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Comment by nerdponx | Hacker News Reader

There's nothing moral about it. The profitability of the tax prep industry depends on taxes being hard to file. Lack of official free e-file is regulatory capture. Any associated blather about making taxes cumbersome to keep people mistrustful of taxes is a fig leaf, as is this case with most "conservative" viewpoints.

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The fact that you need to pay to file taxes it's so distopic that only USA could have invented it

Without evidence that the Trump administration cares about protecting the tax prep industry, this is just a conspiracy theory.

Heck, the Trump admin wants to get rid of income tax entirely, so they're hardly the natural allies of the tax prep industry.

They are because they have an interest in keeping tax filing difficult and unapproachable, to keep public animus against taxes at its maximum. Coincidentally this is 100% in alignment with the tax prep industry whose entire existence is based on products which solve and handle the complicated tax situation.

As he said, conspiracy theory

You're wrong:

https://x.com/elonmusk/status/1888326592096547245

https://x.com/elonmusk/status/1886092387098796499

https://x.com/elonmusk/status/1858872775395426553

https://x.com/elonmusk/status/1873796626223161603

https://x.com/elonmusk/status/1861824194113343870

Reforming the tax code and eliminating loopholes is orthogonal to making it easier to file. Closing loopholes doesn't hurt Intuit and H&R Block.

Simplifying the tax code makes it easier to file.

The 1040 is already really easy to fill out for most people. But you can't just go on the IRS website e-file using the W2 that the IRS already received.

Thought experiment: taxes for everyone are $1 but you have to climb to the top of an icy glacier to place a single dollar bill in a collection box. Is it easy to file these taxes?

No and hence, it wouldn't be considered "simplifying the tax code".

Everyone pays $1 and $1 only is not simple enough? Can’t please some people.

None of those tweets are about tax prep. They are about him personally wanting to pay less taxes.

If Elon wanted he could fund an opensouce alternative to Turbotax.

I am willing to bet 1k that Intuit's 2024 TurboTax Online and other Consumer Group revenue of $4.4 billion will remain above 4B in 2025.

Simplifying the tax code is about tax prep. The simpler the tax code, the simpler to file. Though what you say about him wanting to lower taxes is possibly true, none of those posts are about that.

How so? You don't pay TurboTax per regulation. You pay them a flat fee to file your taxes.

I might buy that line of thinking for a corporation but the direct file program was about individuals. Elon gleefully tweeted about how that had been deleted. That's a direct give away to TurboTax and H&R Block.

I like how the dude you’re replying to is parallelizing being wrong about this in every reply thread.

You're solving the wrong problem.

The issue isn't direct file vs TurboTax.

It's whether most individuals should have to file at all.

A few tweaks around employment income and capital gains, and you can do away with filing altogether for most people.

I am willing to wager that the IRS will continue to exist.

Obviously, but most normal people won't have to interact with them.

I’m not and these tweets aren’t relevant to what I wrote.

Not relevant because you exclude Elon Musk from the "they" who "have interest in keeping tax filing difficult and unapproachable"? Because he is clearly not one of them: "Simplifying the tax code will increase productivity", "Crazy idea: let’s simplify the tax code", "The tax code needs drastic simplification!", etc. And he seems to have quite a bit of influence in the Trump administration.

The people with complicated taxes are rich. Most people have dead simple taxes tax-code wise. W2, standard deduction, dependents, maybe some interest deductions. You’re just being obtuse now. Removing random capital loss carryover loopholes or what have you has nothing to do with mainstream tax prep.

You are the one who said tax that filing was "difficult and unapproachable" for the public. What did you mean by that?

That people don’t know how to do it and thus many pay companies to do it for them. Most of these people’s taxes are extremely simple from a tax code perspective.

If it's simple, why don't most people know how to do it?

Filing is a challenge, and the rules governing what most people pay are simple.

You’re just being obtuse. We can stop now.

The balance of actions taken by the Trump administration suggests it generally is in favor of doing whatever people who suck up enough and donate enough money want.

The history of lobbying on behalf of the tax prep industry is easy enough to find.

Is drawing a line through Trump's well-professed love of sycophants and people who make him money and that lobbying and motivation, to their current actions, so far fetched to you?

I think taking a wait-and-see approach to things like "Trump wants to get rid of income tax entirely" would be wise until we see where the implementation ends up. In the meantime lets talk about what has actually been done to date.

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