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Top-level
@cairobraga @seachanger As an example, the leading tax prep software "free option" will happily take down all your information and set up to submit your taxes. Then when you click submit, it comes up and says, sorry, your income is too high to use the free option, enter your credit card number to pay for the software. You either pay, or start over and do your taxes manually. A lot of Americans file at the last minute, and fear the tax authorities like they were the Stasi, so this is effective. 15 comments
@cairobraga @mike805 @seachanger it really comes down to the power of money: the tax preparation industry has spent money since the 90s lobbying Congress not to authorize the IRS to offer that service. The well-funded government incompetence narrative supports that, too, since many Americans just assume those businesses are right when they say the government doesn’t have the skills to do that, and since most Americans don’t travel internationally few people know most other countries offer it.  @cairobraga @mike805 @seachanger The Tax Software lobby is strong and has killed every bill to eliminate the horrible torture we're forced to endure. @cairobraga @mike805 @seachanger for U.S. taxes, the IRS offers "Free Fillable Forms", an interactive web version of Form 1040 (and supplemental forms) that includes links to explanations and instructions. You can submit these forms to the IRS directly through their provided web site. This is free for all income levels and covers all tax situations. Many U.S. states also offer similar free-filing services online for their state taxes as well. @cairobraga @mike805 @seachanger However, U.S. tax law is so intentionally esoteric (specifically so that rich people don't have to pay taxes) that many people don't feel confident enough to fill out and submit Form 1040 themselves. It also doesn't help that tax-preparation services, such as #TurboTax and #HRBlock, spend significant amounts of money to openly #bribe politicians and civil servants in order to keep the tax code complicated. @zrb @cairobraga @seachanger I used those once. Lately I've been using the PDF fillable forms, printing them out and mailing them in. If I could just upload the filled PDF files I would not be on here complaining. @rskikuli @cairobraga @seachanger Rome took a while too. And like the Romans, America is paying off the barbarians. When the money runs out (or no longer buys anything) look out!  @cairobraga I am in the US and I have been filing my taxes online for free for as long as I can remember, but also I don’t have high income or complicated tax returns. I did have to pay to do my deceased brother’s tax return because he had a 1099 in there which is lame. So I guess this change would have saved me whatever I paid for that. But we have had free online filing for a lot of people for a long time. @cairobraga @seachanger @mike805 nutshell: greed. like fire and war, greed devours everything in the end. greed is never satisfied. @cairobraga @seachanger Here's another one. Lawyers use a private system called Lexis/Nexis to do legal research. They are more or less required to use this monopoly system because judges want the reference numbers (like hyperlinks) in case citations. If you don't use Lexis/Nexis the judge may well not read your argument, and you lose the case!  @mike805 @cairobraga @seachanger @the5thColumnist @cairobraga @seachanger They intentionally do not. They were sued because of dark patterns on the website to redirect you to the paid version. As well as dark patterns within the software itself to let you invest all the effort before demanding payment.  |
Gregory's Server
@mike805 @seachanger thanks for the deeper context. it still bears the "WTF" question. for a country that claims to be ahead of all others, the US is really REALLY behind. filing taxes by mail? private commercial software that handles fiscal obligations? no state-operated online filing system? in Brazil we've been filing our income tax online for 2 decades, on free software developed by a state entity. in Portugal (and the rest of the EU) it's even easier because most of the forms come up pre-filled (we automatically declare as we go and only include incomes/expenses that might've fallen out of the system or originated abroad), it has an automatic review system that warns you about errors and inconsistencies so you can correct them before you submit and this is all done directly on the web browser, on the usual Fiscal Authority services portal, it usually takes less than 30min to do it, for the average citizen. how come the "greatest country in the world" doesn't have that?
@mike805 @seachanger thanks for the deeper context. it still bears the "WTF" question. for a country that claims to be ahead of all others, the US is really REALLY behind. filing taxes by mail? private commercial software that handles fiscal obligations? no state-operated online filing system? in Brazil we've been filing our income tax online for 2 decades, on free software developed by a state entity. in Portugal (and the rest of the EU) it's even easier because most of the forms come up pre-filled...