• House passses bill to permanently ban the IRS from creating a free tax programs.
    53 replies, posted
http://www.businessinsider.com/house-bans-free-government-tax-preparation-software-turbotax-hr-block-2019-4 Corrupt fucks.
'Taxpayer first', what, how is making sure everyone can get their taxes done correctly without shelling out a bad thing?
In Australia you can just do your tax return through the ATO's website, check the PAYG numbers against your records and then they'll send you out your return within a week or so. Out of all the things to do you'd think the government would want to make giving them money easier, this seems like nothing but pure corruption.
AOC voted yes
This is about as retarded as you can get lmao
Yeah it's gotten really good over the last few years. Really clean and intuitive interface, lots of help and guides to complete more complex parts such as capital gains, and even actual people you can chat to through messaging when you're filling them out.
I'm pretty sure this would get struck down in a hurry if it went before a SCOTUS that wasn't stacked horribly...
Companies like Intuit — which produces TurboTax — and H&R Block, allow most Americans to file for free as long as they earned less than $66,000 for the year. Despite that, most eligible Americans do not take advantage of the free filing, with just 3% filing for free.
This was packaged along with a bunch of positive tax reforms, and Democratic whips pulled everyone in line by convincing them that all of the benefits of the bill weren't worth torpedoing the whole bill over the IRS tax prep thing. This is pretty much "the catch" for the question "what's the catch in that nice tax reforms bill?"
this is why we can't ever move away from a corporate dominated political system, the only time the government does any work is when corporations are the customer.
Why on earth would she vote yes
It's a really small provision of a bill with lots of evidence and she compromised. Given that the IRS already enters info partnerships with private companies to offer free tax software the impact of this "compromise" is negligable for most Americans
Was it a rider?
Turbotax has been free for years now, this doesn't really matter lol.
No I don't think so. This is the text of the relevant part of the bill: SEC. 11202. IRS FREE FILE PROGRAM. (a) In General.— (1) The Secretary of the Treasury, or the Secretary's delegate, shall continue to operate the IRS Free File Program as established by the Internal Revenue Service and published in the Federal Register on November 4, 2002 (67 Fed. Reg. 67247), including any subsequent agreements and governing rules established pursuant thereto. (2) The IRS Free File Program shall continue to provide free commercial-type online individual income tax preparation and electronic filing services to the lowest 70 percent of taxpayers by adjusted gross income. The number of taxpayers eligible to receive such services each year shall be calculated by the Internal Revenue Service annually based on prior year aggregate taxpayer adjusted gross income data. (3) In addition to the services described in paragraph (2), and in the same manner, the IRS Free File Program shall continue to make available to all taxpayers (without regard to income) a basic, online electronic fillable forms utility. (4) The IRS Free File Program shall continue to work cooperatively with the private sector to provide the free individual income tax preparation and the electronic filing services described in paragraphs (2) and (3). (5) The IRS Free File Program shall work cooperatively with State government agencies to enhance and expand the use of the program to provide needed benefits to the taxpayer while reducing the cost of processing returns. (b) Innovations.—The Secretary of the Treasury, or the Secretary's delegate, shall work with the private sector through the IRS Free File Program to identify and implement, consistent with applicable law, innovative new program features to improve and simplify the taxpayer’s experience with completing and filing individual income tax returns through voluntary compliance.
Given that she refused to "compromise" by voting no earlier this year on a bill that would reopen the closed government simply because "it would fund ICE", this seems like a double standard. Either she also supports this, didn't read the whole thing, or is willing to compromise on shit against her ideas.
TurboTax is the company that lobbies the hardest for this. They create a problem (a complex tax system) that they provide a service to fix. A private company should not be substituting the government.
Should also mention this won't affect states, they cannot interfere with/change a state's own taxing systems.
"Free" is a nebulous phrase for tax software too. For the last 3 years, I've used HR Block's free tax prep site, and for the first two every part of it was free. This year I got a little bit of refund, and suddenly it's $30 to submit my State taxes through them. The word FREE was all over everything, until it wasn't.
She probably decided funding ice was worth taking a stance on whereas government made tax software wasn't (keep in mind the government does provide free tax software it's just private made). Do any of us really care about this provision or are we just mad because it sounds bad?
Republicans like Grover Norquist are against making taxes easier because people won't hate easy taxes.
Yeah if all you have is a basic, single 1040 otherwise enjoy paying $60+ to them for their "service". Are you in school? Bam, enjoy paying TurboTax extra because you need to file your 1098-T. Went to school and have loans? File your 1098-E. Invested money for retirement? 1099. etc, etc.
Looks like they got to her. No one can be trusted.
Dude, I don't know what's different for you, but I'm married, have a mortgage, have changed jobs multiple times some years, and I've never, not once payed money for turbo tax. I'm sorry it's not free for you though.
The moment i inputted my 1098-T i had to pay $60 to file my taxes. Last year I didn't and i payed nothing. Oh and it's not really $60 cause you gotta pay an extra $30 fee for payong with your tax return which they mentioned nowhere until I had already payed.
Where do you live? Maybe it's free for me because Texas doesn't have a state income tax. All I file is the Federal stuff.
Florida
It's not free, they take a percentage of your tax return.
Because the status quo Dems corrupted her and now she's a traitor
It's not the end of her career, but the self-proclaimed democratic socialist voting in favour of the big banks over the consumer doesn't bode well for her trust. She will be hearing about this in her next campaign, her opponents are always looking for ammo and she just gave something that they can use to shake her supporter's confidence in her.
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