It's pretty dumb that this has an upper income limit that covers plenty of regular W2 wage workers
IRS Direct File to open to all 50 states and D.C. for 2025 tax season
51–60 of 338 posts
Re: IRS Direct File to open to all 50 states and D.C. for 2025 tax season
#52As a Brit it's baffling that this is even an issue. I filed my taxes online with HMRC for free this year (we call it Self Assessment), it took 20 minutes, and I received a 4 figure refund in ~2 weeks directly in to my bank account.
The tax system here (usa) is an absolute joke. I owed $5k this year and I literally did nothing different except receive a small 5% raise last year. I have the most basic taxes you can, single, no kids, no house. Literally just a salary paycheck every 2 weeks. Had no idea I would owe anything, much less that much money until I filed 2 weeks prior to our tax date in April and you're expected to pay everything you owe…
> I owed $5k this year and I literally did nothing different except receive a small 5% raise last year.
This is a common gripe I hear from US tax filers, and I fall into the same psychological trap myself. After all, it always feels bad to have to pay a 4 or 5 figure sum to anyone.
Instead, you should see this as a benefit -- you had the opportunity to extract gains from the stock market (or other investment) on money you rightfully owed to the government; they only came to collect it at the end of the year instead of with each paycheck. Conversely, a tax refund should be seen as a disadvantage, as the government withheld more money from you than it was entitled to.
Re: IRS Direct File to open to all 50 states and D.C. for 2025 tax season
#53I would argue that having to file taxes through a 3rd party accountant or service is not only forced commerce but also broken glass economics. Looks like it helps the economy by creating jobs but the job is redundant and does not create anything of value.
Where are crimes more likely to occur, a city with 10,000 or 1 million? Where are financial crimes more likely to occur, people that make $10,000 a year or people that make $1 million or more a year. I rather have these accounts move into forensic work and go after the wealthy tax evaders.
IRS is an enforcement agency that specializes in tax collection and fraud. People that are clamoring for reduced IRS staffing are ultimately support of defending the police. I rather have a well staff IRS going after those that evade paying their taxes, probability speaking the wealthy.
Re: IRS Direct File to open to all 50 states and D.C. for 2025 tax season
#54The Taxpayers Protection Alliance spokesperson quoted at the bottom says: > Private tax services "have every incentive to find the deductions that will yield them the best return," Zupkus said, adding that the IRS wants "to extract as much as possible from the taxpayer." I think it's worthwhile to acknowledge that there are indeed slightly different incentives involved when it comes to the private sector handling tax…
Yeah, private H&R Block and Intuit have built empires on upselling their products to taxpayers.
Re: IRS Direct File to open to all 50 states and D.C. for 2025 tax season
#55The Taxpayers Protection Alliance spokesperson quoted at the bottom says: > Private tax services "have every incentive to find the deductions that will yield them the best return," Zupkus said, adding that the IRS wants "to extract as much as possible from the taxpayer." I think it's worthwhile to acknowledge that there are indeed slightly different incentives involved when it comes to the private sector handling tax…
The IRS has no incentive to collect more than what you owe. If you overpay and the IRS discovers it, they will send you a refund.
Re: IRS Direct File to open to all 50 states and D.C. for 2025 tax season
#56"Intuit doesn't see a success story here, arguing that the Direct File program is costly for taxpayers"
Good Lord
Re: IRS Direct File to open to all 50 states and D.C. for 2025 tax season
#57Earlier quoted context omitted.
> How volatile is this to the political winds? Very. Had the GOP won the senate in 2022, this would have probably been cut already. Depending on how this November goes the policy could definitely be reversed. > Something like this, in order to be permanent, needs congressional approval. This program did come from Congress. It was apart of the inflation reduction act.
It's a huge problem that when the opposition comes into power, they immediately try to revert and undermine what the previous party did. Not because of merit, but just because of partisanship. So you end up with a lot of programs that get started and after a while get repealed or maintained badly. This costs the country a lot of money. The ACA is a classical example. Instead of improving it or proposing a real replac…
I'm actually curious on the reverse. What programs did the GOP start that were cancelled by the Dems? Note I'm a biased liberal, so potentially the reversals might've been propagandized to me as lifting restrictions or some other such political language and I might be unaware of the actual policies.
Re: IRS Direct File to open to all 50 states and D.C. for 2025 tax season
#58As a Brit it's baffling that this is even an issue. I filed my taxes online with HMRC for free this year (we call it Self Assessment), it took 20 minutes, and I received a 4 figure refund in ~2 weeks directly in to my bank account.
In the US, its basically that simple if you arent a business owner. Might even be simpler.
You type in like 14 numbers, each very clearly delineated.
But... if you are a business owner, it takes like 2-3 weekends. (I say weekends, because we work all day during the week)
Re: IRS Direct File to open to all 50 states and D.C. for 2025 tax season
#59It seemed like the initial Direct File rollout was limited to states that didn't have a state-level income tax, or directly cooperated with the IRS. Are they forcing all states to play ball, or will Direct File not cover state tax submissions?
From the second sentence of the article: "will be made permanent for the 2025 tax season with all 50 states and Washington D.C. invited to participate" It seems very much that this is an opt-in thing, state by state. I would suspect that the results of this will be most Democratic-leaning states at least trying to opt-in for next year, and many Republican-leaning states refusing loudly during this election year, then…
States part of the pilot program (i.e., 2023 tax year): Arizona, California, Florida, Massachusetts, Nevada, New Hampshire, New York, South Dakota, Tennessee, Texas, Washington (state), Wyoming as per https://www.irs.gov/about-irs/strategic-plan/irs-direct-file....
Looks like exactly half and half, Democratic/Republican to me ...
But, who knows maybe next year ...
Re: IRS Direct File to open to all 50 states and D.C. for 2025 tax season
#60Earlier quoted context omitted.
The tax system here (usa) is an absolute joke. I owed $5k this year and I literally did nothing different except receive a small 5% raise last year. I have the most basic taxes you can, single, no kids, no house. Literally just a salary paycheck every 2 weeks. Had no idea I would owe anything, much less that much money until I filed 2 weeks prior to our tax date in April and you're expected to pay everything you owe…
Your company fucked up by not taking withholding from the bonus.
I do get a 20% bonus at this company and I think it is attributed to that. It was my first time getting that bonus. What do I even do here? Talk to HR? I don't think I can do anything and just suck it up and pay it and expect it next year? I dunno.