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California tried to save the nation from tax filing, then Intuit stepped in

latimes.com

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Re: California tried to save the nation from tax filing, then Intuit stepped in

#151

Post by dionidium »

psychometry wrote: post #80
golemotron wrote: post #54

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The nation is pretty tired of California and NY trying to save it.

Yeah let's run the country like Alabama instead. They're doing well! /s

Alabama has a higher GDP per capita than Germany, Belgium, Israel, France, Japan, the U.K. and...I could go on.

Alabama is doing well. We live in such an enormously wealthy country that it only looks bad by comparison. But not by comparison to basically anywhere else on Earth.

Source: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Comparison_between_U.S._states...

Re: California tried to save the nation from tax filing, then Intuit stepped in

#152

Post by ghaff »

JackFr wrote: post #111
throwaway898989 wrote: post #71

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The "Pay-As-You-Earn" system was introduced in Australia and the UK during WW2 lol. The US has the same system its just been implemented extremely poorly

It's not that it's implemented poorly. It's that 1) the federal government collects multiple kinds of taxes out out of your paycheck. Social security, medicare and regular income tax are different. Income tax rates are progressive while the payroll taxes are flat but capped at a certain amount. 2) Additionally forty-two states have income taxes as do dozens of local municipalities. Consider that they also don't treat…

Furthermore, a number of states are starting to require tax returns to be filed even for short durations of working in the state for business purposes.

Re: California tried to save the nation from tax filing, then Intuit stepped in

#153

Post by AnthonyMouse »

Frost1x wrote: post #118
AnthonyMouse wrote: post #79

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> If you think they're a pain in the ass, advocate for simpler taxes. Intuit would lobby against that too.

Not if simplifying taxes was as easy as paying Intuit the $89/yr toll to not deal with taxes. Intuit just wants money, they really don't care about taxes or complexity of the tax system. The only reason they care about complex tax code is that they can make money from it. These large businesses of today don't have visions or value creation goals, they have markets, competitors, and revenue streams. Everything else th…

> Not if simplifying taxes was as easy as paying Intuit the $89/yr toll to not deal with taxes.

That's not what "simplifying taxes" means. That's paying Intuit to deal with the complexity for you, which is the status quo. They need the complexity or there's nothing for you to pay them to do.

Compare this with, say, replacing federal income tax with VAT+UBI. You get a progressive tax system (because of the UBI) with zero individuals having to file income tax returns. Actual simplification. You also solve the problem of people not realizing how much tax they're paying because they see the VAT on the receipt every time they buy something.

Re: California tried to save the nation from tax filing, then Intuit stepped in

#154

Post by junon »

progx wrote: post #7
junon wrote: post #3

Intuit is such an evil company. Now that I've moved to Germany, I know what it feels like not to have to file every year (I still have to for the US but it's trivial now due to FIEC). There's nobody hounding you here, no stress regarding your taxes unless you're filing for a return or have extenuating circumstances, and even then there's a government-provided online portal for direct communication with the Finanzamt…

But only für employees! As an independent or small company owner you have todo it every year.

Right, most people are employees though. Germany has another problem though - getting a Steuerberater (tax advisor) to help you with the paperwork as a business owner is next to impossible.

Re: California tried to save the nation from tax filing, then Intuit stepped in

#155

Post by groos »

nightski wrote: post #27
bogota wrote: post #10

I hate wasting at least a day if not more of my life every year filing. As time goes on and i have more assets the time to file goes up as well and gathering all the required documents with every bank having different timelines is a nightmare. But what can I do about it? I would imagine if it went to a vote overwhelmingly people would say no I don’t want to file like this every year. But here we are and honestly I do…

If you have all these assets and your time is valuable I imagine you can cough up a few $ to pay a local tax accountant. I do this for my single member company, it costs $150 each year. Very worth it and a small price to pay. They even do a quick review of my books. At this point I am familiar enough with all the forms that I could probably do it myself in less than an hour. But I don't mind supporting the accountant…

I've always done my own (US) taxes but have been mulling hiring an accountant this year. But "doing" the taxes is the easy part with software. It's collecting all the needed information that is painful. Will I just be paying an accountant to use their software? Or is there a real difference in using software like Intuit's and a real accountant for individual returns? (I have investments, retirement funds, etc.).

Re: California tried to save the nation from tax filing, then Intuit stepped in

#156

Post by vidanay »

nightski wrote: post #27
bogota wrote: post #10

I hate wasting at least a day if not more of my life every year filing. As time goes on and i have more assets the time to file goes up as well and gathering all the required documents with every bank having different timelines is a nightmare. But what can I do about it? I would imagine if it went to a vote overwhelmingly people would say no I don’t want to file like this every year. But here we are and honestly I do…

If you have all these assets and your time is valuable I imagine you can cough up a few $ to pay a local tax accountant. I do this for my single member company, it costs $150 each year. Very worth it and a small price to pay. They even do a quick review of my books. At this point I am familiar enough with all the forms that I could probably do it myself in less than an hour. But I don't mind supporting the accountant…

The one and only time I used a "professional" tax preparer, I sat in their office and answered the questions they read off their "TurboTax for professionals" software. It was the same damn questions when I did it myself, except I was charged a fee, and I had to do it twice because I had to go home and retrieve some info I didn't have with the first time

Re: California tried to save the nation from tax filing, then Intuit stepped in

#157

Post by junon »

guerrilla wrote: post #114
junon wrote: post #3

Intuit is such an evil company. Now that I've moved to Germany, I know what it feels like not to have to file every year (I still have to for the US but it's trivial now due to FIEC). There's nobody hounding you here, no stress regarding your taxes unless you're filing for a return or have extenuating circumstances, and even then there's a government-provided online portal for direct communication with the Finanzamt…

> but it's trivial now due to FIEC What do you mean?

Foreign Income Earned Credit. Basically since the US is one of two countries in the world to still collect taxes from people living abroad, you have to file taxes every year still but it usually amounts to a net of $0.00 as it's written off under double-tax agreements with Germany.

Re: California tried to save the nation from tax filing, then Intuit stepped in

#158

Post by tehwebguy »

tromp wrote: post #106
junon wrote: post #3

Intuit is such an evil company. Now that I've moved to Germany, I know what it feels like not to have to file every year (I still have to for the US but it's trivial now due to FIEC). There's nobody hounding you here, no stress regarding your taxes unless you're filing for a return or have extenuating circumstances, and even then there's a government-provided online portal for direct communication with the Finanzamt…

Why assign all the blame to Intuit? > They persuaded the Internal Revenue Service for more than a decade to pledge in writing not to adopt California’s innovation or develop any other offerings that threatened their business model. I think the IRS deserves much of the blame for yielding to Intuit's persuasion. Every American should be upset with both Intuit and the IRS.

On the federal level almost every bad thing that happens and good thing that doesn't happen is the fault of the senate.

Re: California tried to save the nation from tax filing, then Intuit stepped in

#159

Post by [deleted] »

Reason077 wrote: post #17
junon wrote: post #3

Intuit is such an evil company. Now that I've moved to Germany, I know what it feels like not to have to file every year (I still have to for the US but it's trivial now due to FIEC). There's nobody hounding you here, no stress regarding your taxes unless you're filing for a return or have extenuating circumstances, and even then there's a government-provided online portal for direct communication with the Finanzamt…

> "there's a government-provided online portal for direct communication with the Finanzamt (finance department)." A government provided portal?! Surely this is a case of government over-reach: directly competing with hard working private-sector businesses (tax accountants, tax software makers), destroying jobs and stifling innovation? It would never be allowed in freedom-loving America! /s

[deleted]

Re: California tried to save the nation from tax filing, then Intuit stepped in

#160

Post by jpalawaga »

mwint wrote: post #68

Since I’ve not seen it mentioned yet, https://www.freetaxusa.com/ . Used it the last few years to do my taxes, which include investment and self employment income. No complaints. Intuit’s stuff would charge quite a bit for my “complex” taxes. They charge a couple bucks to file state taxes, which gives me a bit of confidence they’re not making money by selling my info to someone.

FTU is great, though startupees should be warned that it does not support ISO exercises in the AMT calculation, and you probably won't find that out until you get that far through your taxes.
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