7 ms·

IRS Direct File team disbanded

120 points by elicash 2y ago

toomuchtodo 2y ago
https://archive.today/3vdPN https://archive.today/3vdPN
blueelephanttea 2y ago
How does removing an easy tax filing solution improve government efficiency? It seems like a handout to private tax preparers. I've scanned some of the DOGE stuff and the fact that I have seen pretty much no mention or discussion of the big budget items: social security, military, medicare, and medicaid does not make me optimistic that this is going to do anything about government spending...
- toomuchtodo 2y ago
  Similar ideology to https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Grover_Norquist#Americans_for_Tax_Reform https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Grover_Norquist#Americans_for_... | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Americans_for_Tax_Reform https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Americans_for_Tax_Reform "Taxes are bad. Anything that makes collecting taxes easier or better is bad."
- DevX101 2y ago
  > How does removing an easy tax filing solution improve government efficiency? It doesn't. This is a corporate takeover of key government functions. This is just one small part of the plan. Phase 1, which we're in now is to blame everything on bad governance. Phase 2 is to say: 'business' can fix it and auction off the US government. Schools, the Post Office, Social Security, elements of law enforcement, and much more. Phase 3: Read Balaji's "The Network State". TLDR: It will be to give corporations state power, including but not limited to owning and passing laws on their land, and having their own enforcement police/military.
  - LargoLasskhyfv 2y ago
    So what? Cyberpunk iz da PHUNQ!
- bananapub 2y ago
  > How does removing an easy tax filing solution improve government efficiency? It seems like a handout to private tax preparers. it doesn't, the purpose of DOGE isn't to "improve government efficiency", it's a random company being allowed to take over portions of the actual government. also, killing Direct File is an explicit ask from the H&R Block etc and their lobbyists, since they'll lose business if filing taxes becomes easier. they also oppose any genuine attempt to make the tax system itself more sensible for the same reason.
- red-iron-pine 2y ago
  > It seems like a handout to private tax preparers the entire premise of the Trump administration is to hand out the fed'gov to large companies and the hyper-wealthy. is this really that much of a surprise?
  - deleted 2y ago
    [deleted]
- midnitewarrior 2y ago
  It's not about efficiency, or saving money for taxpayers. It's simply to make government cost less. IRS Direct File saves a lot of people money, just not rich people. If it costs rich people money, they don't want it, regardless of how much money it saves individuals.
- rsynnott 2y ago
  > How does removing an easy tax filing solution improve government efficiency? What makes you think any of this is anything to do with government efficiency. > It seems like a handout to private tax preparers. Yes.
- hnburnsy 2y ago
  >How does removing an easy tax filing solution improve government efficiency? It was not removed.
elicash 2y ago
To be clear, no indication that the program itself has been cut. I tried to be specific in my title that the team was disbanded, not that it's been taken offline. That said, it's clear from this tweet that Musk views this program as a bad one. So I'm definitely concerned a good effort will be lost.
- hnburnsy 2y ago
  The 18F team who works for GSA, is not part of the IRS, and was not the only group that worked on the IRS Direct file program. USDS and Treasury also worked on it.
9283409232 2y ago
I have to imagine Intuit and HR Block paid millions to get this done. You have to be in a cult to in some way align a simple and free way of filing taxes with "far-left" wokeness.
jeffbee 2y ago
The flagged/dead army is out here in full force, but we're watching Elon Musk, Garry Tan who owns this website, YC alumni/notorious sociopaths like Austen Allred, and associates dismantling the government and effectuating, promoting, calling for, cheering a revolution.
- elicash 2y ago
  Wait is THAT why this got taken off the front page? Because it was on there for a couple minutes.
  - PaulHoule 2y ago
    Personally I am inclined to flag any link to X, but especially any link to an Elon Musk post. I'd have no problem with the content if it was in the mainstream media or some kind of analysis on a blog. My own taxes are crazy because my wife runs a riding academy, we have a rental house, etc. My son was a candidate for the 1040EZ back in the day (he only had a W-2) but Direct File was an unmitigated disaster for him last year because he had trouble creating an account, probably because he'd never filed a tax return. While we were on the phone trying to get support (we put it off too long) I was able to download the 1040 and the corresponding form from New York and we filled it out, hung up, and mailed it the next day.
    - elicash 2y ago
      I often find primary sources of news more interesting than analysis that mostly summarizes widely-known facts. Nothing against, say, The Verge -- but their article about this will probably just summarize things folks here already know about the program. I also don't think, for example, linking here is a better experience for HN: https://www.rawstory.com/elon-musk-irs-easy-filing/ https://www.rawstory.com/elon-musk-irs-easy-filing/ or the right wing version: https://nypost.com/2025/02/03/us-news/elon-musk-claims-far-left-tech-team-that-helped-build-elizabeth-warrens-tax-website-has-been-deleted/ https://nypost.com/2025/02/03/us-news/elon-musk-claims-far-l... And with traditional news outlets, sometimes they make it impossible to find the actual primary source because they refuse to hyperlink things (though the Verge is good about that). Then again, if the entire front page were X links, I'd find that less interesting than more thoughtful, longer analysis. So I agree and disagree.
MontgomeryPi2 2y ago
Hopefully doesn't impact eFile/Free File Fillable Forms or it's back to paper returns to the IRS for me vs HR Block
deleted 2y ago
[deleted]
johnneville 2y ago
140,803 taxpayers used it in 2024. "Of the $13.0 million spent on pilot development and implementation, $10.6 million is technology and product development costs and $2.4 million is operational costs (customer service, cloud computing, user authentication, etc.)" "Nearly half of Direct File users reported paying for tax preparation last year, and the Treasury Department estimates that Direct File users saved $5.6 million in tax preparation fees" https://www.gao.gov/products/gao-24-107236 https://www.gao.gov/products/gao-24-107236 https://www.irs.gov/pub/irs-pdf/p5969.pdf https://www.irs.gov/pub/irs-pdf/p5969.pdf edit: this comment had a much different estimate earlier based on a less specific source
- toomuchtodo 2y ago
  It should be expected that the government has a cost to provide for citizens to meet their tax obligations easily, efficiently, and without a private party involved or necessary. https://bsky.app/profile/vermontgmg.bsky.social/post/3lhcg2biqzc2m https://bsky.app/profile/vermontgmg.bsky.social/post/3lhcg2b... > Not for nothing, but Direct File by the IRS was one of the best things the USG has done in years — it allowed millions of Americans to stop paying predatory fees to TurboTax. The literal only people who oppose it are TurboTax lobbyists.
- orionsbelt 2y ago
  I think Direct File is great, but where is the $200 assumption coming from? A lot of the people using direct file (which is quite basic) were probably using free filing solutions or ones much less than $200.
  - johnneville 2y ago
    thanks for the reply. the $200 is a rounding down from $220 for the average fee cost for a 1040 in 2021 according to the national society of accountants. the second link in my earlier comment provides much more direct data, estimating $5.6 million in tax preparation fees saved compared to operation costs of $2.4 million. i've updated my original comment now to remove my personal estimate. $220 source: https://higherlogicdownload.s3.amazonaws.com/NSACCT/725010a8-142f-4092-8b5d-077c2618c728/UploadedImages/Membership/IncomeandFeeSurvey/NSA2020-2021_IncomeandFees_FullStudy.pdf https://higherlogicdownload.s3.amazonaws.com/NSACCT/725010a8...
christophilus 2y ago
Unlike most here, I've been cautiously optimistic about DOGE. I know, I know... But this seems like an absolute mistake, unless the administration really is planning on eliminating the income tax altogether. Filing income taxes in the US is such an enormous waste of time every year, and direct file seemed like we were finally moving in a better direction... sigh
- elicash 2y ago
  What's weird is that there was initial support for the program by DOGE (or at least a similar program) that was expressed shortly after the election: https://www.washingtonpost.com/business/2024/11/19/taxes-irs-musk-ramaswamy/ https://www.washingtonpost.com/business/2024/11/19/taxes-irs... And so having him promote such a negative tweet about the effort just seems out of nowhere.
- mcphage 2y ago
  > Unlike most here, I've been cautiously optimistic about DOGE. I know, I know... But this seems like an absolute mistake Well, now you know why most here are not cautiously optimistic about DOGE. Welcome to the club.
  - dhdjruf 2y ago
    The I will write spurious comments without fully understanding the situation club? How many people here think they could write a direct tax filing program that doesn't cost 10+ million dollars? What I would like from the comment sectection is how would you implement this system more effectively not a bunch of NPC elon bad comments. What's the purpose of these whining comments? When will chatgpt replace these people or has that already occurred?
  - christophilus 2y ago
    Time will tell. There are plenty of reasons to be skeptical of DOGE, and I was well aware of those reasons prior to this action. I think most people agree that fat needs to be trimmed; we disagree about how the trimming should happen. All the hand wringing and gnashing of teeth seemed (and still seems) to me to be overblown, but we will see.
belter 2y ago
https://www.warren.senate.gov/imo/media/doc/final_-_rm_warren_letter_to_bessent_re_treasury_payment_system.pdf https://www.warren.senate.gov/imo/media/doc/final_-_rm_warre...
- Blackcatmaxy 2y ago
  Where is a good place to be reading more about how congress is actually reacting to the actions of Trump and co right now?
danso 2y ago
FYI the issue of free tax filing — including opposing TurboTax's lobbying efforts to kill it — has been a fairly popular topic on HN, to the tune of thousands of upvotes over the years: https://hn.algolia.com/?dateRange=all&page=0&prefix=false&query=turbotax&sort=byPopularity&type=story https://hn.algolia.com/?dateRange=all&page=0&prefix=false&qu...
neilpointer 2y ago
I think it's really creepy and sad that this guy uses language like "This group has been deleted" when he's talking about people and not rows in a database.
- blooalien 2y ago
  In the minds of people like Musk, people are less valuable than rows of data in a database.
johnea 2y ago
Careful with that ax Eugene...
hnburnsy 2y ago
The actual story is that Musk claims he deleted a group (18F) that assisted the IRS (among others) with the creation of the tax filing program. The group is (was) part of GSA.
e8wyohf 2y ago
Direct File is still fully functional and supported for use in 25 states this year. Even if it were removed in the near future, as long as it's up, you can be confident that your tax info will be handled properly, as it uses the same interface for tax submissions as all the existing third party tax filing software. -- DF engineer

120 points by elicash 2y ago

https://archive.today/3vdPN https://archive.today/3vdPN

How does removing an easy tax filing solution improve government efficiency? It seems like a handout to private tax preparers. I've scanned some of the DOGE stuff and the fact that I have seen pretty much no mention or discussion of the big budget items: social security, military, medicare, and medicaid does not make me optimistic that this is going to do anything about government spending...

toomuchtodo 2y ago
Similar ideology to https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Grover_Norquist#Americans_for_Tax_Reform https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Grover_Norquist#Americans_for_... | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Americans_for_Tax_Reform https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Americans_for_Tax_Reform "Taxes are bad. Anything that makes collecting taxes easier or better is bad."
DevX101 2y ago
> How does removing an easy tax filing solution improve government efficiency? It doesn't. This is a corporate takeover of key government functions. This is just one small part of the plan. Phase 1, which we're in now is to blame everything on bad governance. Phase 2 is to say: 'business' can fix it and auction off the US government. Schools, the Post Office, Social Security, elements of law enforcement, and much more. Phase 3: Read Balaji's "The Network State". TLDR: It will be to give corporations state power, including but not limited to owning and passing laws on their land, and having their own enforcement police/military.
- LargoLasskhyfv 2y ago
  So what? Cyberpunk iz da PHUNQ!
bananapub 2y ago
> How does removing an easy tax filing solution improve government efficiency? It seems like a handout to private tax preparers. it doesn't, the purpose of DOGE isn't to "improve government efficiency", it's a random company being allowed to take over portions of the actual government. also, killing Direct File is an explicit ask from the H&R Block etc and their lobbyists, since they'll lose business if filing taxes becomes easier. they also oppose any genuine attempt to make the tax system itself more sensible for the same reason.
red-iron-pine 2y ago
> It seems like a handout to private tax preparers the entire premise of the Trump administration is to hand out the fed'gov to large companies and the hyper-wealthy. is this really that much of a surprise?
- deleted 2y ago
  [deleted]
midnitewarrior 2y ago
It's not about efficiency, or saving money for taxpayers. It's simply to make government cost less. IRS Direct File saves a lot of people money, just not rich people. If it costs rich people money, they don't want it, regardless of how much money it saves individuals.
rsynnott 2y ago
> How does removing an easy tax filing solution improve government efficiency? What makes you think any of this is anything to do with government efficiency. > It seems like a handout to private tax preparers. Yes.
hnburnsy 2y ago
>How does removing an easy tax filing solution improve government efficiency? It was not removed.

elicash 2y ago

To be clear, no indication that the program itself has been cut. I tried to be specific in my title that the team was disbanded, not that it's been taken offline. That said, it's clear from this tweet that Musk views this program as a bad one. So I'm definitely concerned a good effort will be lost.

hnburnsy 2y ago
The 18F team who works for GSA, is not part of the IRS, and was not the only group that worked on the IRS Direct file program. USDS and Treasury also worked on it.

9283409232 2y ago

I have to imagine Intuit and HR Block paid millions to get this done. You have to be in a cult to in some way align a simple and free way of filing taxes with "far-left" wokeness.

jeffbee 2y ago

The flagged/dead army is out here in full force, but we're watching Elon Musk, Garry Tan who owns this website, YC alumni/notorious sociopaths like Austen Allred, and associates dismantling the government and effectuating, promoting, calling for, cheering a revolution.

elicash 2y ago
Wait is THAT why this got taken off the front page? Because it was on there for a couple minutes.
- PaulHoule 2y ago
  Personally I am inclined to flag any link to X, but especially any link to an Elon Musk post. I'd have no problem with the content if it was in the mainstream media or some kind of analysis on a blog. My own taxes are crazy because my wife runs a riding academy, we have a rental house, etc. My son was a candidate for the 1040EZ back in the day (he only had a W-2) but Direct File was an unmitigated disaster for him last year because he had trouble creating an account, probably because he'd never filed a tax return. While we were on the phone trying to get support (we put it off too long) I was able to download the 1040 and the corresponding form from New York and we filled it out, hung up, and mailed it the next day.
  - elicash 2y ago
    I often find primary sources of news more interesting than analysis that mostly summarizes widely-known facts. Nothing against, say, The Verge -- but their article about this will probably just summarize things folks here already know about the program. I also don't think, for example, linking here is a better experience for HN: https://www.rawstory.com/elon-musk-irs-easy-filing/ https://www.rawstory.com/elon-musk-irs-easy-filing/ or the right wing version: https://nypost.com/2025/02/03/us-news/elon-musk-claims-far-left-tech-team-that-helped-build-elizabeth-warrens-tax-website-has-been-deleted/ https://nypost.com/2025/02/03/us-news/elon-musk-claims-far-l... And with traditional news outlets, sometimes they make it impossible to find the actual primary source because they refuse to hyperlink things (though the Verge is good about that). Then again, if the entire front page were X links, I'd find that less interesting than more thoughtful, longer analysis. So I agree and disagree.

MontgomeryPi2 2y ago

Hopefully doesn't impact eFile/Free File Fillable Forms or it's back to paper returns to the IRS for me vs HR Block

deleted 2y ago

[deleted]

johnneville 2y ago

140,803 taxpayers used it in 2024. "Of the $13.0 million spent on pilot development and implementation, $10.6 million is technology and product development costs and $2.4 million is operational costs (customer service, cloud computing, user authentication, etc.)" "Nearly half of Direct File users reported paying for tax preparation last year, and the Treasury Department estimates that Direct File users saved $5.6 million in tax preparation fees" https://www.gao.gov/products/gao-24-107236 https://www.gao.gov/products/gao-24-107236 https://www.irs.gov/pub/irs-pdf/p5969.pdf https://www.irs.gov/pub/irs-pdf/p5969.pdf edit: this comment had a much different estimate earlier based on a less specific source

toomuchtodo 2y ago
It should be expected that the government has a cost to provide for citizens to meet their tax obligations easily, efficiently, and without a private party involved or necessary. https://bsky.app/profile/vermontgmg.bsky.social/post/3lhcg2biqzc2m https://bsky.app/profile/vermontgmg.bsky.social/post/3lhcg2b... > Not for nothing, but Direct File by the IRS was one of the best things the USG has done in years — it allowed millions of Americans to stop paying predatory fees to TurboTax. The literal only people who oppose it are TurboTax lobbyists.
orionsbelt 2y ago
I think Direct File is great, but where is the $200 assumption coming from? A lot of the people using direct file (which is quite basic) were probably using free filing solutions or ones much less than $200.
- johnneville 2y ago
  thanks for the reply. the $200 is a rounding down from $220 for the average fee cost for a 1040 in 2021 according to the national society of accountants. the second link in my earlier comment provides much more direct data, estimating $5.6 million in tax preparation fees saved compared to operation costs of $2.4 million. i've updated my original comment now to remove my personal estimate. $220 source: https://higherlogicdownload.s3.amazonaws.com/NSACCT/725010a8-142f-4092-8b5d-077c2618c728/UploadedImages/Membership/IncomeandFeeSurvey/NSA2020-2021_IncomeandFees_FullStudy.pdf https://higherlogicdownload.s3.amazonaws.com/NSACCT/725010a8...

christophilus 2y ago

Unlike most here, I've been cautiously optimistic about DOGE. I know, I know... But this seems like an absolute mistake, unless the administration really is planning on eliminating the income tax altogether. Filing income taxes in the US is such an enormous waste of time every year, and direct file seemed like we were finally moving in a better direction... sigh

elicash 2y ago
What's weird is that there was initial support for the program by DOGE (or at least a similar program) that was expressed shortly after the election: https://www.washingtonpost.com/business/2024/11/19/taxes-irs-musk-ramaswamy/ https://www.washingtonpost.com/business/2024/11/19/taxes-irs... And so having him promote such a negative tweet about the effort just seems out of nowhere.
mcphage 2y ago
> Unlike most here, I've been cautiously optimistic about DOGE. I know, I know... But this seems like an absolute mistake Well, now you know why most here are not cautiously optimistic about DOGE. Welcome to the club.
- dhdjruf 2y ago
  The I will write spurious comments without fully understanding the situation club? How many people here think they could write a direct tax filing program that doesn't cost 10+ million dollars? What I would like from the comment sectection is how would you implement this system more effectively not a bunch of NPC elon bad comments. What's the purpose of these whining comments? When will chatgpt replace these people or has that already occurred?
- christophilus 2y ago
  Time will tell. There are plenty of reasons to be skeptical of DOGE, and I was well aware of those reasons prior to this action. I think most people agree that fat needs to be trimmed; we disagree about how the trimming should happen. All the hand wringing and gnashing of teeth seemed (and still seems) to me to be overblown, but we will see.

belter 2y ago

https://www.warren.senate.gov/imo/media/doc/final_-_rm_warren_letter_to_bessent_re_treasury_payment_system.pdf https://www.warren.senate.gov/imo/media/doc/final_-_rm_warre...

Blackcatmaxy 2y ago
Where is a good place to be reading more about how congress is actually reacting to the actions of Trump and co right now?

danso 2y ago

FYI the issue of free tax filing — including opposing TurboTax's lobbying efforts to kill it — has been a fairly popular topic on HN, to the tune of thousands of upvotes over the years: https://hn.algolia.com/?dateRange=all&page=0&prefix=false&query=turbotax&sort=byPopularity&type=story https://hn.algolia.com/?dateRange=all&page=0&prefix=false&qu...

neilpointer 2y ago

I think it's really creepy and sad that this guy uses language like "This group has been deleted" when he's talking about people and not rows in a database.

blooalien 2y ago
In the minds of people like Musk, people are less valuable than rows of data in a database.

johnea 2y ago

Careful with that ax Eugene...

hnburnsy 2y ago

The actual story is that Musk claims he deleted a group (18F) that assisted the IRS (among others) with the creation of the tax filing program. The group is (was) part of GSA.

e8wyohf 2y ago

Direct File is still fully functional and supported for use in 25 states this year. Even if it were removed in the near future, as long as it's up, you can be confident that your tax info will be handled properly, as it uses the same interface for tax submissions as all the existing third party tax filing software. -- DF engineer