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FTC sues Intuit for its deceptive TurboTax “free” filing campaign

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Re: FTC sues Intuit for its deceptive TurboTax “free” filing campaign

#491

Post by physicsguy »

From an outsider perspective, the US tax system is nuts.

Here in the UK, the tax year runs from April to April. Your employer reports exactly your taxable earnings to the government every month. You can log in online and see exactly what you're taxed on. You do not need to fill out a self-assessment at all - it's all done automatically, except for under certain circumstances which don't affect most of the population, but roughly:

* You have earnings over £1000 a year from outside of your normal employment (e.g. from interest on savings, selling things on eBay, whatever). * You are earning above £50,000 per year but want to continue claiming child benefit (which phases out between £50,000 and £60,000, so some needs to be repaid). * You earn over £100,000.

Re: FTC sues Intuit for its deceptive TurboTax “free” filing campaign

#494

Post by jbverschoor »

jacobolus wrote: post #477
JSavageOne wrote: post #386

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Blaming "lobbyists" absolves the politicians of their responsibility. The fault lies with the politicians for creating and perpetuating this broken system. (copy and pasted from another comment)

Like anyone else, politicians respond to incentives. US crony capitalism is a large-scale systemic failure, and the tax filing system (and under-resourced IRS) is just one symptom. If you want a narrow target, you can blame the GOP activists on the US Supreme Court, or if you want to go beyond that, blame the GOP senators/presidents who appointed them, the Federalist Society, the GOP donor base, GOP-aligned media org…

There's a word for those incentives.. "bribes"

Re: FTC sues Intuit for its deceptive TurboTax “free” filing campaign

#495

Post by lexs »

rkachowski wrote: post #489
JSavageOne wrote: post #376

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Pretty much every other major developed country operates like this. Here in South Korea for example filing taxes is as simple as logging into some government portal, verifying that the information they already have on you is correct, and making any corrections if necessary. 10 minutes, done. The U.S is unique in forcing its citizens to waste countless hours and pay hundreds/thousands of dollars every year doing the u…

> Pretty much every other major developed country operates like this cries in German

As an employee doing your taxes is optional in Germany as taxes are already deducted by the employer.

Re: FTC sues Intuit for its deceptive TurboTax “free” filing campaign

#496

Post by xunn0026 »

thehappypm wrote: post #416
zw123456 wrote: post #271

A few years back I got audited, and it was called an "electronic audit" by the IRS. Which basically meant that they had their computer systems scour a bunch of the bank records and discovered that I had forgotten to claim a 1099 for some contract work I had. OK, so they sent me a computer print out and they had cross checked everything on my return electronically, my property tax deductions, my stock dividends so on…

Oddly enough conservatives see that as a problem. They want this to be a big process for two reasons. First, taxpayers understanding the process is a good thing. It means they’re not getting gouged and they’re aware of their taxes. Second, they don’t want taxes to be something we just say “k” to like a cell phone bill. That could lead to it being extremely easy to raise taxes.

There is a logic here that's visible with salary talks in the EU: people only care about what they receive, not taxes; so all salary talk ignores taxes, all raises ignore taxes, all tax increases are irrelevant as long as they get in-hand the same amount. This is basically a population that sees taxes as magical money only the employer pays.

People should definitively understand how much taxes they are paying so that they demand some accountability for their money.

How do you accomplish that?

Re: FTC sues Intuit for its deceptive TurboTax “free” filing campaign

#497

Post by Broken_Hippo »

throwaway09223 wrote: post #390
btgeekboy wrote: post #380

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It’s a nice, if overly simplistic sentiment. It’d be nice if my 1099s were electronically filed with the cost basis. But they’re not. So the IRS, every year, thinks I’m going to owe way more than I do. The IRS also has zero idea about the $4000+ of sales tax deductions I’m filing for this year. And finally, if you do get it wrong, you don’t go to jail. They send you a CP2000 letter. (Remember those 1099s? I forgot on…

I agree. The IRS definitely does not know how much I owe each year. However, they do have an estimate and the vast majority of people would accept this estimate. So I think it's reasonable to suggest it ought to be provided. I think the strongest counter-argument against this approach is in regards to bad actors and who discloses first. If you're thinking about hiding income and the first step is the government telli…

Where I'm living, the government does the taxes for you and then sends you a notice to check them.

That last bit? That's important - you get to check them. You can adjust if you should need to. Guess what most folks don't have to do? Check them. This works because most folks have simple returns. They work, might or might not own a house, might have a bank account, might have a retirement account - and that's about it. The government already has what it needs for most people. But you can check them and adjust if they are wrong. Of course, you can just not bother, too.

Is the system perfect? No, but it doesn't need to be. It merely needs to have better overall tax compliance than another system. When taxes are easy for the vast majority of your population, the governement has a better collection rate and can spend manpower auditing those that need audited (perhaps audit more complicated returns from the well-to-do instead of Ordinary Married Citizen that makes 50k jointly) and they can generally spend less money doing things like printing forms and manning question lines that don't give answers that constitute legal advice.

And seriously, in these systems, hiding income is still a crime. So those folks that just "used the IRS figures!" still have the chance of going to jail. Even if they never get caught, the automated system still wins because of the other benefits.

Re: FTC sues Intuit for its deceptive TurboTax “free” filing campaign

#498

Post by thesimon »

rkachowski wrote: post #489
JSavageOne wrote: post #376

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Pretty much every other major developed country operates like this. Here in South Korea for example filing taxes is as simple as logging into some government portal, verifying that the information they already have on you is correct, and making any corrections if necessary. 10 minutes, done. The U.S is unique in forcing its citizens to waste countless hours and pay hundreds/thousands of dollars every year doing the u…

> Pretty much every other major developed country operates like this cries in German

Most employees don't need to even submit a tax return as with PAYG your taxes are already collected by your employer.

If you do end up filing your taxes, you can access the prefilled tax statements. Software to do that is free and easy. If you want software advising you on how to get a bigger refund, you'll have to pay maybe $10-20, though the $5 software from Aldi works fine for me.

Re: FTC sues Intuit for its deceptive TurboTax “free” filing campaign

#499

Post by throwaway48375 »

bombcar wrote: post #58
zaphod12 wrote: post #42

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Not sure why you're including the word 'technically,' in there - you are clearly and definitely committing tax fraud if you knowingly fail to include all of your financial information.

You could do it the hard way by doing the taxes in the app, printing it out, and then modifying the forms as necessary. But the companies know exactly how much to charge you so you avoid the hassle; though I won't shell out for state e-filing when I can print and mail.

>though I won't shell out for state e-filing when I can print and mail.

This is pretty much the only reason I own stamps.

Re: FTC sues Intuit for its deceptive TurboTax “free” filing campaign

#500

Post by xioxox »

lexs wrote: post #495
rkachowski wrote: post #489

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Pretty much every other major developed country operates like this cries in German

As an employee doing your taxes is optional in Germany as taxes are already deducted by the employer.

It can work ok if you're a single person with no children. However, you'll potentially have to pay a lot more tax if you're married where your spouse earns more or less than you. There several other reasons where legally you'll have to complete a tax return (e.g foreign income).

German taxes are really horrible, in general. They expect you to pay in advance for expected untaxed income (based on the previous year's return). Working out the taxes on the income from some ETF is a nightmare, unless your platform does it for you. Unless you really understand the system and can file your own taxes, then low-wage freelance work just doesn't make sense as the cost of doing the taxes can be higher than your income. This means people are trapped into not working.

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