5 ms·

Maybe I’m overly cynical, but creating tax returns for everyone for free would prevent the IRS from allowing you to incriminate yourself by mis-filing (intentio

Maybe I’m overly cynical, but creating tax returns for everyone for free would prevent the IRS from allowing you to incriminate yourself by mis-filing (intentionally or not) and then levying huge penalties and interest on you 10 years later. Everyone is hating on TurboTax for making money, but they’re pretending the government tax machine has no such motivation, which simply is not true.

sergiosgc 7y ago
> Maybe I’m overly cynical, but creating tax returns for everyone for free would prevent the IRS from allowing you to incriminate yourself by mis-filing (intentionally or not) and then levying huge penalties and interest on you 10 years later. Many countries pre-fill the tax return, but require the citizen to submit it. The citizen is responsible for the submitted information, not the government.
- adolph 7y ago
  That would expose the level of identity theft that the IRS does nothing about and actively tries to hide by refusing to provide identity theft victims with documentation. https://web.archive.org/web/20161209003500/http://www.ayotte.senate.gov/?p=press_release&id=1971 https://web.archive.org/web/20161209003500/http://www.ayotte...
andykellr 7y ago
They can't levy huge penalties and interest on you 10 years later. Generally they have 3 years or maybe 6 [0]. [0] https://www.americanbar.org/groups/business_law/publications/blt/2017/08/06_wood/ https://www.americanbar.org/groups/business_law/publications...
- chrismeller 7y ago
  Thanks, I know it’s not 10, I just picked a round number because nothing was supposed to be that specific. Don’t be so literal...
  - tasty_freeze 7y ago
    There is a word for what you did: exaggeration. But your exaggeration was small enough that it was believable and thus misleading. Now you are criticizing someone for giving a factual response. Time for some reflection.
    - chrismeller 7y ago
      It’s just sad that you can’t see a difference between an example and an exaggeration. I wasn’t giving tax advice, I was making a point about the IRS penalizing people. The specific amount of time involved could not possibly matter any less... the point is still valid. I’m sure you never round your income down or your donations up and you never, ever! go even a mile over the posted speed limit. I’m glad you can take this as an example of your own self-richeousness. Don’t confuse that with real life.
    - Chris_Chambers 7y ago
      Sure, it’s “exaggeration” if you have no imagination. Maybe someone is hit with penalties 3 or 6 years later, but then they’re consequently permanently flagged to get aggressively audited for the rest of their life and continue to deal with penalties for much longer than 10 years. There’s a word for what you’re doing: Pedantry. There’s also another word for what you’re doing: Bootlicking. The person you’re responding to is gracefully opening the door to questioning authority and you’re not only pushing it closed on his foot on behalf of your masters but you’re doing it for free. People like you are absolute garbage. And your little condescending cherry on top “Time for some reflection” is just nauseating. Maybe it’s time for you to look up some suicide techniques.
      - chrismeller 7y ago
        We aren’t going to get anywhere in this thread, my friend. TurboTax is evil. Ignore the fact that there are a dozen other companies offering the same service and that prices have actually fallen because of that competition. Also no mention of filling out the free 1040 form... that’s too difficult. As if the companies charging you to do that for you just existed because they were forcing people to pay them...
chipotle_coyote 7y ago
Yeah, that's overly cynical. :) If they switched to a pre-filled system, the revenue from penalties would go down, but it's quite likely the amount they would bring in would actually go up, assuming this reduced tax fraud. In 2016, they charged $24.1 billion in penalties -- but they estimate tax fraud cost them around $458 billion. If they lost 90% of the revenue for the penalties but cut the tax fraud even by 25%, they would be way, way ahead.
JamesBarney 7y ago
The government tax machine is in the business of collecting taxes, not running up fines. I've had several interactions where the IRS was totally with in their rights to fine me but they waved each fine because they understood it was unintentional. The only times I've heard of the IRS going after people who unintentionally violated the rules, they were intentionally and obviously violating the spirit of the law but thought they were within the letter and were wrong. In my experience you can make a good faith effort to figure out what your supposed to owe and pay it. In this case the IRS will treat you fairly and waive all types of fines. Or you can try to aggressively avoid taxes that you should owe in spirit. And in this case you have to be damn sure you're within the letter of the law because the IRS will try to hammer you if you color outside the lines. These seem like two fair options to me. And everyone I know who was slammed by the IRS was doing the latter.
pfranz 7y ago
I haven't looked this up, but I'm pretty sure audits are way down. There was a recent an article saying the IRS was focusing on auditing poorer people because it's too expensive to audit rich people. Since their budget is completely separate from tax income (and their budget has consistently been reduced), it was driven by their local incentives even if that means total tax income was way lower.

sergiosgc 7y ago

> Maybe I’m overly cynical, but creating tax returns for everyone for free would prevent the IRS from allowing you to incriminate yourself by mis-filing (intentionally or not) and then levying huge penalties and interest on you 10 years later. Many countries pre-fill the tax return, but require the citizen to submit it. The citizen is responsible for the submitted information, not the government.

adolph 7y ago
That would expose the level of identity theft that the IRS does nothing about and actively tries to hide by refusing to provide identity theft victims with documentation. https://web.archive.org/web/20161209003500/http://www.ayotte.senate.gov/?p=press_release&id=1971 https://web.archive.org/web/20161209003500/http://www.ayotte...

andykellr 7y ago

They can't levy huge penalties and interest on you 10 years later. Generally they have 3 years or maybe 6 [0]. [0] https://www.americanbar.org/groups/business_law/publications/blt/2017/08/06_wood/ https://www.americanbar.org/groups/business_law/publications...

chrismeller 7y ago
Thanks, I know it’s not 10, I just picked a round number because nothing was supposed to be that specific. Don’t be so literal...
- tasty_freeze 7y ago
  There is a word for what you did: exaggeration. But your exaggeration was small enough that it was believable and thus misleading. Now you are criticizing someone for giving a factual response. Time for some reflection.
  - chrismeller 7y ago
    It’s just sad that you can’t see a difference between an example and an exaggeration. I wasn’t giving tax advice, I was making a point about the IRS penalizing people. The specific amount of time involved could not possibly matter any less... the point is still valid. I’m sure you never round your income down or your donations up and you never, ever! go even a mile over the posted speed limit. I’m glad you can take this as an example of your own self-richeousness. Don’t confuse that with real life.
  - Chris_Chambers 7y ago
    Sure, it’s “exaggeration” if you have no imagination. Maybe someone is hit with penalties 3 or 6 years later, but then they’re consequently permanently flagged to get aggressively audited for the rest of their life and continue to deal with penalties for much longer than 10 years. There’s a word for what you’re doing: Pedantry. There’s also another word for what you’re doing: Bootlicking. The person you’re responding to is gracefully opening the door to questioning authority and you’re not only pushing it closed on his foot on behalf of your masters but you’re doing it for free. People like you are absolute garbage. And your little condescending cherry on top “Time for some reflection” is just nauseating. Maybe it’s time for you to look up some suicide techniques.
    - chrismeller 7y ago
      We aren’t going to get anywhere in this thread, my friend. TurboTax is evil. Ignore the fact that there are a dozen other companies offering the same service and that prices have actually fallen because of that competition. Also no mention of filling out the free 1040 form... that’s too difficult. As if the companies charging you to do that for you just existed because they were forcing people to pay them...

chipotle_coyote 7y ago

Yeah, that's overly cynical. :) If they switched to a pre-filled system, the revenue from penalties would go down, but it's quite likely the amount they would bring in would actually go up, assuming this reduced tax fraud. In 2016, they charged $24.1 billion in penalties -- but they estimate tax fraud cost them around $458 billion. If they lost 90% of the revenue for the penalties but cut the tax fraud even by 25%, they would be way, way ahead.

JamesBarney 7y ago

The government tax machine is in the business of collecting taxes, not running up fines. I've had several interactions where the IRS was totally with in their rights to fine me but they waved each fine because they understood it was unintentional. The only times I've heard of the IRS going after people who unintentionally violated the rules, they were intentionally and obviously violating the spirit of the law but thought they were within the letter and were wrong. In my experience you can make a good faith effort to figure out what your supposed to owe and pay it. In this case the IRS will treat you fairly and waive all types of fines. Or you can try to aggressively avoid taxes that you should owe in spirit. And in this case you have to be damn sure you're within the letter of the law because the IRS will try to hammer you if you color outside the lines. These seem like two fair options to me. And everyone I know who was slammed by the IRS was doing the latter.

pfranz 7y ago

I haven't looked this up, but I'm pretty sure audits are way down. There was a recent an article saying the IRS was focusing on auditing poorer people because it's too expensive to audit rich people. Since their budget is completely separate from tax income (and their budget has consistently been reduced), it was driven by their local incentives even if that means total tax income was way lower.