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Mostly because no one has done it yet, and congressmen are much more open to corporate lobbying and serving elite and business interests than they are intereste
by x5n1 11y ago
Mostly because no one has done it yet, and congressmen are much more open to corporate lobbying and serving elite and business interests than they are interested in serving the people, mostly because the government wants taxes. Taxes come from business, and business often comes from making things that should be easier harder. In a world of perfect competition everything would cost next to nothing and profits would be non-existing. The world would be at equilibrium. Lots of business is about making sure the world never gets to that state so the game can go on.
- tptacek 11y agoIt is certainly not the case that conservatives, who make up roughly half the government and who apparently constitute the bulk of opposition to return-free filing, want more taxes. The belief that Americans are over-taxed defines almost half of American conservative ideology.
- x5n1 11y agoThere is wanting taxes, and then there is wanting taxes. One is the tax rate, and other is how much business is done. The logic goes that if the government generates more jobs through lower business tax then they can get more revenue from the income tax. I guess I should restate and say that the government wants more revenue, whichever way it comes in and is more amenable to policies that produces more revenue for itself and for business in the country.
- tptacek 11y agoOk, I'm being repetitive but also trying to simplify: Conservatives make up the core opposition to return-free filing. Conservatives definitionally do not want more taxation, or complicated taxation. So I'm not sure the notion that Intuit's lobbying has killed return-free filing holds up.
- makomk 11y agoConservatives want lower tax rates. One common conservative argument is that if you tax less, businesses will expand more and you may even make more in taxes overall.
- tptacek 11y agoThat's valid, but the nuance I left out of my comment was the common conservative belief that the government is simply too big, and that by cutting taxes, we can starve it back to an appropriate size. Many conservatives would not be happy with a more efficient mechanism to generate the same revenue we get today.
- jellicle 11y ago> complicated taxation Of course they do. Making something more burdensome makes it easier to attack politically. The Republican ideal tax return would be 796 pages long. "Tax returns too long? Vote Republican! We'll cut taxes on the rich!"