121–130 of 350 posts
One thing I really want to see is an official form where if you answer all the questions, to the best of your knowledge correctly, protects you from liability for incorrectly filing your taxes. End of the day with TurboTax and co, you, as expected, get a "not our system, not our problem" type response when dealing with the post-filing ramifications. There seems to generally be a lot of "I'm not sure if I did it right…
God knows why it took this long.....
This is great news; no matter how restricted it may be initially, I think having a "guaranteed-free" tax filing system will be great for most people, especially lower-income people. The private companies have demonstrated pretty clearly that they will do everything they can to avoid people actually having free tax filing, and while ~$50-100 might not seem like a ton of money, keep in mind that at the current United S…
I've been using FreeTaxUSA for a while now to do my taxes, and I like it very much. (If you use TurboTax or H&R Block or something, I strongly recommend giving FreeTaxUSA a look). I was sort of wondering if the IRS would just buy them wholesale and use that as the free file software, since it's already "finished" and making another one would be duplicated effort. But is there precedent for that, the government just b…
>is there precedent for that, the government just buying a private company for its IP? The government's preference would probably be to contract with them and license it.
> Our overall success will depend on several special legislative proposals and regulatory authorities that we believe are appropriate for an effort of this scope and importance:
> Engaging the Office of Personnel Management to utilize existing direct hire authority for IT modernization positions and/or broadening government-wide critical pay authority
> Seeking reauthorization of IRS Streamlined Critical Pay Authority that expired in 2013
> Ensuring funding is available for multiple fiscal years at somewhat predictable intervals.
[1] https://www.whitehouse.gov/omb/briefing-room/2023/09/22/fact...
[2] https://www.irs.gov/newsroom/irs-modernization
[3] https://home.treasury.gov/news/press-releases/jy1666 | https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=36976331
(please consider a tour of duty: https://www.usds.gov/apply | no affiliation, just an engaged citizen)
One thing I really want to see is an official form where if you answer all the questions, to the best of your knowledge correctly, protects you from liability for incorrectly filing your taxes. End of the day with TurboTax and co, you, as expected, get a "not our system, not our problem" type response when dealing with the post-filing ramifications. There seems to generally be a lot of "I'm not sure if I did it right…
protects you from liability for incorrectly filing your taxes. In practice, it's not really needed. The thing is (and I realize that it's not the general perception) if you sincerely try to file your taxes and you screw up, the IRS will generally work with you to fix things. Sure, if you go all sovereign-citizen/Wesley Snipes and refuse to acknowledge taxes they'll kick in the door and take all your stuff. But if you…
Earlier quoted context omitted.
FWIW, FreeTaxUSA[0] is much cheaper than Intuit and has worked great for me the past few years. I find it slightly easier than TurboTax, in fact. [0] https://www.freetaxusa.com/
sorry... cheaper? surely a place called free tax usa would be free?
Before everyone gets too excited: This will probably only apply to simple tax situations: If you have more than these, you might not be able use it: #Income reporting W-2 wage income Social Security and railroad retirement income Unemployment compensation Interest of $1,500 or less #Credits Earned Income Tax Credit Child Tax Credit Credit for Other Dependents #Deductions Standard deduction Student loan interest Educa…
See, this is the thing that gets me. For almost anyone who fits in this box, you shouldn't have to file in the first place . Not "shouldn't have to pay", but literally, "should not have to send documents to the government telling them how much you owe them" - because they already have all of that information . They should just give you an itemized breakdown and ask if it's correct.
If an entire industry can be killed by a public service, it probably didn't deserve to exist in the first place.
> If an entire industry can be killed by a public service, it probably didn't deserve to exist in the first place. It was created by a public service. It would be better if they'd just made a rule that those with super simple tax affairs just didn't need to file, as we have in the UK. But there's probably no pork in just making things better.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
> I don't want operating systems to be a government-provided 'public good'. Huh. Interesting example. I actually do want to see a government produced public good operating system. Where we're going, operating systems will either be ad filled messes or locked down walled gardens. A public good option would be required to meet high bars for interoperability while also not ad funded. It's one thing to regulate away a ma…
> Where we're going, operating systems will either be ad filled messes or locked down walled gardens. Linux?
China has given money to FOSS projects far more than the US does, and there is an official Chinese Linux distro available to Chinese users. Nobody is forced to use it, outside of Chinese government employees on their work machines, but like a library, it is something of value that the state can provide to those who might need it.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
FWIW, FreeTaxUSA[0] is much cheaper than Intuit and has worked great for me the past few years. I find it slightly easier than TurboTax, in fact. [0] https://www.freetaxusa.com/
sorry... cheaper? surely a place called free tax usa would be free?