Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

IRS to begin trial of its own free tax-filing system

nytimes.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

151–160 of 338 posts

Re: IRS to begin trial of its own free tax-filing system

#151

Post by IshKebab »

hackernewds wrote: post #68
freedomben wrote: post #63

Earlier quoted context omitted.

For those who don't know, of those 12 states, only 4 actually have income taxes. The other 8 do not. This whole system stinks. The overly complicated tax code, the sleazy corporations making tons of money on it, the entrenched politicians and bureacrats who make a living on it, etc.

We can still appreciate progress. And this is progress. Although if the IRS is gonna audit when I under pay, they technically already know how much I owe. Why not just tell me? Reckon it's since people also over pay, and there's no refunds for doing that.

Yeah I wonder the same question about UK taxes. If you self-assess they'll still say "actually we calculated your tax and got this number so you owe us £X".

The vast majority of people don't need to file taxes but even then it somehow still comes out wrong and you occasionally get a refund.

Re: IRS to begin trial of its own free tax-filing system

#152

Post by lupusreal »

unethical_ban wrote: post #93
lupusreal wrote: post #74

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm with you; if I still have to fill in the paperwork then quite literally what is the point? I'll continue paying an accountant to do this bullshit. This 'new' system is useless to me.

You're not the only taxpayer in the country. Other people might benefit. You have an accountant, so you're already a minority of citizens. Open your mind.

I don't want an accountant, all I want is the system other countries have where the government fills out the forms for you and all you do is sign; this is what everybody has been asking for, for years, and I'm not going to pretend otherwise. If they can't or won't give us that then there is no cause for celebration. My taxes aren't complicated but I detest paperwork and have anxiety over all of it. I don't hire an accountant for fun, I do it because I don't want to fill in the damn forms!

If I have to fill out the forms myself, then it's utterly pointless. I could already do that if that's what I wanted. Not rhetorical: what is even new about this, being able to do it without using paper and pen? Big fucking whoop, thanks for nothing IRS.

Re: IRS to begin trial of its own free tax-filing system

#153

Post by xav0989 »

mig39 wrote: post #35
asia92 wrote: post #11

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Not canada

For the last couple of years, my T4, pension, RRSP, and some of my pension forms have all been imported automatically into CRA, and then into Turbotax. So maybe it's an optional thing for some employers? Of course, would be great to just skip the Turbotax portion.

I think that all employers are now required to input the T4/remuneration information in a way that CRA can machine-process it, which allows them to make it available to third-party systems like TurboTax or SimpleTax.

But yeah, for the large majority of us, having the option to skip TurboTax and just use a pre-filled, government generated tax return would be great.

Re: IRS to begin trial of its own free tax-filing system

#154

Post by leereeves »

_ihaque wrote: post #98

For anyone interested in why the system looks the way it does, I recommend patio11's insightful recent blog post, which is nominally about payroll systems but ends up discussing the history of taxation in the US because that's the origination of many of these systems: https://www.bitsaboutmoney.com/archive/payroll-providers-pow... A relevant quotation for much of the discussion here: > And, relevant to the question o…

> Norquist considers a public filing option a tax increase by stealth and opposes it automatically.

When phrased that way, it sounds ridiculous. But those are the author's words, not Norquist's or ATR's.

What Norquist and ATR want is for people to be aware of taxes. In their words (from the article): "More than any other public policy, the way the government raises revenue—how much, at what rates, under what circumstances, from whom, and for whom—has the greatest impact on our economy’s performance."

And even the article admits that making taxes easier to file has the side effect of "decoupling public sentiment and policy changes" (that is, making "tax increases by stealth" easier):

> ATR [Norquist runs Americans for Tax Reform] is institutionally skeptical of withholding, because they believe that withholding allows one to increase taxes by stealth. I don’t think it is excessively partisan to say that, if one phrases that claim a bit more neutrally as “withholding increases tax compliance by decoupling public sentiment and policy changes,” the people who designed the withholding system would say “I’m glad the National Archives makes our design documents so accessible. We wrote them to be read!”

Re: IRS to begin trial of its own free tax-filing system

#155

Post by arbuge »

PopAlongKid wrote: post #131
arbuge wrote: post #50

I have a hard time understanding why the IRS doesn't at least have a basic web portal for individuals and businesses to do simple things like update addresses, send secure correspondence, check on the status of correspondence, file forms electronically, etc. A lot of paper forms and letters, human resources and time could be saved with such a system, even if it doesn't actually provide for any tax computations itself…

>I have a hard time understanding why the IRS doesn't at least have a basic web portal for individuals and businesses to do simple things They do have such a portal which does some of the things you list and several other things too. https://www.irs.gov/payments/your-online-account

Yes, I know about that. It has a limited subset of the functionality I mention - for individuals. Does not exist for businesses.

Re: IRS to begin trial of its own free tax-filing system

#156

Post by seanmcdirmid »

hackernewds wrote: post #68
freedomben wrote: post #63

Earlier quoted context omitted.

For those who don't know, of those 12 states, only 4 actually have income taxes. The other 8 do not. This whole system stinks. The overly complicated tax code, the sleazy corporations making tons of money on it, the entrenched politicians and bureacrats who make a living on it, etc.

We can still appreciate progress. And this is progress. Although if the IRS is gonna audit when I under pay, they technically already know how much I owe. Why not just tell me? Reckon it's since people also over pay, and there's no refunds for doing that.

So…they know very little actually. We just got a nasty tax bill from the IRS because when my wife gets an RSU grant, her company sells some stock to pay income tax for that grant. Little did I know, that generates a 1040 for the stock sale (to pay ordinary income taxes) with a cost basis of zero! Instead, you have to adjust the cost basis to the entire sale (or even more!) via supplemental information. Annoying, so I had to learn a bunch of tax rules over one day on the weekend, and in the end the amended return said the IRS owed us money.

It’s crazy stuff like this that means the IRS can’t really calculate your taxes for you.

Re: IRS to begin trial of its own free tax-filing system

#157

Post by ghaff »

seanmcdirmid wrote: post #156
hackernewds wrote: post #68

Earlier quoted context omitted.

We can still appreciate progress. And this is progress. Although if the IRS is gonna audit when I under pay, they technically already know how much I owe. Why not just tell me? Reckon it's since people also over pay, and there's no refunds for doing that.

So…they know very little actually. We just got a nasty tax bill from the IRS because when my wife gets an RSU grant, her company sells some stock to pay income tax for that grant. Little did I know, that generates a 1040 for the stock sale (to pay ordinary income taxes) with a cost basis of zero! Instead, you have to adjust the cost basis to the entire sale (or even more!) via supplemental information. Annoying, so I…

Cost basis stuff has improved over time and I haven’t had problems recently that I know of but I’m sure there are still issues.

Re: IRS to begin trial of its own free tax-filing system

#158

Post by koolba »

leereeves wrote: post #154
_ihaque wrote: post #98

For anyone interested in why the system looks the way it does, I recommend patio11's insightful recent blog post, which is nominally about payroll systems but ends up discussing the history of taxation in the US because that's the origination of many of these systems: https://www.bitsaboutmoney.com/archive/payroll-providers-pow... A relevant quotation for much of the discussion here: > And, relevant to the question o…

> Norquist considers a public filing option a tax increase by stealth and opposes it automatically. When phrased that way, it sounds ridiculous. But those are the author's words, not Norquist's or ATR's. What Norquist and ATR want is for people to be aware of taxes. In their words (from the article): "More than any other public policy, the way the government raises revenue—how much, at what rates, under what circumst…

> "More than any other public policy, the way the government raises revenue—how much, at what rates, under what circumstances, from whom, and for whom—has the greatest impact on our economy’s performance."

A perfect world would have people writing a check for their entire annual tax just before stepping into the voting booth.

Re: IRS to begin trial of its own free tax-filing system

#159

Post by consp »

leereeves wrote: post #154
_ihaque wrote: post #98

For anyone interested in why the system looks the way it does, I recommend patio11's insightful recent blog post, which is nominally about payroll systems but ends up discussing the history of taxation in the US because that's the origination of many of these systems: https://www.bitsaboutmoney.com/archive/payroll-providers-pow... A relevant quotation for much of the discussion here: > And, relevant to the question o…

> Norquist considers a public filing option a tax increase by stealth and opposes it automatically. When phrased that way, it sounds ridiculous. But those are the author's words, not Norquist's or ATR's. What Norquist and ATR want is for people to be aware of taxes. In their words (from the article): "More than any other public policy, the way the government raises revenue—how much, at what rates, under what circumst…

> And even the article admits that making taxes easier to file has the side effect of "decoupling public sentiment and policy changes" (that is, making "tax increases by stealth" easier)

How on earth is this possible? Instead of not having any clue, you actually get to see everything. My taxes have been automatic for years and I still have to approve every step of them along the way and I get to see and approve everything which had been filled in. The big difference is I now not have to spend hours researching everything if it remains the same as it was last year and only check if it changes.

Re: IRS to begin trial of its own free tax-filing system

#160

Post by consp »

koolba wrote: post #158
leereeves wrote: post #154

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Norquist considers a public filing option a tax increase by stealth and opposes it automatically. When phrased that way, it sounds ridiculous. But those are the author's words, not Norquist's or ATR's. What Norquist and ATR want is for people to be aware of taxes. In their words (from the article): "More than any other public policy, the way the government raises revenue—how much, at what rates, under what circumst…

> "More than any other public policy, the way the government raises revenue—how much, at what rates, under what circumstances, from whom, and for whom—has the greatest impact on our economy’s performance." A perfect world would have people writing a check for their entire annual tax just before stepping into the voting booth.

> A perfect world would have people writing a check for their entire annual tax just before stepping into the voting booth.

That would definitely be a horrible idea. No, I won't vote for drivable roads because I just payed my taxes, potholes be damned. And afterwards complain about the potholes anyway.

Post reply on HN