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

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

#191

Post by candiddevmike »

landemva wrote: post #150
Clubber wrote: post #89

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>What (the left) needs to do is clear out rents. Unfortunately in the US the rent seekers have an easy hack to make sure that never happens: lobbying. The system will never change unless we vote out the current politicians, and then maybe it will change. We might have to clear out most, ideally all of the applicable congress every election cycle for a few years before we see any results. As long as we keep voting in…

The federal system in regards to lobbying would change if we followed the constitution as written to allow House of Representatives to grow with census population count. And restore the not direct election of Senators. Then remove federal personal income tax. For icing on the cake, shut down the 3rd central bank known as 'Federal Reserve'. This would require a nationwide general strike to show the people are serious.…

Definitely expand the house, but we should abolish the Senate. It serves no purpose except tyranny of the minority and gridlock.

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

#194

Post by tromp »

mmmBacon wrote: post #167
tromp wrote: post #106

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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.

This isn’t the fault of the IRS. The IRS can only do what Congress allows them to do. It’s the fault of Congress. In fact the 2 key Congresswomen responsible are Zoe Lofgren and Anna Eshoo. I currently live in Eshoo’s district but I can tell you she is completely unresponsive to you if you don’t live in Atherton or Palo Alto. I have never seen her campaign once. Her district is sprawling and includes 3 counties in th…

How can only 2 congress people be responsible? Surely all the other members would have had a say as well in legislating IRS policy?

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

#195

Post by garmaine »

iammisc wrote: post #170
Maarten88 wrote: post #168

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Isn't the IRS just executing the policies that elected politicians decide? It seems the IRS wanted to do the right thing 20 years ago, but they were stopped by politicians who were corrupted by lobbyists. Maybe US people should elect politicians that represent them instead of business. And stop buying the incredible amounts of double-speak that is always present in discussions like these.

Yes. I should restate... I'm not mad at low-level IRS employees. Rather the ones nominated and approved by Congress, who ultimately make these decisions.

It is Converse that makes these decisions, no? The IRS just does what it is told.

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

#196

Post by notanormalnerd »

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

Funnily enough it isn't.

Because you can go out and buy one of the programs that are on the market. There is a public interface/api that can be used by the companies to file your taxes. We even have startups doing your taxes with a questionaire on your phone.

But the government provides you with a free, basic version, the same they did with the standard forms. There is little help, a bit of explanation but nothing more.

And since you have to hand it in digitally now, they are also providing the means to do so. Paper, but digital.

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

#197

Post by ItsMonkk »

ZoomerCretin wrote: post #175
landemva wrote: post #150

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The federal system in regards to lobbying would change if we followed the constitution as written to allow House of Representatives to grow with census population count. And restore the not direct election of Senators. Then remove federal personal income tax. For icing on the cake, shut down the 3rd central bank known as 'Federal Reserve'. This would require a nationwide general strike to show the people are serious.…

>The federal system in regards to lobbying would change if we followed the constitution as written to allow House of Representatives to grow with census population count. Sounds good. >And restore the not direct election of Senators. Then remove federal personal income tax. For icing on the cake, shut down the 3rd central bank known as 'Federal Reserve'. I’m curious to know how any of these policies would be benefici…

I'm not the GP, but I mostly agree. The principles that I suspect we both share are that concentration of power will always result in harms, and the only way to get ourselves out of the mud is diffusion of power.

1. Up until 1913 the Senators were elected by the Representatives. In 1910 the law changed for Representatives to be per 30,000 population, to be static count of Reps. There is now is now 750,000 people per Representative. Because a Representative can not possibly talk to all 750,000, they can not represent them. The supply of their time is limited and that pushes up the supply/demand curve. They lobby for donors and only talk to the richest of the set.

If there were 131 Representatives in CA and only they could vote in Senators, the Senators would be beholden to them, and would be required to act on the average behalf. As the distribution is currently to large, this does not happen, and the poorer of the population are ignored and harmed.

2. The only tax that is non-distortionary is a Land Value Tax. All other taxes create distortions and should be eliminted. A Land Value Tax, if implemented, would be sufficient to handle all government spending. The only other tax that should be able to be implemented are Pigovian taxes on negative externalities.

3. The core mandate that the Federal Reserve handles is the management of the money supply. Austrian economic principles state that this is a waste of time, and you can do the same job, perfectly, and with less economic cycles and harm caused, by simply mandating a static monetary velocity.

So you can see in both the Taxes and the Federal Reserve example you can work out the exact algorithmic rule that should always be applied, and remove the need for individuals within the government from mucking up the system with their corruptions.

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

#198

Post by slg »

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.

Intuit is lobbying in defense of their entire industry. Almost every company of their size would do the same thing in their situation. The people who deserve the blame here are the people who are susceptible to those lobbying efforts.

Blame Congress.

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

#199

Post by celeduc »

tromp wrote: post #194
mmmBacon wrote: post #167

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This isn’t the fault of the IRS. The IRS can only do what Congress allows them to do. It’s the fault of Congress. In fact the 2 key Congresswomen responsible are Zoe Lofgren and Anna Eshoo. I currently live in Eshoo’s district but I can tell you she is completely unresponsive to you if you don’t live in Atherton or Palo Alto. I have never seen her campaign once. Her district is sprawling and includes 3 counties in th…

How can only 2 congress people be responsible? Surely all the other members would have had a say as well in legislating IRS policy?

How? Fundraising power! Horse trading! Lobbying! The entire system of government being corrupted by corporate money from top to bottom.

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

#200

Post by locallost »

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…

Living in Germany it's difficult to understand somebody saying nice things about their tax system :-). It almost caused a divorce for me, several times. But ok, if you don't file then it's understandable. But you should as you are almost always getting money back. For around 200 you can find somebody to do it for you and it will still be worth it.
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