Seems appropriate today...
cross-posted from: https://yall.theatl.social/post/2382939
I never understood why there wasn't a federal web site where you input your gross based on W2. Then check off boxes for special deductions like kids. And wamo here's what you owe. But if our tax system was simple and stupid than thousands of people at IRS wouldn't have jobs. Too bad. Let them find other jobs.
“thousands of people at IRS wouldn’t have jobs”
or they could start going after the actual tax cheats (wealthy and corporations) instead of hassling regular workers barely scraping by
The IRS is (supposedly) under funded. That's (supposedly) why they can't actually go after the rich people and business. They can't afford the legal fees.
The reason there's no federals site is corporate lobbying. You see if there was federal site, business like Turbo Tax and HR Block would fail. They convinced the government "let us take care of the online platform", the gov said "okay, but as long as you make a free service for low income people".
Then the corps branded the free version a different name, burried it and advertised the paid one. Then they filled the service with all kinds of dark patterns to get people to pay for crap they don't need. Government hasn't done anything about it.
I had to decline "upgrading" to a paid tier 6 times while filing NY taxes through HR Block this year.
Try freetaxusa.com the only fee I've ever been charged is $15 to file state taxes. Fed is free.