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Intuit asked us to delete part of this Decoder episode

106 points by ossusermivami 2y ago

deleted 2y ago
[deleted]
jitl 2y ago
I would like the government to just send me a bill and/or check by default please. Sure let people get fancy tax preparation services and advice if they’re making millions to do complicated things but honestly it’s so backwards to demand citizens compute their own bill and then penalize them if they get it wrong. Doing your own calculation should be opt-in, not opt-out (via annoying software). Among my tech friends Intuit’s reputation is already mud for standing against human decency on tax filing reform for 30 years, but non-tech-sphere people are always surprised to hear about the Intuit lobbying & deception stuff.
- tombert 2y ago
  I've told this story before here but it's relevant. A few years ago, I filed my taxes and forgot to report some stock sales and therefore some short-term capital gains tax. More than a year after I filed, the IRS sent me a bill for about $8000, $7000 for the unreported capital gains, and a $1000 fine. I wasn't really upset about having to pay the $7000; if I owe the money then I owe the money, fair enough, it was my dumb fault, and I wasn't even that upset about the fine, because again it was my dumb fault. What annoyed me is that if the IRS knows I owe the money better than I do, then why am I involved with this at all? I don't have enough money for the IRS to put a team together or anything elaborate like that, so it was almost certainly an automated program that determined I underpaid. Why not instead just send me a refund and/or bill at the end of the year and have me pay it, instead of having me write down the numbers that they already have, and then they can check to make sure I wrote those numbers down correctly by verifying it against their records. I understand having the option to use complicated tax software for cases where the taxes are complicated, but my taxes really aren't; I have a typical W2 job, a typical mortgage, and very occasionally selling stock, I think in my case the "default" would be fine.
  - DrillShopper 2y ago
    Most places in the US send you a property tax bill with a provision to challenge if you think that it's wrong. I don't understand why the IRS can't do the same.
    - tombert 2y ago
      My property taxes (in NYC) are actually automatically paid as part of my mortgage payment. It requires literally no work on my end. If the IRS already has my stuff, I don't see what TurboTax (and its competitors) is actually doing that's necessary. I'm confident my employer is sending the IRS my W2, ETrade is clearly sending over my stock trading stuff, my bank is probably sending over my mortgage information. As I said, obviously some people are going to have more complicated taxes than the default thing that the IRS has access to, and for that then sure, TurboTax might be useful, but I don't think that's the majority of people.
    - coldpie 2y ago
      They can, if congress passed a law telling them to do so. The IRS isn't the entity preventing this from happening.
      - Suppafly 2y ago
        >They can, if congress passed a law telling them to do so. Louder for the people in the back.
      - DrillShopper 2y ago
        Love living in a broken republic
  - potato3732842 2y ago
    >if the IRS knows I owe the money better than I do, then why am I involved with this at all? Well they made an extra $1k by doing it this way. Maybe if you'd have lawyered up you could have got them down to $500 but the point still stands. Sure, the database and the developers and mailing the letters isn't free but you need to have basically all that overhead regardless of whether they're sending you a bill or a fine. The incentive is there. On top of that, it costs them nothing to make you file your taxes. In fact they probably rake in a whole boat load of money from all the people who report things the IRS didn't know about or didn't have enough sophistication to attribute to them.
- BrandoElFollito 2y ago
  You should not do any calculations. In France I go to the tax web site and they know all of my income. I press ok and I am done. It takes 30 seconds (this was also the ad of the tax service, to do your taxes during a short break). Of you want to go fancy, you have 5 or 6 pages to play with. But this is really uncommon because you were need to have stuff the taxes do not know about.
zoezoezoezoe 2y ago
The grip these tax companies have on the market is insane and needs to be put in check 20 years ago. The lobbying these companies do to keep their only business model alive is outrageous, the tax system right now is unbelievably broken and it's the fault of these tax companies, and the behavior that they allegedly committed that's discussed in this article should put them out of business.
- nashashmi 2y ago
  Do you blame them to fight to survive?
  - instaclay 2y ago
    Of course I do. The fight should be fought within a reasonable expectation that it isn't impeding the progress of mankind. These aren't living entities that I should feel sympathy for after all. The idea that when they cease to exist they have some "death"? They're not people. If something doesn't go well, you don't [usually] die... you go do the next thing. If there's no longer a market for the product, it has no right to continue to exist for the sake of shareholders 'feelings' (read as: investment portfolios)...
    - nashashmi 2y ago
      It is a reasonable expectation. They are fighting to survive. And find time to transition to something else more profitable. A more graceful way is to make the govt data available for import. And then build products around that data. And that gives way to open source solutions in the future. And other projects too.
      - instaclay 2y ago
        It might be an expectation of a corporation to attempt to stay in business. I will concede that. It's harder to say that I can't blame them for doing so in underhanded ways. Expectation and blame are not married. Just yesterday I was in a driving situation in which I lost visual sight of an intersection that is usually very busy (because oncoming cars are pilling up around a 90 degree bend and blocking visual just on the other side of the bend). This is a fairway for me without any traffic signals. While the intersection into the fairway has a stop sign (T style intersection). Because visual was lost, I made the decision to lower my speed considerably in EXPECTATION that a car would enter the roadway dispite not safte to do so. Normal speed for this roadway is 60mph but I lowered to 40mph. I did not hit them because I expected them. I still honked though.
ferfumarma 2y ago
Sasan Goodarzi, CEO of Intuit, seems to not like being on the record about what his company has been doing in Congress. Shouldn't that prompt introspection about what you're doing in Congress, sasan?
beardyw 2y ago
Seems like the Streisand effect.
- ko_pivot 2y ago
  Yeah, I came here to say this. Hard to comprehend how someone could have a comms role at Intuit and not know basic principles like this. Only plausible explanation is that the CEO insisted on taking this approach even after the very likely Streisand effect outcome was explained.
jeffwask 2y ago
For $27 million a year, he should be able to handle a hard question or two.
jerojero 2y ago
I think trying to squeeze journalists is a really bad idea. If you fuck up the best thing to do is just ignore it and pray no one notices. I don't think many readers of this outlet really care all that much about this topic. I mean, international readers don't care about US taxes all that much and generally people don't care. This lobbying is pretty egregious though. But generally lobbying laws in the USA are problematic. In many countries these practices are considered illegal. This, however, has become very much juicy gossip now, so as someone else mentioned. It's going to be the Streisand effect.
- nashadelic 2y ago
  I think the interview itself is fine, their PR person messed up by sending that email and becoming the news story itself, which otherwise was a nothingburger, insert b-player-hire-c-player/founder-mode meme
nashashmi 2y ago
I read the "heated" exchange. And it was heated. But it was more like a reporter grilling the interviewee. "You did xyz. Are you going to do zyx [the opposite]?" And then he calls him to remove this part of the interview. And I don't blame him. The question was effectively are you going to do the opposite of what you have been doing all along. And that is not a fair question. Instead the interviewee pivots to something they have done (making taxes simpler) in similar line to what the question was asking (lobbying gov't to send a pre-prepared tax bill). I think they should have deleted the part of the audio, and simply reported on what occurred. We grilled Sasan on pushing gov't to send people an already prepared tax bill, but he deflected to pushing govt to make taxes simpler.

106 points by ossusermivami 2y ago

deleted 2y ago

[deleted]

jitl 2y ago

I would like the government to just send me a bill and/or check by default please. Sure let people get fancy tax preparation services and advice if they’re making millions to do complicated things but honestly it’s so backwards to demand citizens compute their own bill and then penalize them if they get it wrong. Doing your own calculation should be opt-in, not opt-out (via annoying software). Among my tech friends Intuit’s reputation is already mud for standing against human decency on tax filing reform for 30 years, but non-tech-sphere people are always surprised to hear about the Intuit lobbying & deception stuff.

tombert 2y ago
I've told this story before here but it's relevant. A few years ago, I filed my taxes and forgot to report some stock sales and therefore some short-term capital gains tax. More than a year after I filed, the IRS sent me a bill for about $8000, $7000 for the unreported capital gains, and a $1000 fine. I wasn't really upset about having to pay the $7000; if I owe the money then I owe the money, fair enough, it was my dumb fault, and I wasn't even that upset about the fine, because again it was my dumb fault. What annoyed me is that if the IRS knows I owe the money better than I do, then why am I involved with this at all? I don't have enough money for the IRS to put a team together or anything elaborate like that, so it was almost certainly an automated program that determined I underpaid. Why not instead just send me a refund and/or bill at the end of the year and have me pay it, instead of having me write down the numbers that they already have, and then they can check to make sure I wrote those numbers down correctly by verifying it against their records. I understand having the option to use complicated tax software for cases where the taxes are complicated, but my taxes really aren't; I have a typical W2 job, a typical mortgage, and very occasionally selling stock, I think in my case the "default" would be fine.
- DrillShopper 2y ago
  Most places in the US send you a property tax bill with a provision to challenge if you think that it's wrong. I don't understand why the IRS can't do the same.
  - tombert 2y ago
    My property taxes (in NYC) are actually automatically paid as part of my mortgage payment. It requires literally no work on my end. If the IRS already has my stuff, I don't see what TurboTax (and its competitors) is actually doing that's necessary. I'm confident my employer is sending the IRS my W2, ETrade is clearly sending over my stock trading stuff, my bank is probably sending over my mortgage information. As I said, obviously some people are going to have more complicated taxes than the default thing that the IRS has access to, and for that then sure, TurboTax might be useful, but I don't think that's the majority of people.
  - coldpie 2y ago
    They can, if congress passed a law telling them to do so. The IRS isn't the entity preventing this from happening.
    - Suppafly 2y ago
      >They can, if congress passed a law telling them to do so. Louder for the people in the back.
    - DrillShopper 2y ago
      Love living in a broken republic
- potato3732842 2y ago
  >if the IRS knows I owe the money better than I do, then why am I involved with this at all? Well they made an extra $1k by doing it this way. Maybe if you'd have lawyered up you could have got them down to $500 but the point still stands. Sure, the database and the developers and mailing the letters isn't free but you need to have basically all that overhead regardless of whether they're sending you a bill or a fine. The incentive is there. On top of that, it costs them nothing to make you file your taxes. In fact they probably rake in a whole boat load of money from all the people who report things the IRS didn't know about or didn't have enough sophistication to attribute to them.
BrandoElFollito 2y ago
You should not do any calculations. In France I go to the tax web site and they know all of my income. I press ok and I am done. It takes 30 seconds (this was also the ad of the tax service, to do your taxes during a short break). Of you want to go fancy, you have 5 or 6 pages to play with. But this is really uncommon because you were need to have stuff the taxes do not know about.

zoezoezoezoe 2y ago

The grip these tax companies have on the market is insane and needs to be put in check 20 years ago. The lobbying these companies do to keep their only business model alive is outrageous, the tax system right now is unbelievably broken and it's the fault of these tax companies, and the behavior that they allegedly committed that's discussed in this article should put them out of business.

nashashmi 2y ago
Do you blame them to fight to survive?
- instaclay 2y ago
  Of course I do. The fight should be fought within a reasonable expectation that it isn't impeding the progress of mankind. These aren't living entities that I should feel sympathy for after all. The idea that when they cease to exist they have some "death"? They're not people. If something doesn't go well, you don't [usually] die... you go do the next thing. If there's no longer a market for the product, it has no right to continue to exist for the sake of shareholders 'feelings' (read as: investment portfolios)...
  - nashashmi 2y ago
    It is a reasonable expectation. They are fighting to survive. And find time to transition to something else more profitable. A more graceful way is to make the govt data available for import. And then build products around that data. And that gives way to open source solutions in the future. And other projects too.
    - instaclay 2y ago
      It might be an expectation of a corporation to attempt to stay in business. I will concede that. It's harder to say that I can't blame them for doing so in underhanded ways. Expectation and blame are not married. Just yesterday I was in a driving situation in which I lost visual sight of an intersection that is usually very busy (because oncoming cars are pilling up around a 90 degree bend and blocking visual just on the other side of the bend). This is a fairway for me without any traffic signals. While the intersection into the fairway has a stop sign (T style intersection). Because visual was lost, I made the decision to lower my speed considerably in EXPECTATION that a car would enter the roadway dispite not safte to do so. Normal speed for this roadway is 60mph but I lowered to 40mph. I did not hit them because I expected them. I still honked though.

ferfumarma 2y ago

Sasan Goodarzi, CEO of Intuit, seems to not like being on the record about what his company has been doing in Congress. Shouldn't that prompt introspection about what you're doing in Congress, sasan?

beardyw 2y ago

Seems like the Streisand effect.

ko_pivot 2y ago
Yeah, I came here to say this. Hard to comprehend how someone could have a comms role at Intuit and not know basic principles like this. Only plausible explanation is that the CEO insisted on taking this approach even after the very likely Streisand effect outcome was explained.

jeffwask 2y ago

For $27 million a year, he should be able to handle a hard question or two.

jerojero 2y ago

I think trying to squeeze journalists is a really bad idea. If you fuck up the best thing to do is just ignore it and pray no one notices. I don't think many readers of this outlet really care all that much about this topic. I mean, international readers don't care about US taxes all that much and generally people don't care. This lobbying is pretty egregious though. But generally lobbying laws in the USA are problematic. In many countries these practices are considered illegal. This, however, has become very much juicy gossip now, so as someone else mentioned. It's going to be the Streisand effect.

nashadelic 2y ago
I think the interview itself is fine, their PR person messed up by sending that email and becoming the news story itself, which otherwise was a nothingburger, insert b-player-hire-c-player/founder-mode meme

nashashmi 2y ago

I read the "heated" exchange. And it was heated. But it was more like a reporter grilling the interviewee. "You did xyz. Are you going to do zyx [the opposite]?" And then he calls him to remove this part of the interview. And I don't blame him. The question was effectively are you going to do the opposite of what you have been doing all along. And that is not a fair question. Instead the interviewee pivots to something they have done (making taxes simpler) in similar line to what the question was asking (lobbying gov't to send a pre-prepared tax bill). I think they should have deleted the part of the audio, and simply reported on what occurred. We grilled Sasan on pushing gov't to send people an already prepared tax bill, but he deflected to pushing govt to make taxes simpler.