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> Intuit spent at least $25.6 million since 2006 on lobbying, H&R Block about $9.6 million and the conservative Americans for Tax Reform roughly $3 million. >

> Intuit spent at least $25.6 million since 2006 on lobbying, H&R Block about $9.6 million and the conservative Americans for Tax Reform roughly $3 million. > In contrast, the NAACP has spent $140,000 lobbying on “free-file” since 2006 and Public Citizen has spent $110,000 in the same time frame. With two orders of magnitude of lobbying dollars difference on either side, I'm surprised this is going anywhere. > “An IRS direct-to-e-file system is redundant and will not be free – not free to build, not free to operate, and not free for taxpayers,” Plummer (a spokesman for Intuit) said, adding that it “will unnecessarily cost taxpayers billions of dollars.” Oh, like the system your company built and lobbies for? How do you say stuff like this out loud without your pants bursting into flames on the spot?

andybak 3y ago
Imagine if they spent that money on, you know, making a better product.
- snarf21 3y ago
  But lobbying has such better ROI!! .. We also need lawys from the federal level that all these "known" things must be pushed to the IRS and the state and local use that as their source of information .. Then this software just needs to deal with federal deductions that aren't digital or optional like charity .. We have such a dumb system
- asah 3y ago
  Alas, free would still win enough marketshare for it to make sense to spend on lobbyists to delay this. :-(
- stetrain 3y ago
  They seem to spend all of their money adding fake slow progress bars that advertise their premium version to you.
- lIl-IIIl 3y ago
  They would have a better product, but they'd be out of business since without lobbying against it, the government product would actually be built.
- jfengel 3y ago
  The product is fine. It doesn't really need radical improvements. That money should have been returned to shareholders. What it needs is to not exist. The product does a fine job of doing an unnecessary thing. For the vast majority of users it should be a tax bill or refund check that arrives with no user intervention at all. The remaining use cases should be handled differently -- perhaps by a professional. That professional may themselves want such software, but it's likely a different interaction than software also aimed at users with much simpler use cases.
denimnerd42 3y ago
I'm not arguing one way or another but one point the tax software companies do have is who pays the cost. In the commercial product arena, the products are bought by people who make over median wage. The lower income folks have simpler taxes usually. The free products cover them generally. I may be wrong but that's how I see it. I didn't feel the need to pay for any software until I was making a lot of money (relative to median) and managing a lot of assets.
- rhaway84773 3y ago
  And you pointed out exactly what the problem with the current system is. The rich can pay someone to do the work for them. This saves them time, stress, energy, etc. The poor cannot. They have to do all this themselves and then they’re open to the risk of actually getting something wrong. And the impact of getting something wrong is highly imbalanced. If they get something wrong and end up paying more tax than they need to there will never be a second thought given to it. But if they mess up and pay less taxes than they should they will be hit with a penalty, interest, and even maybe an audit. And the idea that everyone should be reasonably competent in taxes seems a little ridiculous to be honest especially when no one is taught how to do taxes in any point in their lives. An alternative might be to teach how to do taxes in school, but at that point the cost of teaching taxation would far exceed the cost of developing this software, never mind the human hours that are wasted.
  - ndriscoll 3y ago
    > If they get something wrong and end up paying more tax than they need to there will never be a second thought given to it. Anecdotally, I messed up copying tax owed from the table a couple years back, and the IRS sent me a letter telling me I made a mistake and overpaid, along with a check for the difference. In any case, a lot of the complication in the tax code comes down to the government incentivizing certain behaviors, so it makes sense that we should put more focus on teaching people to read the rules and find out what those incentives are. Of course a free calculation tool to run simulations could help people to understand those rules, and we ought to make the actual filing more convenient for everyone.
NikolaNovak 3y ago
It's tricky. I can definitely foresee a future, based on governmental record in publicly-facing IT systems, where every single word of that statement is technically 100% true. First part is all but tautological - Of course it won't s not free to build or operate; and thus it wouldn't be "free for taxpayers" in the most technical sense (this doesn't mean it wouldn't be excellent value or save money overall or even cost more money but save it where it counts). It's the last sentence (unnecessarily cost taxpayers billions) that could go either way. This could in principle end up an efficient and effective, easy to use and helpful well performing system that's a brilliant investment of public money. I hate to say it though, but it's also extremely possible it would cost a lot of money with nobody using it because it sucks. Besides, it feels like in the USA, IT systems are only a part of issue with tax system. Actual tax code and submission options are the bigger part.
- lowercased 3y ago
  We've had the last few years of one party demonizing the IRS, insisting they're "coming after" the little guy. I suspect trust in something like this is already starting on shaky ground before it's even rolled out, which may contribute to "it's such a waste - no one uses it!". Even if a substantial of people that need this the most (people least able to afford any filing fees), this will continue to be fought. :/
- willis936 3y ago
  Just because it's true doesn't fireproof their pants. They already operate a service that is not free to build operate, and we know beyond a shadow of a doubt costs taxpayers needless additional billions of dollars. So then why would the taxpayers not want to invest an alternative that could spend "needless billions" to save additional needless billions?
- theptip 3y ago
  Classic political rhetoric. Who cares about “free”? I’m already paying for TurboTax. This only needs to be cheaper.
  - deleted 3y ago
sitzkrieg 3y ago
im glad these shoe-in clowns are finally having to hopefully complete w fed direct free efiling
clucas 3y ago
>With two orders of magnitude of lobbying dollars difference on either side, I'm surprised this is going anywhere. I think everyone should use this to update their priors on the impact of lobbying. Government action is not contingent on a dollar vs dollar comparison. Citizens United did not result in a raft of unpopular legislation being passed. (Not saying it was the right decision, just that its impact was overstated.) We should all feel heartened that our government is responding to good arguments over lobbying dollars. Another one we should keep fighting on is Right to Repair. John Deere and the like can put as much money into the fight as they want - as long as we have people like Rossman being gadflies, sanity will win. Eventually.
- OkayPhysicist 3y ago
  Frankly, by far the biggest impact of lobbying happens when one side has anything at all, and the other side doesn't. Most lobbying isn't bribery, as much as it is spending money to get create a situation where the politician will listen to you explain your case. When the politician has heard both sides in such a manner, they'll basically vote with their conscience. When only one side has explained their argument, it's a lot easier for the politician to vote with that one.
  - nielsbot 3y ago
    We'd be happy to put lots of money into your reelection campaign if you'll hear us out. e.g. Bribery.
stonemetal12 3y ago
If I were Intuit, I would be spending that on making sure the IRS selected us as the sole provider of their free tax software. Then make sure it's slightly more annoying than using TurboTax so I could get paid twice for the same job.
- LapsangGuzzler 3y ago
  It would be an epic failure if the government issued a tax collection software contract out and didn’t put in some sort of clause preventing intuit from providing a competing service. I have a hard time seeing them do something like that.
daniel-cussen 3y ago
> “will unnecessarily cost taxpayers billions of dollars.” This is undisputably true. H&R Block n Intuit are taxpayers, n free-file will cost them billions of dollars. Being real, online taxes through the SII work great in Chile.
hot_gril 3y ago
It's not a crazy statement. I expect the IRS's system to be worse and more costly than TurboTax on the technical side, at least initially. But it's a step in the eventual right direction; I shouldn't need a third party to pay taxes.
throwawaymobule 3y ago
Are the NAACP/public citizen the highest value lobbyists for this? I would not have guessed, but makes sense reading it.

andybak 3y ago

Imagine if they spent that money on, you know, making a better product.

snarf21 3y ago
But lobbying has such better ROI!! .. We also need lawys from the federal level that all these "known" things must be pushed to the IRS and the state and local use that as their source of information .. Then this software just needs to deal with federal deductions that aren't digital or optional like charity .. We have such a dumb system
asah 3y ago
Alas, free would still win enough marketshare for it to make sense to spend on lobbyists to delay this. :-(
stetrain 3y ago
They seem to spend all of their money adding fake slow progress bars that advertise their premium version to you.
lIl-IIIl 3y ago
They would have a better product, but they'd be out of business since without lobbying against it, the government product would actually be built.
jfengel 3y ago
The product is fine. It doesn't really need radical improvements. That money should have been returned to shareholders. What it needs is to not exist. The product does a fine job of doing an unnecessary thing. For the vast majority of users it should be a tax bill or refund check that arrives with no user intervention at all. The remaining use cases should be handled differently -- perhaps by a professional. That professional may themselves want such software, but it's likely a different interaction than software also aimed at users with much simpler use cases.

denimnerd42 3y ago

I'm not arguing one way or another but one point the tax software companies do have is who pays the cost. In the commercial product arena, the products are bought by people who make over median wage. The lower income folks have simpler taxes usually. The free products cover them generally. I may be wrong but that's how I see it. I didn't feel the need to pay for any software until I was making a lot of money (relative to median) and managing a lot of assets.

rhaway84773 3y ago
And you pointed out exactly what the problem with the current system is. The rich can pay someone to do the work for them. This saves them time, stress, energy, etc. The poor cannot. They have to do all this themselves and then they’re open to the risk of actually getting something wrong. And the impact of getting something wrong is highly imbalanced. If they get something wrong and end up paying more tax than they need to there will never be a second thought given to it. But if they mess up and pay less taxes than they should they will be hit with a penalty, interest, and even maybe an audit. And the idea that everyone should be reasonably competent in taxes seems a little ridiculous to be honest especially when no one is taught how to do taxes in any point in their lives. An alternative might be to teach how to do taxes in school, but at that point the cost of teaching taxation would far exceed the cost of developing this software, never mind the human hours that are wasted.
- ndriscoll 3y ago
  > If they get something wrong and end up paying more tax than they need to there will never be a second thought given to it. Anecdotally, I messed up copying tax owed from the table a couple years back, and the IRS sent me a letter telling me I made a mistake and overpaid, along with a check for the difference. In any case, a lot of the complication in the tax code comes down to the government incentivizing certain behaviors, so it makes sense that we should put more focus on teaching people to read the rules and find out what those incentives are. Of course a free calculation tool to run simulations could help people to understand those rules, and we ought to make the actual filing more convenient for everyone.

NikolaNovak 3y ago

It's tricky. I can definitely foresee a future, based on governmental record in publicly-facing IT systems, where every single word of that statement is technically 100% true. First part is all but tautological - Of course it won't s not free to build or operate; and thus it wouldn't be "free for taxpayers" in the most technical sense (this doesn't mean it wouldn't be excellent value or save money overall or even cost more money but save it where it counts). It's the last sentence (unnecessarily cost taxpayers billions) that could go either way. This could in principle end up an efficient and effective, easy to use and helpful well performing system that's a brilliant investment of public money. I hate to say it though, but it's also extremely possible it would cost a lot of money with nobody using it because it sucks. Besides, it feels like in the USA, IT systems are only a part of issue with tax system. Actual tax code and submission options are the bigger part.

lowercased 3y ago
We've had the last few years of one party demonizing the IRS, insisting they're "coming after" the little guy. I suspect trust in something like this is already starting on shaky ground before it's even rolled out, which may contribute to "it's such a waste - no one uses it!". Even if a substantial of people that need this the most (people least able to afford any filing fees), this will continue to be fought. :/
willis936 3y ago
Just because it's true doesn't fireproof their pants. They already operate a service that is not free to build operate, and we know beyond a shadow of a doubt costs taxpayers needless additional billions of dollars. So then why would the taxpayers not want to invest an alternative that could spend "needless billions" to save additional needless billions?
theptip 3y ago
Classic political rhetoric. Who cares about “free”? I’m already paying for TurboTax. This only needs to be cheaper.
- deleted 3y ago

sitzkrieg 3y ago

im glad these shoe-in clowns are finally having to hopefully complete w fed direct free efiling

clucas 3y ago

>With two orders of magnitude of lobbying dollars difference on either side, I'm surprised this is going anywhere. I think everyone should use this to update their priors on the impact of lobbying. Government action is not contingent on a dollar vs dollar comparison. Citizens United did not result in a raft of unpopular legislation being passed. (Not saying it was the right decision, just that its impact was overstated.) We should all feel heartened that our government is responding to good arguments over lobbying dollars. Another one we should keep fighting on is Right to Repair. John Deere and the like can put as much money into the fight as they want - as long as we have people like Rossman being gadflies, sanity will win. Eventually.

OkayPhysicist 3y ago
Frankly, by far the biggest impact of lobbying happens when one side has anything at all, and the other side doesn't. Most lobbying isn't bribery, as much as it is spending money to get create a situation where the politician will listen to you explain your case. When the politician has heard both sides in such a manner, they'll basically vote with their conscience. When only one side has explained their argument, it's a lot easier for the politician to vote with that one.
- nielsbot 3y ago
  We'd be happy to put lots of money into your reelection campaign if you'll hear us out. e.g. Bribery.

stonemetal12 3y ago

If I were Intuit, I would be spending that on making sure the IRS selected us as the sole provider of their free tax software. Then make sure it's slightly more annoying than using TurboTax so I could get paid twice for the same job.

LapsangGuzzler 3y ago
It would be an epic failure if the government issued a tax collection software contract out and didn’t put in some sort of clause preventing intuit from providing a competing service. I have a hard time seeing them do something like that.

daniel-cussen 3y ago

> “will unnecessarily cost taxpayers billions of dollars.” This is undisputably true. H&R Block n Intuit are taxpayers, n free-file will cost them billions of dollars. Being real, online taxes through the SII work great in Chile.

hot_gril 3y ago

It's not a crazy statement. I expect the IRS's system to be worse and more costly than TurboTax on the technical side, at least initially. But it's a step in the eventual right direction; I shouldn't need a third party to pay taxes.

throwawaymobule 3y ago

Are the NAACP/public citizen the highest value lobbyists for this? I would not have guessed, but makes sense reading it.