not know the edge case exists, but out of all the people that have that edge case hopefully there is one that does know about it and can implement the fix.

Also I'd be curious to know what edge cases you're thinking about. Many people just have a W-2 and a few 1099s. If someone has a complex business or some other concern they're probably at least partially aware.

Re: Open Source Tax Software

#202

Post by zakpatterson »

amelius wrote: post #109
xivzgrev wrote: post #19

I worked on tax software and have seen these kind of efforts. Noble, yes. Short lived, yes. It’s relatively easy to make a free 1040 file. The real problem comes from all. The. Edge. Cases. 1) do you support xyz state? 2) what if I lived in multiple states? 3) what if i… And on and on. And it’s not just one and done. Every year IRS and states are changing their shit so you have to go thru and make all kind of updates…

> what if I lived in multiple states? You just pick the state that gives you the smallest tax.

Partial year residency is an annoying issue. This is not one of the ways we're solving it though!

Re: Open Source Tax Software

#203

Post by throwaway889900 »

drstewart wrote: post #96
bjarneh wrote: post #90

Filing personal taxes in the US sounds like filing taxes for a company in other countries. A complete nightmare consisting of tons of forms that some bureaucrat dreamed up, which nobody really knows how to fill out correctly. Software exists to fill them out for you, and if you use some well-known software to do it, it's just assumed to be correct by everyone; including the state.

90% of people in the US could fill out their taxes by hand in less than 5 minutes. It's Yes, the IRS could do even this for you, but there's a myth that US taxes are always monstrously complicated that everyone likes to perpetuate: 1) The tax companies like it because it keeps people scared of doing it themselves 2) Tax reform advocates like it because it's they can cluck and shake their head at the corrupt governmen…

The 1040EZ is deprecated. https://www.irs.gov/forms-pubs/about-form-1040-ez

Re: Open Source Tax Software

#204

Post by ghaff »

PaulDavisThe1st wrote: post #191
nwatson wrote: post #173

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In the U.S. this "withholding" happens as well. Regular employee paychecks already lose a chunk of nominal income attributed to various buckets, federal and state and maybe local level. Toward the beginning of the next year comes the grand reconciliation though, where what you "really owe" gets computed, only roughly matching what already is withheld. There are so many rules, exclusions, exceptions, additions. They i…

The US uses its tax code(s) to try to implement policy. Increase taxes on something to try to discourage people from using/buying/participating in it. Decrease taxes or offer tax credits to try to encourage something. On the face of it, this is not a bad idea, but cumulatively it gets pretty messy (especially when, as you note, some of the policy-as-tax-code has implications over more than just a single tax year).

>some of the policy-as-tax-code has implications over more than just a single tax year

Yes, as my finance professor used to say, make all of your decisions based on after-tax.

Which is very relevant on a personal level to, say, someone buying a house in the US with a sufficiently large mortgage to itemize deductions is going to be... unhappy if that deduction suddenly gets snatched away.

"Rules" obviously do change but there are good reasons to exercise restraint with respect to established rules that led individuals to make substantial commitments on the basis of that rule.

Re: Open Source Tax Software

#205

Post by xeromal »

PaulDavisThe1st wrote: post #191
nwatson wrote: post #173

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In the U.S. this "withholding" happens as well. Regular employee paychecks already lose a chunk of nominal income attributed to various buckets, federal and state and maybe local level. Toward the beginning of the next year comes the grand reconciliation though, where what you "really owe" gets computed, only roughly matching what already is withheld. There are so many rules, exclusions, exceptions, additions. They i…

The US uses its tax code(s) to try to implement policy. Increase taxes on something to try to discourage people from using/buying/participating in it. Decrease taxes or offer tax credits to try to encourage something. On the face of it, this is not a bad idea, but cumulatively it gets pretty messy (especially when, as you note, some of the policy-as-tax-code has implications over more than just a single tax year).

You're not wrong with this take. One of the biggest policies is encouraging having children through all the various credits and writeoffs you can do with having children.

Re: Open Source Tax Software

#206

Post by BiteCode_dev »

koheripbal wrote: post #150
BiteCode_dev wrote: post #139

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The french initiative started in 2013 is still alive (last commit a few days ago), and passes the gov test suite (they keep in touch with our version of the IRS): https://github.com/openfisca/openfisca-france The way we got this is interestingly twisted. French citizens requested the software used by the administration, and they managed to get it! But, it was written in Mlang, a proprietary language created by the fr…

France has no State/Provincial level taxes. They also do not tax global income. These add major complexities to the US tax code.

The states don't do the taxes manually, either.

Just like France, they could open source their software.

Re: Open Source Tax Software

#207

Post by mgkimsal »

peteri wrote: post #141
EvanDotPro wrote: post #26

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Around 2007-2008, as a "side project" I tried to build a web-based payroll software for a single state. Me and the developer I employed were able to get to 80% real quick, with ACH and everything. But as you say, the final 20% (edge cases) are nearly endless and ever-changing. Even a single state ended up being way too much for two developers.

Way back when I wrote accounting software in the UK. I had a conversation with my boss about us writing our own payroll software so we didn't have to a pay a third party to white label their software. I then went and found out how many folks one of our competitors (a bit more mass market than us) had writing payroll software. The answer was it was a six person team just to keep up with the government changes every ye…

I switched payroll providers a few years ago away from Quickbooks Payroll. They hosed up my stuff so bad I was dealing with the fallout for close to 2 years afterwards - overpaid, underpaid, refunds, fines, it was a mess.

The new company I switched to did not allow me to do payroll on the days that I'd wanted. They only offered 2 or 3 options, none of which matched what I'd done before. "That's all we offer" was the reply. There've been a couple other 'restrictions' (lost flexibility) on some behaviors - nothing horrible, of course.

I've no doubt removing some of that flexibility has reduced their overhead - there's enough changing regulations every year in multiple jurisdictions - keeping the main stuff under their control as simple as possible seems to have worked out for them. I've had... 4 years with them without incident, but 2 years of pain with QB before.

FWIW, QB hosed up dealing with my state. Federal was fine, but they created so many problems with my state filings...

Re: Open Source Tax Software

#208

Post by snackematician »

xivzgrev wrote: post #19

I worked on tax software and have seen these kind of efforts. Noble, yes. Short lived, yes. It’s relatively easy to make a free 1040 file. The real problem comes from all. The. Edge. Cases. 1) do you support xyz state? 2) what if I lived in multiple states? 3) what if i… And on and on. And it’s not just one and done. Every year IRS and states are changing their shit so you have to go thru and make all kind of updates…

> I worked on tax software and have seen these kind of efforts. Noble, yes. Short lived, yes.

I've been using excel1040.com for several years now (2017 iirc), and I think it's been around for awhile before that as well -- so I don't think it's fair to call it short lived.

It's pretty amazing how thorough it is. Not perfect, but I found it much more comprehensive and flexible than the free/cheap version of Turbotax.

That said, it is maintained by one crazy guy in Kansas. I doubt the project will survive after he stops working on it.

Re: Open Source Tax Software

#209

Post by triceratops »

koheripbal wrote: post #150
BiteCode_dev wrote: post #139

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The french initiative started in 2013 is still alive (last commit a few days ago), and passes the gov test suite (they keep in touch with our version of the IRS): https://github.com/openfisca/openfisca-france The way we got this is interestingly twisted. French citizens requested the software used by the administration, and they managed to get it! But, it was written in Mlang, a proprietary language created by the fr…

France has no State/Provincial level taxes. They also do not tax global income. These add major complexities to the US tax code.

The US could stop taxing global income for individuals. US companies don't have to pay taxes on their overseas profits, why do people?

Re: Open Source Tax Software

#210

Post by snackematician »

phuff wrote: post #12

The US government provides this online for free. Only the edgiest of edge cases aren't supported. You can e-file your federal return with this regardless of how much money you make. You still have to do the calculations yourself. But you don't have to use paper. https://www.irs.gov/e-file-providers/free-file-fillable-form...

I use Free File Fillable Forms together with excel1040.com. First I fill in the numbers in Excel, then into Free File Fillable Forms, and check that they get the same answers. It works well for me.
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