141–150 of 268 posts
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McDonald's main product is not a piece of software. Intuit's is.
That's what I'm saying though, they don't even produce a product. They produce legislative influence to create a money collecting trap. Turboxtax isn't a "product" per se. That's like calling the mafia security guards because they force you to pay protection money. Many countries don't even require filling out tax forms. You just sign and pay.
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I came here to say the above. But let me add the following… Intuit is a criminal lobbying organization.
I guess they’re not doing a great job then? Because of the auto-filing/IRS-backed filing system being developed?
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I assume that information exists. It's mostly just totaling up some numbers. I know these days, for me, standard deduction works unless I have some outlier charitable/investment thing going on which I'm going to talk to my accountant about anyway. I assume there are other alternate energy credits and the like but not sure how they work and again aren't in play for most people in a given year.
Mortgage interest and state income taxes can easily get you well over the standard deduction for single people.
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One third times one fifth loses a lot of folks. As does addition and subtraction of fractions that don’t start with the same denominator, for that matter. They might figure out what to do to pass the test, but they may not get it .
Fractions are just division. When kids learn division, it's about splitting into equal groups. Fractions are a bit different though - you're splitting a single thing into equal chunks. Hence, slices of pie. Multiplying by 1/5 is really dividing by 5. Introduce that first. We already know how to do this. You split your 1/3 slice into 5 equal slices. Do the same to the other 2/3 slices, count all the slices, and you ha…
I’m not saying I don’t get it, I’m saying others have told me that they found the explanations and instructions they were given nonsensical.
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A 1040EZ covers that case and filing it is the cost of the stamp and envelope.
And an understanding of tax law
Now maybe you miss out on some deductions if you just transfer a few numbers to the forms. But the standard deduction is going to cover most people until you get into big mortgages or charitable writeoffs.
Any recommendations on how to really file taxes for free (federal and state)?
I've been using https://www.freetaxusa.com/ the last couple years and plan to continue this year. It is free for Federal (though I usually pay for an upgrade), and state is $15. The only option I know of for free state is to do the forms manually.
I just saw an TurboTax Ad where a guy was like "I Like free stuff" and then it said he was "happy to read the disclaimer" on TurboTax and see that "Roughly 37% of taxpayers qualify" which he looks thoughtfully in the distance and says "Thats me!" I thought it was a funny commercial because 37% doesn't seem like a lot and Turbotax is portraying it as the average person will identify themselves as part of that 37% even…
TurboTax is marketing to the kind of people who think getting big refunds is a good thing. That's generally people with lower incomes, so this fits that target.
That said, TurboTax did hit a specific level of 'eww' when I started seeing the refund option of a debit card (of course for some stupid fee that, if nothing else, provides some transparency to their kickback from the issuer).
I'm going to be doing what might be my last filing with them this year; it's easier for the purposes of history/other events but after that, it's gonna be my Fiancee's CPA.
Originally, I got 'started' when it was a desktop app only, and the user limit was very graceful, my parents and all of my siblings could benefit from that one yearly purchase...
Come to think of it, we should probably capture that date in the historical timeline of Enshittification.
And, yaknow, I'll ask my dad this weekend how he's doing his taxes this year. I'm honestly curious if he's finally fed up with their antics too... (It's a high bar; in the past he learned the basics of virtual machines to use some of his old-school software/tools, it's a beautiful level of curmudgeonry. OTOH my siblings have good CPAs.)
[0] - Not to be confused with some of the weird 'chop shop' Tax places I have seen around me in the past, sort of 'pop-ups' with a statue of liberty wearing person or 'wacky inflatable arm-flailing tube-man' to help drive business in.
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It's not that they're rare, it's that it legitimately is an easy error to make even if you understand it to be an error. Even people who work with equations every day will occasionally make careless mistakes like this. That's why mathematicians joke about how it's important to make an even number of sign errors. To not make this mistake, you have to be able to call to mind that the map x -> 1/x reverses the inequalit…
For fractions like 1/3rd and 1/4th all it takes is common sense.
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I agree on every level, but I'm compelled to remind you this is the America where wendy's (?) had to revert to a 1/4 pounder from a 1/3 pounder bc people thought they were getting less meat. And let's not forget the ever-present anti-education cohort that can't be convinced math is good even when you tell them it's how you calculate discounts or tips.
I had to look this up as I didn’t grow up in the States. It was A&W. https://www.snopes.com/news/2022/06/17/third-pound-burger-fr... Crazy.
Any recommendations on how to really file taxes for free (federal and state)?