I volunteer through the IRS-funded program to help low-income people file their taxes.[1] I see a few dozen returns per year, and I don't know how representative they are of the "typical" return.

I would say maybe 30% of them would be done correctly if they were filled out automatically based on what the IRS knows. The great majority involve one or more questions like:

- (Education credit) When did you actually pay the tuition that your school reported to the IRS as "billed"? What kind of degree program are you in?

- (Dependents) Did you provide most of your brother's support for the year?

- (Earned income credit) Is your child a full-time student?

- (Married filing separately) Is your spouse going to itemize deductions this year?

- (Self-employed) What business expenses did you have?

- (Obamacare) What months did you have health insurance for? Do you qualify for any of the exceptions for the individual mandate penalty?

- (Mortgage interest deduction) Was this a home equity loan?

- (Gambling income) Did you have any offsetting losses?

As I said, I don't know how representative my sample is, but based on my own anecdotal experience, I just don't buy that the vast majority of people could have their return correctly prepared by the IRS without a TurboTax-like questionnaire. I would like to see more evidence for that claim.

If we're talking about greatly simplifying the tax code, then that's one thing. Or if we're talking about the IRS developing their own version of TurboTax, fine. But the idea that "the government has everything they need and only lobbying from Intuit is preventing them from just doing your tax return for you" strikes me as highly suspect.

[1] http://www.irs.gov/Individuals/Free-Tax-Return-Preparation-f...