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

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

ftc.gov

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

531–540 of 610 posts

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

#531

Post by alistairSH »

noduerme wrote: post #524
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…

I dunno. Most people I know are 1099 / contract workers, and a lot of them get paid cash off the books. The government might have a rough idea of what they make, but it definitely doesn't know down to the penny. I keep very good books, but I have foreign bank accounts, crypto trades, subcontractors I paid over Paypal, people who paid me over Paypal, and there's no one system I'm aware of that could figure out what I…

We should keep a broken tax system because many of your peers are paid illegally? Or because edge cases exist?

I should be a pretty typical middle-class example. Two salaries (me + spouse), a mortgage, limited other deductions. Yet every year I have to wait for various forms that the government already has, enter the values on paper or pay for tax software, hope I don’t fat finger a value, and wait 7-10 years for an audit. Heck, since Trump increased the standard deduction, I’ll probably be taking that soon (mortgage interest is near that threshold now), but still can’t just click a button at irs.gov that says “yup, that’s right, here’s my bank info for refund/payment”

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

#532

Post by noduerme »

alistairSH wrote: post #531
noduerme wrote: post #524

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I dunno. Most people I know are 1099 / contract workers, and a lot of them get paid cash off the books. The government might have a rough idea of what they make, but it definitely doesn't know down to the penny. I keep very good books, but I have foreign bank accounts, crypto trades, subcontractors I paid over Paypal, people who paid me over Paypal, and there's no one system I'm aware of that could figure out what I…

We should keep a broken tax system because many of your peers are paid illegally? Or because edge cases exist? I should be a pretty typical middle-class example. Two salaries (me + spouse), a mortgage, limited other deductions. Yet every year I have to wait for various forms that the government already has, enter the values on paper or pay for tax software, hope I don’t fat finger a value, and wait 7-10 years for an…

Oh no. I'm just explaining why it's more efficient for the IRS to do it this way. I'd personally like to abolish income tax and only tax sales, with up to 100% tax on luxury goods and no tax on food, etc.

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

#533

Post by AnIdiotOnTheNet »

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…

It isn't just the lobbyists, certain ideologically anti-tax politicians desperately want their constituents to think of taxes as a Great Evil perpetrated upon them so they can present themselves as the solution. Making the process as much of a pain in the ass as they can is part of their reelection strategy.

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

#534

Post by adwww »

denton-scratch wrote: post #529
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…

> The U.S is unique in forcing its citizens to waste countless hours It may be unusual, but it's certainly not unique; I have to fill in a tax-return every year, because I receive rental income. Anyone in the UK that receives income that isn't taxed at source by their employer has to complete one. The last one I completed was 21 pages long, with notes for each page; a lot of the time I spent was scrabbling through my…

Even rental income has a fairly generous allowance before you need to file a full tax assessment.

The first £1,000 is tax free (presumably the cost of admin makes it easier to let that go).

And up to £2,500 you just have to phone / email HMRC.

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

#535

Post by adwww »

noduerme wrote: post #532
alistairSH wrote: post #531

Earlier quoted context omitted.

We should keep a broken tax system because many of your peers are paid illegally? Or because edge cases exist? I should be a pretty typical middle-class example. Two salaries (me + spouse), a mortgage, limited other deductions. Yet every year I have to wait for various forms that the government already has, enter the values on paper or pay for tax software, hope I don’t fat finger a value, and wait 7-10 years for an…

Oh no. I'm just explaining why it's more efficient for the IRS to do it this way. I'd personally like to abolish income tax and only tax sales, with up to 100% tax on luxury goods and no tax on food, etc.

That sounds pretty regressive. A massive tax burdon on a low income family so that high earners don't have to file income taxes.

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

#536

Post by azemetre »

PaulDavisThe1st wrote: post #482
quantified wrote: post #394

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Well, Intuit lobbying/bribery has a lot to do with it in the last couple decades.

I was referring to the complexity of the tax code, not the filing system itself.

Complexity of the tax code is just part of the system Intuit wants. If taxes were simple you wouldn't have to pay for unique software right?

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

#537

Post by noduerme »

adwww wrote: post #535
noduerme wrote: post #532

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Oh no. I'm just explaining why it's more efficient for the IRS to do it this way. I'd personally like to abolish income tax and only tax sales, with up to 100% tax on luxury goods and no tax on food, etc.

That sounds pretty regressive. A massive tax burdon on a low income family so that high earners don't have to file income taxes.

Well, really it's progressive if it only taxes stuff you don't need to buy. Here's what I think:

Fuel and food, no tax.

School supplies, shoes, clothing, any item under $100, no tax. Over $100, ramp it up.

Diamond rings, 100% tax.

Alcohol and cigarettes, 20-30%.

Used cars, no tax.

New cars, 10% up to 100%. Credits if they're electric or extremely fuel-efficient.

Playstations, high end sneakers, Smart TVs, iPhones, rims, jewelry, expensive furnishings, rugs, anything better than your basic washer/drier: 100% tax.

Books: Free and subsidized by the government, as many as you want, any book ever written.

Healthcare: Free.

College: Free.

Basically under my plan, as long as you get stuff you need for your family, you pay no tax. If you get stuff you want for your pleasure, you pay tax on it.

How's that regressive?

The only real downside I see is the potential for a massive black market in luxury goods, tobacco and alcohol. But legalizing and taxing pot and prostitution should take some of the sting out of that.

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

#538

Post by bick_nyers »

A dark pattern I just learned about with TurboTax, is that if you attempt to downgrade from paid to free when it is time to file (even without utilizing paid features), they force you to completely start over from scratch. For a lot of people, they may not even know they are in "paid mode" until it comes time to punch in the debit card.

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

#539

Post by alistairSH »

noduerme wrote: post #532
alistairSH wrote: post #531

Earlier quoted context omitted.

We should keep a broken tax system because many of your peers are paid illegally? Or because edge cases exist? I should be a pretty typical middle-class example. Two salaries (me + spouse), a mortgage, limited other deductions. Yet every year I have to wait for various forms that the government already has, enter the values on paper or pay for tax software, hope I don’t fat finger a value, and wait 7-10 years for an…

Oh no. I'm just explaining why it's more efficient for the IRS to do it this way. I'd personally like to abolish income tax and only tax sales, with up to 100% tax on luxury goods and no tax on food, etc.

I don't by the "more efficient" argument.

The IRS could generate online forms (or snail mail) with what they know and let us add deductions and other income. They should know salary/wages, they could know investment income (not sure if broker report to the IRS, or just send forms to filers).

Even if the filer has to manually enter deductions, credits, etc, doing it on an IRS site has several benefits... no $50+ fee for H&R/TaxCut/etc, no $500+ for a CPA (for fairly typical tax situations), no worrying about whether online submission processed correctly (because you'd be submitting directly to the IRS instead of relying on a 3rd party to submit for you). Multiply that time/money/stress savings across the population and it's a MASSIVE benefit to society.

Post reply on HN