Comment by yunesj | Hacker News Reader

Comment by yunesj | Hacker News Reader

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I didn’t see evidence in the linked article and the cited article therein that Intuit tried to prevent a simplification of the tax code. They just tried to stop the government from trying to build competitor software (partially paid for by Intuit and others in the tax accounting industry). Frankly, it sounds like a PITA to have IRS calculate your taxes with poorly written software, and then have to challenge it.

I think it’s unlikely that Intuit has the power to steer the complexity of the tax code. States like NY and CA, for example, oppose a standardization of tax law for “road warriors” because they make so much money from non-resident workers who step foot in their state.

US tax policy is about 70,000 pages (mostly regulations, bulletins, and case law). And that doesn’t include state and local taxes.

If you stop being an easy case, for example you want to claim FEIE within 5 years of spending > 30 days in the US, then the IRS tells you to get a lawyer to pay for a private letter ruling. This is because, where other countries don’t tax their citizens income worldwide, the US does and then gives a moderate exemption. AFAIK, US tax code complexity dwarfs that of any other country.

I find it hard to believe that it’s TurboTax’s fault, a day after reading about Sen. Warren’s plan for a wealth tax and a $100B to the IRS to help them calculate and enforce it...

> Frankly, it sounds like a PITA to have IRS calculate your taxes with poorly written software, and then have to challenge it.

That's not how the proposed systems work. The proposed system is: gov sends you a notice "here is your filled out tax return based on everything we know about you" and then you look over the return, make any modifications you believe are correct, and send it to them. You're not "challenging" something.

> and then you look over the return, make any modifications you believe are correct, and send it to them

Or more likely, they send you their estimate, based on a tiny fraction of the tax code, you recalculate it from scratch, send it to them, and then they audit you.

Civil disagreements with the IRS start under the assumption that the IRS is correct (e.g., “your cost basis is zero,” or “that wasn’t a valid deduction”), and then you must prove to them that they are wrong.

Again you're describing something very different from what is being suggested - and this is not a weird experimental theory - MANY countries have deeply complex tax codes and have also implemented an auto-file system where LARGE portions of the population can file in minutes due to a pre-filled return.

I've yet to hear any stories where anything like your nightmare scenario has actually happened. Perhaps you would not be part of the group who could rely on a pre-filled return - and you would still have to file manually, but nobody is proposing taking that option away or even making it harder than it already is.

> Many countries have deeply complex tax codes.

Can you give an example of any country whose tax code is more than 70k pages long?

Or a country where it requires, by default, taxes paid on money earned while living oversees, depending on a large number of international treaties, case law, and expensive private letter rulings? Or a country that requires you to file a different tax return in almost every state you step your foot in while working remotely? Or a country that requires you to essentially recalculate taxes on a quarterly basis to determine if you should be fined for underpaying estimated taxes?

> nightmare scenario

That’s not a nightmare scenario. That’s just a standard audit. They assume, e.g., zero coat basis, or residency, or it wasn’t used for business, or ... and you have to prove otherwise.

https://www.vox.com/policy-and-politics/2017/3/29/15109214/t...

> As of 2014, the tax code was only about 2,600 pages long

The usa hardly has a monopoly on tax code complexity. We're talking about personal income tax right now and I can't find a complexity index for that, but for business taxes the usa ranks fairly low on https://www.taxcomplexity.org/

> That’s not a nightmare scenario. That’s just a standard audit.

The "nightmare" scenario was "you recalculate it from scratch, send it to them, and then they audit you." - a scenario you put forward where this improvement to the tax code (auto-filled returns) results in a world where any time your return isn't what they auto-filled you get audited. That sounds bad, but has not happened anywhere where auto-filled returns have been implemented.

> the tax code was only 2,600 pages - Vox

> “a tax practitioner who relies just on the tax statutes will go to jail” - Tax Foundation

https://taxfoundation.org/how-many-words-are-tax-code/

> nightmare scenario has not happened anywhere

I’d be surprised to learn that any country had zero audits, because their file-free tax system worked for everyone. Is that the case anywhere?

Intuit has so little real effect. However it makes for sensationalist reporting and attracts eyes and easily picks up people who want to believe tax law is all the result of corporate greed. Simply put, its too complex for one company to have a significant effect.

Nearly every bill out of Congress can effect tax law and this includes even special appropriation bills; all the covid bills have had tax law changes.

there are some three thousand pages comprising Federal tax law however much of this is additionally subject to various regulations that can affect when and when not a tax takes affect. then throw in every state, city, and more.

To be honest I don't know of a good fix. there are too many forms of income and taxation that Congress would have to reduce the number of definitions for what is income into much simpler categories, say employer paid income, interest, capital gains, money transfers from others, and such, and then macro the rest into miscellaneous subject to a permanent fixed rate.

As in, account for the most common forms of income at a lower rate and they get all those that don't fit that definition and charge it at a higher rate as likely none of these would ever be claimed by the average tax payer.

when it comes to deductions, simply do what the Trump tax change did in 2016 but do it again, raise the standard deduction so that if you are under 250k you never need to itemize.

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